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Work in Progress — A community of makers shipping together 🚧
Work in Progress is a community of makers. We help each other stay accountable and focussed on building, shipping, and growing our products.
We publicly share our todos, celebrate our successes, discuss our failures, track our goals, and provide each other with actionable feedback.
Don't ship by yourself, ship together!
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@rrhoover Thanks Ryan!
Membership was actually free of charge for the first few members as there wasn't much to charge for yet. It later became paid (for new members) to slow down growth. Too many new people coming in would disrupt the community we built.
Right now there are no plans for a free tier. I'd rather focus all my efforts on making WIP the best platform it can be for makers that commit to WIP by paying the membership fee.
I do realise there are makers around the world that truly cannot afford it. I'd like to find a way to help them at some point too, but I don't think a free-for-all membership would be the answer.
@marckohlbrugge that's one way to curb user growth! At Product Hunt, we had a similar challenge in the early days. We didn't have the systems or internal support to manage a large community in the beginning so we introduced an invite system to slowly expand the community.
@marckohlbrugge The Dutch Connection (You & Pieter) definitely aims for the Guinness World Record of "most websites built in a lifetime". The anti-thesis for everybody who believes you should focus on one thing rather than many.
The idea of WIP is great! Sometimes I just rest and think: It's crazy to see what impact PH had on a whole community. But isn't the cool part about the 'maker community' that people support each other for free. Free tools to build stuff, free advice from highly skilled experts, reach via popularity/votes instead of marketing spends. Not sure if a paywall supports this ideology. Imagine submitting to PH would have a price, what would the community be like today?
Not saying you don't deserve rewards for your hard work, just that a paywall is a very conservative way of receiving those. There's so many more options. Introducing a paywall to slow down user growth!? You're a real boss 😂
@bnjmnlbr While I wholeheartedly agree with the concept of paying it forward, I don't believe that means every maker-oriented product or service should be free of charge. It might be okay for a one-off tool, but for anything more serious it's not sustainable.
Every day new maker tools come and go. The ones that stay tend to be the ones that figured out a revenue model.
Now there are different ways to raise the required capital to build a platform like WIP, but I personally believe simply charging customers is the model where everyone's incentives are best aligned. It has been working really well so far.
We might open up some parts in the future of course, but I don't want to run before I can walk. One step at a time :)
👋 Hi PH! I'm so excited to finally share WIP with all of you!
A few months ago I started a simple Telegram group for a couple of makers to share what they were working on and keep each other accountable to ship daily. Today this group has grown into a vibrant community of makers working in public, sharing their progress, and motivating each other to keep shipping.
Here's how WIP works:
💬 Group chat
Most of WIP happens in our Telegram group chat. Here's where we discuss what we're working on, ask for help, and share the occasional meme. We have a chatbot that lets you track your todos, and when you've completed them. This way everybody gets to see what the rest is working on which is very inspiring.
🤖 Chat bot
We have a bot called @wipbot that lets you easily perform tasks in the chat. For example you can type "/done launched on Product Hunt" to create a completed todo, or "/ask What are best practices to launch on Product Hunt?" to post a question to the group.
🔥 Shipping Streaks
If you complete at least one todo each day you will earn a streak. Kinda like how you can earn a streak on Product Hunt for upvoting, but with WIP it's all about shipping your own products. There's a public leaderboard of who has been shipping the most consistently. Currently dominated by Product Hunt Maker of The Year @levelsio with 162 consecutive shipping days. (This guy ships!)
👩💻 Maker Profiles
Each maker has their own maker profile. It shows the world which todos you recently completed and which are still pending. It also shows your shipping stats so you can get a better sense of when you are most productive. Here's mine: https://wip.chat/@marckohlbrugge
🤔 Q&A
Got a question for other makers? Looking for feedback? You can ask in the chat, but it might disappear after a while. That's why we've got slash commands like /ask that cross-post your question to the group. Recent questions: https://wip.chat/questions
💰 Paid membership
WIP is a bootstrapped product so to support further development all memberships are paid. This also makes sure the community doesn't grow too big too fast. There are monthly and yearly subscriptions available.
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For more info see https://wip.chat/about and https://wip.chat/open for all our public numbers.
I'd be happy to answer any questions!
Major shout out to all WIP members for helping build the platform. Without you and your feedback WIP would just be me talking to myself.
I can't possibly @mention everyone here (well actually I could with a simple database query, but I don't think PH will appreciate me @mentioning dozens of people), but you know who you are. Thank you so much for your support!
