Independence

As the new year dawns, our hosts look back at the year that was: the ups, the downs, the lessons they learned, and everything in between.

Handing work over to another person is a major step for any business owner, and as indies it can be especially scary. Curtis is potentially looking at doing some outsourcing in the near future, so he, Alice, and Jelly take a look at why offloading work is useful, what the downfalls can be, and whether it’s worth it in the end.

Managing press is an important part of creating products, especially around releases. Alice, Curtis and Jelly discuss speaking with the press, the resources they make available, and what they really need to be doing to improve their respective approaches.

To continue to thrive and grow, every indie needs to spend time learning and staying aware of their industry. Our hosts are no different, and they spend some time going over some of their approaches to learning, to staying on top of their game, and ensuring that they make good decisions.

Making the jump from regular job to independence is not an easy thing. There’s a lot of moving parts that you need to account for! Alice, Curtis and Jelly each recount their experiences of going from full time work to where they are today: what they’ve done right, what they’ve done wrong and the lessons they learned along the way.

No indie is an island; we all have to deal with external influences on our projects, some better than others. From users to Apple and everything in between, our hosts take a look at the things that influence their workflow, how the mitigate the bad ones, and how it’s changed their approach to their work.

Stress comes in many forms, and being an indie comes with a slew of additional sources of potential stress that you might not expect. Our intrepid hosts recount the stresses they’ve experiences during their indie careers, discuss potential ways they manage stress, and pitch possible ideas for avoiding it in the first place.

Getting to know to strangers at conferences and meetups is hard, but an absolutely important part of being an indie; building and developing relationships with others in your community can make a huge difference to your work! Alice, Curtis and Jelly share their own experiences and troubles with networking, building relationships, and breaking the ice.

More often than not, your workspace is a reflection of who you are, and how you get things done. Taking this to heart, our three hosts look at the workspaces they each inhabit during their working hours, and whether those spaces are conducive to actually working.

Customer support is a huge part of any business where you create products. Dealing with problems, handling requests and getting 1-star reviews all comes with the territory, so what is the best way to interact with customers? Alice, Curtis and Jelly examine their own practices to figure out what they’re doing right, and maybe give each other a little help with the process.

As indies, we’re naturally drawn to having projects alongside our regular workload. These can grow into whole new career opportunities, or they can begin to place undue stress on your work life balance, so how do you know what projects are a good fit? Belle, Curtis and Jelly explore their own side projects; both how they’ve started, and how they’ve ended… or are ending, as the case may be.

A lot of thought needs to be put into launching, both with new products and even with updating existing ones. How do you decide what’s worth making noise about, and what steps do you follow to make sure all your potential customers know? Curtis is deep in thought about this topic himself, so he takes Belle and Jelly through a discussion about their typical processes to figure out what works for them, and what doesn’t.

One of the major parts of owning a product is that the buck stops with you in respect to the features you implement, the time spent on maintenance, and what the overall direction is. What plays a role in making those decisions? Do you involve user feedback, and are you transparent about it? Belle, Curtis and Jelly dive into their own practices, taking a hard look at their varied approaches to these questions and more!

When the lines start to blur between work and life, it can be very difficult to make sure that you’re spending enough time renewing your energy so that you’re giving your best to both. Our three intrepid indies look at their own work/life balance, discussing how they fare, what they do to ensure proper separation, and how they feel they could improve.

Money comes and money goes. This ebb and flow is ever more noticeable as an indie, coming with a unique set of concerns that can affect an entire household. Belle, Curtis and Jelly discuss their approaches to managing their finances, accounting for lean times, and handling the stress that accompanies running a business.

Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) is back, and having never been, Belle wants to know what it is that draws Curtis and Jelly back every year. Together, they look at what they like about WWDC, what it’s like in comparison to the independent conferences put on each year, and what they would do to improve it in the future.

What is independence, and why is it something that Belle, Curtis and Jelly aspire to achieve? In their inaugural episode, they discuss what they consider being independent, what the downsides are, and where they are in their journey towards it.