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WordPress.org

The Global WordPress Marketing Team markets WordPress and its community to the wider world.

Read more about our team and how to get involved.

Join us!

Come hang out with us in the #marketing channel on Slack. And (or) join us at our next Weekly Marketing Chat at Wednesday, February 12, 2020 at 03:00 PM UTC .

#showcase

Make WordPress.org Marketing

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webcommsat AbhaNonStopNewsUK 10:46 am on January 29, 2020

Global Marketing Team Notes 22 January 2020

These notes focus on key items from the meeting and to assist with asynchronous contribution to the Global Marketing Team. For those unable to attend a meeting due to timezone issues, please do join the discussion threads and tasks on Trello after the meeting and send your updates.

The meeting discussions on Slack can be found at: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C0GKJ7TFA/p1579705290124300

Attended: @harryjackson1221, @michellefrechette, @simonasNaudzius, @darls, @timbb, @Fayazgabol, @OGlekler, @nullbyte, @mta1, @passioniate, @maedahbatool, @carike, @megphillips91, @siobhanseija, @kashifgabol, @sharaz, @JillianMaxwell , @adityakane, @webcommsat.
If you have contributed to the meeting and we do not have your WordPress.org ID please contact the notetaker for the day.

Welcome to new contributors joining today @sharaz and @JillianMaxwell

Notetaker: @JillianMaxwell

New Contributors

Provide a list of new members joining us today.

Successes of Past Week (WordPress Wins)

Project: WordPress Showcase 

Task lead: @harryjackson1221

Trello Card: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/wQJwSmfT 

Update

  1. Great meetings on the Showcase work during this past week. Thanks to everyone.
  2. Summary can be found via the P2 Post http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://make.wordpress.org/marketing 
  3. Next Steps: Comments from P2 posts will be used to encourage contributions from everyone, and figure out how to best move forward.

Project: Proposed 2020 Content Marketing 

Task lead: @Megphillips91

Update (More on this task in the projects section of the notes)

  1. Personas and Journey Mapping meeting with Cathi Bosco from WordPress Governance Project planned for next week. 
  2. 91 topic suggestions for a proposed 2020 content marketing strategy. @Carike is managing the spreadsheet and tracking the status. 

Project and Task Updates

Summarize any updates from Task Leads that are discussed here.

Project: proposed Content Marketing Plan

Task lead: @MegPhillips91 

Trello Card: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/AxoJHcsM  

Topics

  1. Sign up to attend the Personas Meeting with Cathi Bosco (Now Scheduled for Wednesday 29 Jan 2020, 14:00-15:00 UTC) 
  2. Example of Content Planning/Audit tool added to the Marketing Google Drive. The tool helps set measurable goals, buyer personas, buyer journeys content ideas, and content schedule. Used to plan before implementing or creating content. 
  3. Prospective channels and how to take this forward are being discussed. Meg, Yvette, Abha and others to meet to explore this further In the next few weeks.
  4. Content Planning tool may be helpful in the pitch and development of this proposal, showing the structure, goal and required work needed to complete the proposed goals.

Scheduling Doodle poll for meeting on personas and journey from the experience of the WordPress Governance Project http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://doodle.com/poll/58z6xa86xu5gvytq 

Content Topics Suggestions: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yHPXIYazN8hu7hIVhtHaJuOuq0jGiBGd1iVvEeoR1Iw/edit#gid=329469429 

Content Planning/Audit Tool: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dxmWW2zvnKWH54hrtMkcyKVQZ3VTN8-Q/edit#gid=1394574761  

[Note: this is in development and proposal stage, and will come back to the Marketing Team as a more in-depth proposal before it is taken out for wider consultation. Thanks to Meg for leading on developing this task and encouraging contributions from the marketing team. ]

New Business

Topic: Discuss the overlap between goals of the showcase and the proposed content marketing plan

Question: How do these work together towards the same goals?

  1. Showcase End Goal: Real-world examples of solving problems businesses run into using WordPress. 
  2. Proposed Content Marketing Strategy: wider reach potentially. Showcase is a subset of the overall WordPress strategy. 
  3. Not competing initiatives – rather complement each other. 

Background note: The Showcase is an existing project which has been through the process and project as a whole including resourcing. It is a main feature of the WordPress.org.

Topic: WordCamp Vienna 

Question: Who will be attending the Contributor Day from the Marketing Team?

  • @nullbyte and @OGlekler will be attending the event. Further information has been requested from WordCamp Vienna and the German speaking marketing team on what they have prepared.
  • A request for what may be needed and examples of suggested tasks have been sent in December to WordCamp Vienna via the Contributor Events marketing sub group. The take up will depend on The camp’s plans and resources available as with all camps, and as many attendees are expected to be German speaking, any plans by the German speaking marketing team.

