front page idea

[Deb Goodkin]

Murray Stokely wrote:
> On 11/19/07, Deb Goodkin <deb at freebsd.org> wrote:
>> Here's some history for the request. We have a marketing team helping
>> us, from a company who has benefited from using FreeBSD. They have
>> offered their services to help us better market ourselves for
>> fundraising purposes. They looked at the project's website and said it
>> was confusing on how to donate. They also said there was no correlation
>> between donating and clicking on the foundation button. A person looking
>> to donate might not know what the foundation link means.
> 
> Yes, I agree.
> 
>> They had suggested to either add a "Donate to the Foundation" or "Keep
>> FreeBSD Free" button in a prominent spot on each page of the project.
>> That would also create a connection between the two entities.
>> Especially, since our whole mission is to support the project. We are
>> going to add a section on our website that answers the questions:
> 
> I think we could add a button with one of those two slogans to the
> bottom of all the second level pages.  To the right of the copyright
> information, right-justified.  I think that would look nice and
> provide additional links and fundraising visibility.  Do you have any
> such graphical buttons created?
We can create a button like the one we currently have on our website. We 
just need to decide which message to use.

> 
>> Why is FreeBSD free? or
>> Why do we want to keep FreeBSD free?
>> Why is this so important?
>> What happens if FreeBSD isn't free?
>> What happens if it goes away?
>>
>> This will then tie into why donate to the foundation. We would love to
>> have both, the donate button and the foundation link. But, if we had a
>> choice of only one, I'd choose a donate button that linked to our donate
>> page.
> 
> On second look there are actually already two links on the front page
> to the foundation.  One in the title nav bar and one in the footer for
> the copyright information.  Should we change the title navbar to say
> "Donate" instead of "Foundation" on both the front and second level
> pages?  Or should we just leave it as "Foundation" but also add a
> "Donate to the Foundation" button on all the second level pages in the
> footer, right-justified as described above?

I don't think we should change the navbar to say "Donate", because you 
have a donate link on the upper right already and that would be 
confusing. But, what I'm hoping is that you'd add this button we're 
talking about, either to the header or somewhere on the top right of 
each page. Or, at a minimum on the homepage. Adding it to the top makes 
it more significant. On the bottom, people might not even see it. And, 
it just seems like it would be less effective there. We have our donate 
button in our header, so it shows up on every page.

> 
> There could also be additional places to add links ot the foundation,
> such as in the Newbies page linked from the main page.  We could add
> some information there about how donations help development.

That couldn't hurt. :-)

> 
> I also think a newsflash entry whenever you reach a fundraising goal
> or set a fundraising goal would be appropriate.  You can just send
> text to freebsd-www@ or freebsd-doc@ or one of us personally to add
> the notice.

I think this is a great idea! I should have done this at the end of the 
auction. I will definitely do this after the Thanksgiving holiday, when 
people are thinking about gifts and DONATIONS.

Thanks,
Deb

> 
>           - Murray
>