@marckohlbrugge hi Marc, looks like a great community. Congrats on the launch and for building a place like this for Makers! 💯
Quick observation from your homepage. I see 40+ guys (+1 cat & 1 dog). I don't see any women. This may sound small but it makes the community seem much less welcoming (to me personally). If you have women in your community, be great to highlight on your homepage to feel more inclusive. If you don't, do you have plans do diversify your community?
@marckohlbrugge @ems_hodge That actually seems like a really good point in my opinion as well, I don't think there are more than a dozen women in WIP, @marckohlbrugge maybe you can share some stats?
@marckohlbrugge @ems_hodge Hi Emily, there're definitely women on WIP. What you see on the homepage sidebar is a leaderboard of the individuals with the longest streaks. In the middle is a stream of the most recent ships by the members of the group. Anyone can get on the homepage based on their level of engagement with the community.
@marckohlbrugge @jonathan_trev hey Jonathan! That's good to hear. I was mainly referring to the two header images on the homepage and about us page. They were the first 2 things I saw when checking out the community.
WIP has kept me accountable for the last 150+ days:
https://wip.chat/@levelsio
I've shipped more than ever: 773 tasks in 162 days.
WIP's chat on Telegram has been very solid to get quick feedback on new ideas I have, and help newbie and advanced shippers with issues they have, that we might have had in the past. Think "which payment processor to use" to "should I use Discourse for forum software or build my own?".
I'm a solo maker, and at times that can also be lonely and being in a chat with ~1,000 people chatting about shipping and making friends has helped me a lot there.
I know @producthunt is building something similar, and for good reason. Mixing community + accountability is a great idea and I think WIP validates it.
I wonder what more products we'll see pop up. There's now so many indie makers, and WIP shows you can make products that help them ship.
Finally congrats on the launch! WIP is one of most viral product that seen that was building in my eyes. I'm using it to building my products on regular basis: https://wip.chat/@AndreyAzimov
Can you please share plans for near future?
P.S. Thanks for adding me on GIF :)
@andreyazimov Hey Andrey, thanks so much for your support!
I will develop WIP based on the community's feedback and requests. One of the most popular requests is the ability to keep track of milestones (e.g. getting 100 customers) and setting goals/deadlines (e.g. turning break-even).
At the same time I will continue to evolve the current functionality and user experience.
The idea seems nice, but I find the pricing quite expensive.
It seems that the whole idea could be replaced by a slack channel with some integrations and everyone would save $20/month. I get it that you are really paying to be a part of the community, not for the chat product itself, but anyway...
@aviggiano Hi Antônio. I get where you're coming from, but the pricing is based on value rather than costs. If you join WIP you'll notice that the most successful makers price their products this way. It leads to a sustainable business and ultimately happy customers.
Have a look through some of the customer reviews above and you'll see what I mean.
@marckohlbrugge No doubt, I've seen other makers' reviews before this PH promotion, and indeed everyone seems pretty happy with the product. Nevertheless, I am generally reluctant to buy a product without trying it first, even after reading tons of reviews. That's why I was surprised to see a popup asking for my credit card when I tried to create an account, without any kind of free trial access whatsoever. Anyway, maybe I am missing the point and this is how the WIP community build things, but I am just giving my feedback as a potential client, not as a fellow maker.
@aviggiano - The price is expensive. But, is it worth it? I was trying WIP, and the price seemed expensive. But something happened when I posted a very draft concept - In half an hour I got advice on CSS changes, someone picked up a typo, my copy was improved, and I got some SEO advice. So after that, I just paid, because the value was just immense.
@ebrahimkhalil Well I should perhaps rewrite my comment, since I mixed two subjects in a single post.
My issue with the pricing is ONE that I find it expensive (although I never tried it, so I can't really say if it's worth paying) and TWO that I cannot try it without paying $20.
The first issue is totally questionable, I agree with you, and it seems that 100% of the users would say that it's worth paying.
The second issue is what I find the most weird and non-standard, the fact that this product does not let me try it before I buy it. Everything on the internet will let you try at least something for free (5 articles per month on newspapers, limited storage on file storage services, not real-time data on analytics websites, you name it), but not WIP.
Anyway it's just my opinion, and I am well aware that everyone else here does not agree with it.
@aviggiano - you entitled to your opinion and I respect it. I however think offering a free tier is great for bigger companies, but not a good strategy for Indie Makers.
YOOOOO! I'm in the thumbnail!
WIP chat is the best thing since sliced bread. I love the community and being accountable for shipping. (I also need to commit more to being accountable)...
No trial available. Can I at least get a refund if I don’t like it? I like the idea of supporting indie makers to deliver top quality stuff, but I need at least a backup, just in case I don’t find what I expect there.