Topic: WordCamp Asia 

Question: Who will be attending from the Marketing Team?

Request: @adityakane from the Community Team

Call For Contributors: @harryjackson1221Currently looking for contributors to help or take part on the contributor day. Please note, you will need a Contributor Day ticket.

Next Steps: @harryjackson1221 and @webcommsat to talk about incorporating the work on contributing events marketing sub group and linking in with WCEU. TGhere will be multiple languages to be considered for WordCamp Asia.

Next meeting

Wednesday 29 January 2020, 15:00 UTC, in the Marketing Channel Slack.

Thank you everyone who has joined, attended and updated the meeting, or contributed asynchronously in the last few days.

#showcase

webcommsat AbhaNonStopNewsUK 10:03 am on January 29, 2020

Marketing Team meeting 17 January 2020

Re-post.

Welcome to the Make WordPress Marketing Team meeting. This note captures the key areas from the meeting and asynchronous discussion to assist others in taking part and contribution on marketing from other teams.
Full Slack meeting link: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C0GKJ7TFA/p1579100431150100

Notetaker: @webcommsat

Attendance: @siobhanseija, @harryjackson1221, @webcommsat, @maedahbatool, @jonoaldersonwp, @oglekler, @darls, @simonasn, @megphillips91, @passoniate, @nullbyte, @antialiasfactory, @mta1, @simonasn, @carike, @kashifgabol
If you attended or contributed to this meeting asynchronously and are not listed above with your WordPress.org ID, please contact @webcommsat or @yvettesonneveld so we can update this list. We ask members to please add their WordPress.org ID if it is different to their Slack ID into the attendance thread or at the start of any task update during the meeting as finding the correct WordPress ID can be difficult and time consuming. Thanks everyone for your help with this.

1) Google document tips to help with onboarding

Introduction to task

@webcommsat from the WCEU 2020 Contributing Team and lead of contributing events marketing sub group.

Aim of the task

What we are looking for is input/ examples / FAQs on using Google Docs to help new contributors at WCEU and reduce barriers to contributing. These guides will be able to be updated and translated through a process on GitHub by other WordCamps and the wider WordPress community. This new facility in a WordPress area on GitHub has been recently agreed. Thanks to @chanthaboune and Francesca Marano, Tammie Lister for this, and to everyone who inputted on this in the contributing events marketing sub group meetings.

Who can contribute and how?

  • How? Add comments to the Trello board, add ideas to the card or the DM @webcommsat http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/I62iDEJO
  • Who? Everyone in the marketing or community team who uses Google documents and sheets for the WordPress project is welcome to contribute to this task.
  • Helping people with using Google Docs is an important part of our onboarding and working on tasks.
  • If you are new to using Google Docs and have questions about how to use it for WordPress collaboration or are an experienced Google Doc collaborator from other environments and have tips which could be shared to help people get started, we would value your input.
  • This may be a potential task for someone new to the marketing team. We will also need to help test the information we produce and translate it.

Questions on using Google Documents

  • What documentation is needed to help new contributors use Google Docs to collaborate on blogs or notes?
  • What are the typical questions we hear from new contributors at events or in meetings as they start to get involved?
  • Do you have any examples with optional screenshots of problems you have found or tips for using Google Docs collaboratively?
  • Are there any examples which can help others unfamiliar with using Google Documents in this kind of collaboration, for example, adding comments, signing in, using suggestion mode?
  • From your experience of collaborating on documents in the marketing team, have you had any specific difficulties or found solutions which can be shared?

Some of the issues and questions highlighted by marketing team members:

  • how to sign-in to a document to help task leads or other collaborators interact with you or ask a follow up question
  • how to set up a document in the right location, that is, WordPress marketing folder (for us) or how to check where it is being stored (so that it is in the right team folder)
  • what it means to edit in suggestion mode and how do you check you are doing this
  • how to check your spelling when you add your comment or draft a document
  • how to make a suggestion in wording that can be accepted rather than someone having to retype it
  • how to make a suggestion in wording that can be accepted rather than someone having to retype it
  • is there a way of reading and responding to each comment individually within a Google document without all the other comments on the same or adjoining text appearing. This can make it difficult to get a sense of the sentence and comment in question and the whole piece. It can also cause confusion in following the comments. Any input into helping with this query is particularly welcome as it has been regularly raised by members during onboarding, when contributors first start working on a document, and task leads. It has also been highlighted by a few members as causing an accessibility barrier.
  • do you have any other suggestions or examples? All welcome.

