Building in Public Definite Guide: Use Transparency to Win

EamonnMR 5 years ago |

I sort of stumbled into a process like this. I built a game as a hobby project with the intent to hand it off to a community that I thought totally wanted it. Interest in the project was minor. So for the next project I tried to actually engage the community as much as possible to see if anyone actually wanted to try it. Turns out the answer was still no, but at least I got a chance to prove my thesis that the project was doomed and I couldn't blame the lack of engagement.

jhunter1016 5 years ago |

It’s cool to see building in public become mostly mainstream. I’ve always felt like transparency was a far better approach than hiding behind a curtain. That still runs counter to the way a lot of traditional and VC-backed businesses operate.

I’ve taken to building my current project (https://perligo.io) in public on Indie Hackers as I’ve pulled back on my Twitter use. It’s a decent enough place to share what you’re working on.

Folcon 5 years ago | |

Is this live streaming some/all of your coding sessions? Or something else?

I'm really interested in this to be honest, but have personally held off on doing it because I've no experience with OBS or live streaming, so I hope you don't mind the question =)...

jhunter1016 5 years ago | | |

No live streaming for me. My coding style wraps around my family life. So when you have two kids doing remote learning, a dog barking at every passing Amazon driver, and a significant other sharing your home office space, you learn to code around the chaos. Not sure I could find a way to stream or record videos around the chaos. What I do instead is tweet (less so now) and write a lot of blog posts. Every time I learn something new, I’ll write about the experience. Then I also post periodic updates about my progress on IH.

Folcon 5 years ago | | |

This is something I'm trying to get into the habit of doing, but with little success, how do you deal with the fact that writing a decent blog post takes a fair bit of time?

jhunter1016 5 years ago | | |

I will say my 10-year-old son wants to be a youtuber. So I got him set up on OBS and it is incredibly easy. He still struggles with the settings sometimes, but he’s 10. It’s really impressive software.

lifeisstillgood 5 years ago |

I am starting to build in public (youtube channel - The software mine) simply because I hope it will hold my feet to the fire and ensure I consistently progress (an inch a day will do)

The rest of the advice here (audience etc) seems accurate but second order to the essential part of JFDI

carapace 5 years ago |

There's a book "Honest Business" by Salli Rasberry and Michael Phillips. Grew out of hippy businesses in the SF East Bay in the 70's IIRC. Anyway, they advocate for a radical openness in business management, like spreadsheet on the wall for all to see.

skc 5 years ago |

I like the concept a lot.

But what about those of us who are already near completion/launch? Is it still worth it to open up at that stage?

mromanuk 5 years ago | |

Yes, is always interesting to know what other people is building, in fact, you should start blogging/twitting/exposing your project right away

kevonc 5 years ago | |

Yeah absolutely, you can start anytime. It is more about sharing the journey/learnings/useful info so that you're not just selling a group of people a product. They get to understand how this product is built, the people running it, and how certain decisions are made. It is quite powerful when it comes to trust building.

mromanuk 5 years ago |

Building in public tend to gravitate around "info-products", entertainment, newsletter, games, courses, etc, where an audience is a must.

I would like to see more info about apps/websites/products built or being built in public.

devhulk 5 years ago |

Hey, it's a great guide! It's a must-read for each maker who wants to build in public. I want to help grow this community too. I'm making a toolset for building in public creators to save their time and help them being transparent. You can check it out here: https://candormakers.com.