Right on the heels of our previous discussion about Firefox 3 beta’s adoption, I noticed that Net Applications has a “featured report” highlighting Firefox 3′s increasing worldwide market share:
April, 2008
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Apr 08
The Early Rise of Firefox 3 Adoption
We’ve known for some time that Firefox 3 (beta versions) is being adopted at incredible rates. In other words, in terms of aggregate numbers of active daily users, we’ve seen far more users of Fx3 beta than we ever saw with Fx2 beta.
I was curious about taking this knowledge one step further – how does the adoption rate compare on a percentage basis across time periods?
In late September 2006 (one month prior to the official release of Fx2), here’s what the situation looked like:
(Fx2 beta users)/(Fx1.5 users) = 1.4%
Today, here’s what the current situation looks like for Firefox 3:
(Fx3 beta users)/(Fx2 users) = 2.0%
How should one interpret these numbers? There are certainly different ways to think about this. However, I think the biggest takeaway is two-fold: (1) Firefox 3 rocks and (2) our users remain extraordinarily passionate. Downloading a beta product requires a user to both make an informed decision and go out of their way to intentionally take an action, and the fact that millions of people around the globe have already taken this step with Firefox 3 is utterly amazing.
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Apr 08
Another Win for Firefox Users
We just want to give an appreciative acknowledgment to Google AdWords for a recent change to their policy regarding display URL’s. While we’re most excited about how this rule change is a big win for most businesses and all consumers, we thought it might be interesting to describe the impact from Mozilla’s perspective. In short, other advertisers are no longer able to show ads that display something like “mozilla.com” or “firefox.com” as their domain (then redirecting to their actual site).
Why does this matter? The example below, captured a couple months ago, provides a powerful illustration. Neither of those two ads on the right-hand side belongs to Mozilla (nor are sending clickers our way)! An advertiser was previously able to list anything they desired as the URL displayed and then send the consumer to a completely different, unrelated web site. The process, from the consumer’s perspective, was non transparent, and in extreme cases, could be dangerous.
And here’s a close-up:
Please note: we’re always happy to see affiliates helping with the distribution of Firefox; we’d just prefer that other advertisers not use our actual domains (e.g., mozilla.com) in their ads (when those ads are not actually directing users to Mozilla’s sites).
What’s remarkable here is that Google may take a revenue hit as a result of this change. I’m guessing they made this decision because it’s clearly in the best interest of consumers and because it’s the right thing to do. It’s always enlightening to see a company put the interest of users ahead of the interest of shareholders.
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Apr 08
Analytics and the Firefox User Experience
John Lilly recently wrote an excellent post about our passion around the Firefox user experience. I wanted to spend a few minutes talking about how this same mission applies to marketing and analytics at Mozilla. Perhaps a story would be a good way to start this discussion…
Yesterday, I spent some time on Google’s localized sites (e.g., www.google.cn) searching for Firefox related terms. I was curious if a new Firefox user is able to easily find a Mozilla related web site and download Firefox if he/she decides that’s what they want to do. For the most part, the answer seems to be “yes” – search for “firefox” in other Google language versions and our web sites (and affiliates) occupy the top search results. There was one exception, though, where this was not the case (I’d prefer for the locale be remain nameless). Searching for “firefox” in this particular locale showed a questionable site as the #2 result and a “mozilla” search displayed a questionable site as the #1 search result. Within a few minutes, I created an adwords campaign for just that locale to ensure that more new users are able to more easily find us (we’re also working on a few other longer-term solutions).
So, you may be wondering why, between this story and previous posts on this blog, I’m so obsessed with search marketing? In short, it’s because of the Firefox user experience.
Typically, user experience is defined by a user’s experience and direct interaction with a product. With Firefox, for example, direct interaction consists of many things: all the technologies and development that goes into the product itself, as well as the forward facing interface (e.g., all the great work done by folks like Mike Beltzner and Alex Faaborg).
I’d like to add a slightly broader definition of “user experience.” For me at least, it seems as though a user’s experience with Firefox begins at the moment that person conceives the idea in their mind that they’d like to try Firefox. Once that idea is conceived, the user then attempts to find Firefox (e.g., perhaps they already know about www.mozilla.com or perhaps they go to a search engine). And once the user takes this step, he/she makes a few clicks and navigates their way to the download process. All of these interactions are important in this broader view of “user experience,” and making these interactions as efficient and delightful as possible for the user drives much of the marketing and analytics efforts here at Mozilla.