Why do we use free and widely available or open source tools?

Why don’t we use tools like Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel or one of the proprietary content specific collaboration tools which can have more features, audit functions etc?

  • Tools like Google Documents and Sheets are used to help with access, ease of translation, and to avoid cost being a barrier to contribution to this open source project. Through improving how we use and the support we can provide on Google tools, the marketing and other teams hope to get more use out of its functions, and avoid some of the problems with lost text, follow-up discussion with collaborators, improve the contribution process for a document.
  • If others know of other open source tools which we could also be used, please do share this with the team.
  • If we can help answer the questions new contributors and task leads have when dealing with Google Documents, it can be more positive for how we collaborate together and reduce some of the barriers we know members have experienced.

2) Contributor events marketing group

Ongoing discussion: Contributor events ideas for onboarding

  • Encourage contributor events to publish agenda with more detail before the event, where known.
  • WordCamp teams and Make WordPress teams try to prepare subjects beforehand, but it proves hard. Sometimes what can be used at an event will depend on who joins the table and what communications can be done with attendees before the event to help with preparation and encourage set up of tools, the bringing of equipment, multi-language support and extra support for new contributors. As part of the preparation, we need to prepare a mixture of tasks, ranging from something for writers to those who want to contribute to idea creation or review.
  • Onboarding takes a significant amount of time at contributor events and this can affect who is available to support other tasks on the day. We are working in the group and with the team reps on continuing to improve onboarding.
  • Contributor Day meetings differ between WordCamps and what resources they have, the experienced contributors that are available to assist others on the day, and the language support that may be needed.
  • We have a contributor event marketing group which is working with other teams on ways of helping camps put on contributor events and work with the teams on materials. There’s been a lot of progress on this and with the agreement for using GitHub initially for onboarding materials, this will also help.  The community team is also reviewing some documents, and some work with other teams on finding ways of listing events. 
  • The WCEU Contributing Team is also working on even more ways to support contributors this year and sharing from the experience of WCUS and others.

The WCEU contributing team is working on collaboratively producing guides to help new contributors including those new to teams that use Google Docs, Trello, GitHub and other tools. Many camps have an onboarding stream or dedicated table which also helps people coming for the first time.

Reply to questions to encourage members to support the work the team does at Contributor Days

  • Single day events which are part of a WordCamp have their own ticket booking process and are often at different venues to the main conference. These tickets may not be released at the same time as the main WordCamp ticket. They are only available to those who also book for a WordCamp ticket.
  • There are also some standalone contributor days which are not linked to a WordCamp. They are great places to get involved and meet other contributors.
  • We have a planning process for materials and tasks at contributor events we are able to support. We are also working with other teams and WCEU on onboarding materials which will be held in a central repository on GitHub. Link with @webcommsat and @yvettesonneveld if you are planning to attend a forthcoming event and may be able to assist. There are also opportunities to support the group working on contributor events marketing including for members who have multi-language skills.

2) Content the open source approach blog

Task lead: @harryjackson1221

Trello task: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/dELGoIP8/317-content-the-open-source-approach-blog-post

Google document: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://docs.google.com/document/d/1a6bi0ztc10xKsewHlDWUKcEjyGXm1dJNYA7adNwO69g/edit#

Please add to this document which we think will get some good traction in the WordPress community focusing on optimization plugins. Add your Slack ID to the bottom of the document.

If you are interested in contributing to this project, add yourself to the card (and put your name and WordPress.org ID in the document).

  1. First blog post – initial due date 5 February 2020, to ensure we have this content ready for review and publication.
  2. @harryjackson1221 has access to a sheet where everyone shared their time estimates for the inclusion of the class and data attribute. This will mean the post can be launched when most of the plugins have released the compatibility feature.

Meeting finish and thanks

Thank you to everyone for their contribution. Please do continue to work on tasks inbetween our meetings and to add to the topic threads if you were unable to attend the meeting itself. Next Global marketing team meeting Wednesday 22 January 2020 in the Slack channel from 15:00 UTC.

#contributor-day, #contributor-event, #google-documents

Maedah Batool 7:48 am on January 14, 2020

Marketing Meeting 2020, January 08

Meeting timestamp on Slack for full notes

Notetaker: aurooba

Attendance

@miker, @Meg Phillips, @OGlekler, @maedahbatool, @harryjackson1221, @Matthias Bathke, @aurooba, @nullbyte, @Michelle Frechette (she/her), @AfshanaDiya, @Megan Geissinger, @Maziar, @Arslan Ahmed, @mta1, @webcommsat

Task Lead Updates

Blog Post: Core Integrates With GitHub

Lead: @Meg Phillips

Trello Link: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/Yzb6YveV

  • GitHub Bridge: We’ve learned from the team developing this feature that it is not ready for publicity. Therein the project has been put into stasis until we hear back.
  • The Trello board is updated with our progress and the card has been moved into “in progress”. Thank you to @koop for bringing this feature to our attention. I will notify the team when we can publicize the feature.

