Creator Science

BONUS: Building Community and Being Acquired (Indie Hackers)

Mar 11, 2021

Courtland Allen, founder of Indie Hackers, a thriving community for creators, shares his insights on building online communities and the journey to financial independence. He discusses the strategic balance between entrepreneurial freedom and community-based business models. Courtland also dives into the challenges of genuine engagement in a digital age, critiques platforms like Clubhouse, and highlights Circle as a revolutionary tool for fostering meaningful connections. His experiences at Stripe add depth to the conversation about community acquisitions and creator monetization.

54:54

Creator website

Episode guests

Courtland Allen

AI Chapters

Episode notes

Intro

2min

The Journey of Community Building and Financial Independence

2min

Building Community and Financial Independence

9min

Building Genuine Communities

14min

Navigating Clubhouse: The Future of Audio Engagement

5min

Exploring Circle: A Community-Building Revolution

6min

Navigating Community Acquisition Challenges

11min

In this bonus episode, I'm talking with Courtland Allen, the founder of Indie Hackers. As I’ve shared a couple times over the last few months, my accelerator and community Unreal Collective was acquired by Smart Passive Income in January of this year.

I wrote an article about the acquisition, and it got quite a bit of attention. One of the places it got shared was on Indie Hackers, a massive online community of nearly 30,000 people trying to build profitable side projects.

It was originally shared by Rosie Sherry, the then-community manager for Indie Hackers. And the founder of Indie Hackers, Courtland Allen, left a really thoughtful comment on the piece too.

Indie Hackers itself was once acquired by Stripe, and now Courtland works for Stripe while building the community full time. So we had a lot of common ground.

In this episode, Cortland and I talk about the acquisition, earning a living as a creator, why I don’t really like Clubhouse, and how to build a community online.

Courtland is an incredibly smart creator himself, and I’m excited to interview HIM on Creative Elements here soon.

***

WHEN YOU'RE READY

📬 Creator Science Newsletter

🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system)

🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community)

🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer

***

CONNECT

🐦 Connect on Twitter

📸 Connect on Instagram

💼 Connect on LinkedIn