Diversity Speaker Training Marketing

Lead: @aurooba

Trello Link: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/eNghs0YZ

  • Progress is still underway! We will soon update probably in the next meeting.

Showcase Redesign Meta Ticket

Lead: @harryjackson1221

Task Lead: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/wQJwSmfT

  • @harryjackson1221 encouraged everyone to keep putting out as much information about using WordPress as we can.
  • Although it can be frustrating not knowing where content will live, we still need to do everything we can keep growing the WordPress user base. 
  • @Megan Geissinger shared a doodle for breakout meetings for the Showcase.

Collaboration Time: WordPress Resolutions for TwentyTwenty

Lead: @miker

Trello Link: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/4xuZpTfK

  • During the meeting, everyone worked together to create a draft for the first resolution: “In TwentyTwenty,  I resolve to share my knowledge in a way that is humble and inclusive.” We made good progress on the 3 major takeaway points for the resolution.

New Business

2020 Content Marketing Plan

Trello Link: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/AxoJHcsM

  • @Meg Phillips shared this article that sparked a lot of that conversation. As a result of the conversation, a lot of people came to the consensus that the Marketing team should create a strategic content marketing plan to create an impact, regain lost market share, and introduce more people to WordPress.
  • @Meg Phillips has volunteered to take lead on this project to create a content marketing plan, a firm set of goals for 2020, and an action plan.
Maedah Batool 11:04 am on December 16, 2019

Marketing Meeting 2019, December 11

Meeting timestamp on Slack for full notes

Notetaker: maedahbatool

Attendance

@maedahbatool, @yvettesonneveld, @dhruvpandya, @Meg Phillips, @nullbyte, @darls, @OGlekler, @webcommsat, @FahimMurshed, @antialiasfactory, @raym , @harryjackson1221, @passoniate, @bethgsanders, @mta1, @Matthias Bathke, @mikerbg, @fayazgabol 

#MakeWordPress Marketing Successes of the Past Week

@yvettesonneveld: Glad to announce that we published another wonderful People of WordPress story on /news. You can find the link here: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://wordpress.org/news/2019/12/people-of-wordpress-jill-binder/. Mad props to @Ali-WPFiddlyBits for doing most of the work again! 

@harryjackson1221: @raym took care of another audit of the Showcase for us. Some changes are expected which should be done in the coming week.

@webcommsat: A moment of celebration to thank everyone who worked on the release schedule blog in the last few meetings and especially to @miker for leading and advocating its importance. This was edited with help from the relevant teams and finally checked with Francesca. It was published at http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://make.wordpress.org/marketing/2019/12/05/wordpress-major-release-schedule/. You will find a summary of promotions, short links, and hashtags to help share this at http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C0GKJ7TFA/p1575564922159800. These will be added to the Trello card too. Please help us promote this provisional schedule.

@webcommsat: Moreover, we have published a marketing post on the new provisional release schedule. @francina, @miker, and others worked with Abha and they made sure that they had captured the key messages and fact-checking. Also, a huge thanks to those who have contributed to recent meetings. For follow up check this URL:
http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://make.wordpress.org/marketing/2019/12/05/wordpress-major-release-schedule/
It’d be great if you share it with your networks and on social media to help spread the information on this provisional schedule produced by the Core team. You will find key messages in the post. We are using the hashtag: #WordPressReleaseIf you need some intro copy to share with others, here is our excerpt:
A new WordPress release schedule has been published with provisional dates to the end of 2021. The timetable is hoped to help the community with planning and encourage involvement in future development work.

Task Lead Updates

Plugin Document 

@webcommsat Update: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/cTgoVoy4

It will be great if anyone else from the marketing team would like to join a chat to content test some of the key areas in this document on this with some plugin and theme developers. If you have a plugin or theme development background, this would be very valuable and a great chance for you to contribute.

Collaboration Time

Quite recently, Abha has been working on ways to make contributor days in countries with native languages other than English easier, more effective and more fun and she’d like your input for making this even better. Share all views about what have been some of the issues in non-English speaking countries. We would love to hear some great feedback and ideas from you in this respect.

Update “WordPress Features” Page on WP Marketing

OGlekler Update: http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/o4PIoq8r/312-update-wordpress-features-page

She created this new card and volunteered to take lead on this. @Meg Phillips will be helping to get this page updated.

Since this page is located in an area of the site that we don’t actually manage or work on, we may want to reach out to the team that does, and offer help?

Adding images will absolutely help with making the page more easily digestible. We could also reach out to the design team if need be. We are planning to get in touch with the support team first. They’ll need to be willing to accept our offer for help first. And we may want to add this to the to-do list of the communications lead for new releases. Also, a video screencast with a voiceover would be very nice as well. Moreover, visual components can be added later to the content.

Contributor Event & Marketing Support

@webcommsat Update: Document where you can share your thoughts. 
http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XZBqYvDyoavxQCm803YAD7bQ9jd6sxE84UnopueITYY8:18 PM

A group is working on Marketing Contributor Events and Marketing Support. You can find all the news under ‘Community updates’ in the following meeting notes.

Efforts have been put to find solutions on how we can reduce some of the barriers to marketing contributions and help encourage the use of the multi-language skills of our marketing team members. This reflects feedback gathered at contributor events over the last 18 months. We have worked with organizers on some of the difficulties at the event or in preparation, work with the WCEU community/contributing team, and lessons from events where we have provided support through various methods. It also incorporates feedback gathered with the help of WordPress Translation Day and input from conversations with the German and Italian speaking communities.

One of the key areas which have been identified from our findings is how can we help new marketing team members at events who may need some support with translation access and contribute to the cards. We would love to hear your feedback about how can we capture a list of marketing team members who have a proficiency in another language and/or work in marketing in another language in addition to English, who would be willing to assist either in person or virtually before, at and after the event.

Regarding Google Doc, we are looking at the following questions:

  • Polyglot Overlap: We need to ensure whether they are a Polyglot member already and which locale. Do we need any supplementary questions on how they interact with polyglots?
  • Sometimes it is also about the difference between the literal translation of process terms and marketing language translation, which is where our marketing team members can add considerable value.
  • We have seen this with contributor events work we have done so far. So we need questions about how we can capture what languages. What questions do we need to ask here?http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XZBqYvDyoavxQCm803YAD7bQ9jd6sxE84UnopueITYY

Please feel free to contribute asynchronously this week and we will bring comments together under headings so that we can start to get a survey together.

siobhanseija 1:51 pm on December 12, 2019

Marketing Meeting 2019, December 4

Meeting timestamp on Slack for full notes

Notetaker: @siobhanseija

Attendance

@miker, @Meg Phillips, @Megan Geissinger, @OGlekler, @maedahbatool, @siobhanseija, @Arslan Ahmed, @harryjackson1221, @Matthias Bathke, @aurooba, @nullbyte, @Michelle Frechette (she/her), @mta1, @scottjones @abhanonstopnewsuk

#MakeWordPress Marketing Successes of the Past Week

@siobhanseija: We just had a great cross-team Zoom chat about supporting contribution events. Thanks for organizing @webcommsat.

@Matthias Bathke: The German Marketing Team had a meeting just before WordCamp Düsseldorf. Based on feedback from @nullbyte they discussed improving their communication with the international marketing team. Also thanks to @grafruessel for a discussion on improving the onboarding process for contributors in spe. The team has decided to adopt the international vision for their team. They have decided on six goals for the team and assigned them to attendees. Click for the full overview.

@raym: Completed the December Monthly Showcase review.

Task Lead Updates

WordPress Release Schedule

@mikerbg‘s update on: WordPress Release Schedule.

Worked on a draft in last week’s meeting, ready for review before publishing today. Mike and @aurooba worked on the content during the meeting.

Take-away from this discussion: there are different users such content could be focused on, like plugin/theme devs, WP businesses, end-users, and so on. Mike proposes making a different article with a focus on end-users.

Diversity Speaker Training Marketing

@aurooba‘s update on: Diversity Speaker Training Marketing.

Aurooba feels stalled and could use some help/input, especially with writing up different scenarios of what the community is lacking. For example a11y, age, etc. Some other thoughts and input were offered in the discussion. Read it all in this thread.

Take-away from this discussion: we could start creating “Calls for Contributors” for various issues. A card was created for that: [Call for Contributors] Creating outreach scenarios for the Speaker Diversity Training Template.

webcommsat AbhaNonStopNewsUK 4:44 pm on December 5, 2019

WordPress Major Release Schedule

Stay connected

A new WordPress release schedule has been published with provisional dates for the next two years. Produced by the Core team, it responds to feedback from the community to help with planning.

The timeline goes up to the end of 2021 and to a version 6.0. The dates may need to be revised when the work on the release begins, to accommodate changes in technology and the project. But this new outline of dates will give developers and other WordPress users time to be more aware of any implications for their own product timelines and work.

Be prepared

With more than 35% of the web using WordPress for their online platform, users are increasingly asking for timescale information to plan for new releases. Users may want to test and tweak their websites with new releases and this may need careful planning. It is hoped this provisional schedule will help them do this and raise awareness of future release dates.

For plugin or theme creators, this roadmap provides timeframes to help them get involved with each release’s development. It will also aid their planning for new features or testing. 

The schedule

Version Provisional release date
5.4 April 21, 2020
5.5 August 11, 2020
5.6 December 8, 2020
5.7 March 9, 2021
5.8 June 8, 2021
5.9 September 14, 2021
6.0 December 7, 2021

Find the latest release news

Please help share this provisional schedule. #WordPressRelease #WordPressUpdate

The WordPress Roadmap page which is regularly updated to help users and contributors.

You can add your comments to the WordPress Release Schedule Tentative Dates 2020-2021 post.

Stay up to date on each release through the WordPress Core Development team blog.

Or join the conversation directly and connect with more than 600 contributors who participated in the last release! 

Marketing

Thanks to contributors @mikerbg, @webcommsat, @francina, @megphillips91, @mta1 @yvettesonneveld, @OGlekler, @aurooba, @nullbyte for contributing to the marketing of this release plan.

Follow up to - Hands on problem solving clinic - 15 Jan 2020 - WordUp Pompey! 12:47 pm on January 16, 2020

[…] marketing team has published the WordPress Major Release Schedule for the next 2 years – to 2021 and WordPress 6.0. BTW: You’ll notice this post was […]

Mike Reid 6:00 am on December 5, 2019

Marketing meeting 2019, November 27

Meeting timestamp on Slack for full notes

http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C0GKJ7TFA/p1574866812428300

Notetaker: @mikerbg

Attendance

@mikerbg, @maedahbatool, @dhruvpandya, @Megphillips91 @oglekler, @webcommsat, @aurooba, @scottjonesukcom, @yvettesonneveld, @nullbyte, @grafruessel, @antialiasfactory, @mta1, @passoniate, @FahimMurshed

Welcome

Welcome to the WordPress Weekly Digest from the Global Marketing Team.

Traditionally, we have provided more of a historical recap of what was done during the week. Moving forward, our objective is to shift the focus towards summary with actions which make it easier for other teams and those who can’t attend to catch-up  and use the slack link to read more about a particular aspect. A collection of copy is also being designed to be shared (via social media or other channels) with end-users. 

We want to cover the same great things each week, but shift the focus to be sharable directly with end-users or WordPress Partner Organizations (WPOs). This will take some time to fully complete the transition, but we are excited to have a vehicle to share the WordPress story more directly with the people that use it every day. 

WordPress Release Schedule Announced

Update: @mikerbg
After a strong and well-voiced request from the WordPress community of developers, the WordPress Core team have published a tentative new release schedule for the next three years. While tentative in terms of the specific dates, this newly published schedule gives developers time to consider their own product timelines and react appropriately. 

With more than 35% of the web depending on WordPress for their online platform, application or webshop, users have become louder in expressing the need to be able to plan for new releases. New releases need testing and tweaking, and the more complicated the install, or the more installs a business/ organization manages, this requires careful planning. 

5.4 – April 21, 2020

5.5 – August 11, 2020

5.6 – December 8, 2020

5.7 – March 9, 2021

5.8 – June 8, 2021

5.9 – September 14, 2021

6.0 – December 7, 2021

Community Updates (formerly celebrations)

This section will highlight some of the many outstanding events and interactions that make this community special. We will be looking to move away from length recaps of events (which are typically shared with multiple existing channels) and towards short blurbs that highlight specific events or interactions. 

The goal here is to shift how we talk about the community by focusing on short form (tweet length) updates that can be shared through multiple channels. The tone and focus of this section will be very positive to celebrate the community. 

Local WordCamps go Global

Contributor Events Update: @webcommsat
Marketing team contributors have been working on a draft model to support contributor events in local areas and help overcome barriers, such as language, timings, post event follow ups. They have also explored how to encourage inclusion and longer term contributing within the team as part of the offer for the marketing members at contributor events. Feedback from materials produced for and at marketing tables have been used at subsequent events. It has also been used to create a draft model on how we can work with and support local organizers and find more ways to involve marketing team members and their skills. 

WordCamp Milano Contributor Day last weekend built on and tested this developing model. It incorporated feedback on the approach used at recent marketing tables including Dublin, Stuttgart, Zurich and others. It also incorporated work on this area which started with marketing table support for Contributing Days at Glasgow, Zaragoza and Milano last year. Resources and tasks are prepared in an easy to access way, supported by online slack support from global team members. Where it has been identified as useful, an online video / call facility has been set up to support the local team and others working on similar tasks. The tasks and resources included an awareness of local needs and linked in with local organizers and facilitators. 

This approach enabled:

  • a live slack “drop-in” facility with global team members able to provide support in addition to local on boarding arrangements. Where useful, this was supported by an online “drop-in” video or call facilities. Contributors and marketing team members (including task leads, marketing members with relevant local language skills, others working on the same tasks) were able to use this link. Contributors used these facilities to:
    • say hello
    • ask questions
    • overcome technical issues not possible to be resolved easily at the event
    • get some help with translation of an instruction
    • get more onboarding support or find areas as new contributors they would like to work on
    • support and work with local organizing teams, and marketing contributions better linked to the current work of the team.

This developing model helped:

  • provide a smoother and more positive contributing experience according to feedback
  • improve the onboarding experience and overcome some of the barriers
  • provide a link between local organizing teams, locales and the global marketing team. For example, in Milano, two of the fluent Italian-speaking marketing members were not available to help as planned on-site due to circumstances beyond their control. But the rolling preparation for contributor events, ready resources and drop-in access via slack and other channels was able to be expanded. It allowed marketing members to be available to help remotely to assist with preparation or answer questions. They were also able to link in with arrangements set up locally to help with language queries
  • support the local language and locale needs, and enabled a better communication between the event lead and the marketing team. For example at Milano, the event information and summary from the marketing table were provided in Italian as well as in English, thanks to working with Italian speakers leading or attending the event
  • raise awareness of the language barrier for contributing to global tasks and the importance of having a rolling cycle of contributor events planning
  • make the marketing table at recent contributor days even more inclusive
  • to start or continue conversations with local teams about (1) producing / signposting marketing and resource information on contributing in other languages and (2) translating tasks or key instructions in other languages in advance of events. This in turn can help to reduce some of the barriers for camps considering putting on contributor events
  • to avoid the extra demand or pressure on one or two members of the global team in being available for all contributor events. It enables more marketing team members to be involved and offer their linguistic skills within a marketing environment

Thanks

We were able to use and gather further feedback on the draft model working with Giovanni Invernizzi and others in Milano. Thanks to everyone who fed into this during the months, and especially @zetaraffix, @aurooba, @michelleames, @yvettesonneveld, @siobhanseija, @kmarcink, @mariajaragon and @nullbyte for their ideas and contributions over time and sharing their knowledge.

For marketing at WordCamp Milano 2019 Contributor Day, we:

  • identified WordPress benefits from product developer/ creator perspective which could be used for marketing. This built on the work in Dublin and will be followed up with @scottjonesukcom who is helping to lead this
  • reviewed marketing videos and had a few people sign-up to continue working on this and to subtitle
  • lots of questions answered on contributing to marketing and good conversations to encourage contributing
  • ideas for helping local communities get involved with global marketing team to help with the work in this area
  • some sustainability questions and how to market it better with language differences 
  • more feedback on the Contributor Orientation Tool
  • suggestions on how sponsors’ document could be adapted for smaller camps
  • ideas for helping new people contribute 
  • encouraged take up of the WordPress.org user survey
  • continued conversations about ways to support Italian-speaking contributors wanting to join or were in the global marketing team. Ideas were shared from the German-speaking marketing team and other areas
  • input into many other marketing tasks.

    Special thanks to @webcommsat who prepared and led the Marketing aspects for Milano and Giovanni Invernizzi, who led the Contributor Day. Thanks to @antialiasfactory who supported on the ground co-ordination at Milano 2019 and provided a welcome during the event to new contributors. Thanks to all those who helped with translations and in preparing many of the tasks or answering questions in Italian and English. And to everyone who joined the marketing tasks on the day.

WordPress.org Homepage block

More work was done on this task, led by @yvettesonneveld. This task will go back to the Meta Team when completed. 

Trello card http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://trello.com/c/dwUQFidM

Changes to wording were looked at to provide three key points of information and to help more users access the content.

Suggestion that this block is re-reviewed for every future WordPress release to make the key points specific to the latest release. This could also tie into the themes which link with the musician that the release is named after selected to name the release. (@mikerbg).

Thanks to contributions to this document: @mikerbg, @yvettesonneveld, @Aurooba, @scottjonesukcom, @Megphillips91, @mta1

Mike Reid 7:58 pm on November 26, 2019

Global Marketing Team Notes – Nov 20, 2019

Meeting timestamp on Slack for full notes

http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C0GKJ7TFA/p1574262119142300

Notetaker: @miker

Attendance

@miker, @harryjackson1221, @koop, @aurooba, @OGlekler, @dhruvpandya, @Arslan Ahmed, @yvettesonneveld, @nullbyte, @mta1, @webcommsat, @MegPhillips91 @Arslan Ahmed, @darls

Celebrations

  • We were all very happy with the release of 5.3 “Kirk” on Nov 12!
  • @harryjackson1221 reported that the WP Showcase is now completely cleaned up. Every site in the showcase is now verified to still be on WP. 

Main Tasks

Content Creation for WP.org main page

We used a substantial portion of our meeting time to work on copy for the “It’s as easy as…” block on the bottom of the home page. We collaborated on a version of the copy that is more general. We also added CTAs to encourage exploration of the WP ecosystem.

This content will be submitted shortly via trac. 

Diversity Speaker Training

We have been working to promote the work of the Diversity Speaker Training program led by @aurooba. Work is continuing on this initiative, but the initial response from the community has been very positive! Thanks as well to @webcommsat who has been very active in promoting this initiative a multiple events.

Additional updates will come over the next several weeks.

WordPress Showcase

We have been working on a revamp of the WordPress Showcase in conjunction with both Design and Meta, with @harryjackson1221 leading the Marketing effort. Currently, this team has completed an audit of the existing showcase sites and verified that all remaining are currently running WP.

Next up: We will be setting up a recurring meeting schedule to discuss the showcase. We will also be looking at the submission process for the showcase itself.

WordPress Plugin Developers: Preparing and preventing Crisis communications

@webcommsat updated on the group working on this initiative from the marketing side. It followed a request for communications steps for developers to respond to security or issues.

This task has had further input from recent contributor events. The feedback has shown there is support for changing the title to a more prevention based approach, which will be done during the editing process. Contributions for an alternative title are invited.
The document has now been sent to specific plugin developers within the community to help with particular queries including from WordCamp Milano this weekend. We are also grateful for the help from members of the Plugin Collectiv (pluginkollektiv).

If there are any other plugin developers in the marketing team who would like to assist in the FAQs part of the document, please post in the marketing channel.

This document is due for publication in January 2020, assuming it can be verified by the other teams within this timescale. Thanks everyone who has been involved from the crisis communications, developer processes and other teams.

WordPress Marketing Contributor Outreach

@webcommsat provided a number of updates from recent contributor days.

Amazing progress on this in the last few months particularly with contributions from the marketing team in the summer and the contributor events during the last six months. Particular progress has been on supporting events where language has caused difficulty for inclusion, translating tasks, and how we can support local events and their local communities virtually. We have continued to work and test models, and with the success of the last round of tests/ feedback at Zurich, Stuttgart and Dublin, a very clear model is developing. We were able to discuss some of this with many of the camps, including Milano about how to progress the Italian speaking community’s interest in some of the tasks and provide materials for Italian-language speakers to be able to participate more easily. This has all been inspiring. We will be arranging to share and talk this further with @francina and @lasacco in coming weeks too.

There has been awesome input and two way dialogue with contributors from the German-speaking, Italian-speaking and some of the Indian contributors, and with the work with WCEU, and I would like to again thank everyone who has followed up on tasks, sent new ideas and given feedback on the Contributor Orientation Tool and general Contribution Day information. The files for the next Contributor event which has asked for marketing input is Milano this weekend. These are being put together with some additions to be confirmed with two task leads. Thanks to @Maziar and all the other marketing contributors who will also be around to help at Milano.

Next steps

We will continue to have meetings in the marketing channel too on this area too. If you are an experienced contributor from another team or have an interest in contributor events planning, do  consider joining this or chatting about how you could be involved. It has been suggested that we have a next meeting before the main marketing one in the first week of December. [post meeting update – 4 Dec 2019, 14:00 UTC will be the next chat]

New Business

@LeBaux posted a request to support http://wayback.fauppsala.se:80/wayback/20200211151713/https://savedotorg.org/, which is an initiative to oppose the sale of the .org TLD to a private equity firm. They requested that WordPress promote this initiative and sign on as a public support.

Currently, the Marketing team is not directly working on this, as this involves a third party and would require higher levels of approval from within the organization. However, @chanthaboune is aware of this initiative and is working on potential ways for WordPress to get involved.

In the interim, contributors will be asked to share the link through social media channels if they wish.

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