@ovidiutepes Yes. Message me on Telegram (preferred) or Twitter if you want a refund for your most recent payment. My username is @marckohlbrugge at both places.
Looks like there are a few other WIP members on the Product Hunt frontpage today. Make sure to check them out as well to get a better idea of what type of products our community is building.
https://www.producthunt.com/post...
https://www.producthunt.com/post...
https://www.producthunt.com/post...
https://www.producthunt.com/post...
I joined WIP community last year. Great to see how much it evolve since than. Community members are very helpful. You can get help on any part of product building from conception to shipping. It a place to explore new things are in progress. It keeps you motivated to ship new things.
It's inspiring how Marc has built this community of makers by constantly iterating through a feedback loop.
It feels amazing to be part of this community from the start. 😻
@greg_x_willis Whoops. No it isn't. I'm guessing you try opening the sign up page in a new tab/window, rather than just left-clicking? If you just left-click it should work okay and open in a modal window. I still need to fix this bug that happens when you open in a new window.
I've been a paying member for about a month so far and my work and side project productivity has increased significantly. Being encouraged to ship something, no matter how big, every day keeps you moving forward and keeps motivation up 📈
Pros:Huge community of people who can help/advise/support you with just about anything.
Cons:Can some times feel intimidating to post something whilst there's a conversation going - but that's just a big community issue 🤷♂️
Congrats on the launch, @marckohlbrugge! :) Awesome to finally see WIP on PH!
I've joined WIP a few months ago and can only recommend it to other makers!
Here's why you should join too:
💪🏻 Motivation
Streaks are a very powerful technique to build habits and get things done. I've definitely been more productive since I joined WIP (280 to-dos completed so far!)
🆘 Help from others
If you're a solo-maker, you're probably not an expert in everything. WIPs community is pretty diverse ranging from writers and designers to coders and marketers. So getting feedback and help from others is really easy.
👨👩👧👦 Community
I used to work at a large corporation before becoming a solo-founder and the thing I missed most was being surrounded by other people. While being in a Telegram group isn't exactly the same, it does help to have a group of people to chat and drink a virtual coffee with!
Hope to see some familiar PH faces on WIP soon :)
Who are the people that WIPs? Do they hold their full time jobs and do these todos when they can? Or, they are always free?
@mirmayne Hi Daveyon. It's a mixture of full-time entrepreneurs, freelancers with side-projects (often with the goal to become full-time entrepreneurs), and full-time employees with side projects.
🚧 WIP is great.
I had questions about Webpack & I posted all over the internet & I got my answers only in WIP
You want designers. WIP has it.
Developers. WIP has it.
Marketers. WIP has it.
It is diverse community of makers from all over the world 🌐
It is the only community with full of positivity. No bullshit.
Although it is a community of shippers, there is a lot of help from the community if anyone ever gets stuck. Mostly all questions are answered.
I've joined WIP 5 months ago & its only been a fun ride.
#wip4life ❤️
Great community!
Thanks Marc, I also just launched my product I've been building public on wip.chat what a coincidence! https://www.producthunt.com/post...
I've been recommending WIP to friends for months now! Come for the accountability, stay for the music! WIP just continues to deliver. It's a great support system, especially for those of us working in areas of the world where there isn't an active community of makers and founders to draw support and feedback from.
Pros:Active and engaged community. Always positive, always helpful. Well worth the membership fee!
Cons:If you're cash-strapped, it can seem pricey (it's not, IMHO). I'd love to see Marc add a 48-hour trial, or scholarships for those in need.
I'm now a member for three months and it has been a great platform to meet other indie product developers and receive feedback on my products.
WIP.chat automatically creates a history of tasks completed which is an excellent method to get a feeling for how much you've accomplished over a certain amount of time ( as an indie dev sometimes it just feels like you're stuck in the mud ). ⚡️
Indie product developing from home can get a bit lonely sometimes, so having a community to be part of makes it a bit easier. 🌍
Congrats on the launch @marckohlbrugge! 🚀
Joining WIP has been a turning point to me. I before spent a whole year working on side projects and had no one to share my progress, to ask technical questions, talk about pricing and even strategy. I was going to the wrong direction.
Since then, I've been shipping every single day for the last 3 months: https://wip.chat/@lbckr alongside with a 9-5 job, which led me to launch my project and reach $100+ MRR within a month. All credit goes to WIP and its people 🙌
I have been very productive for the last 70 days. The gamification of keeping your streak (shipping every day) going is addictive. Money making makers are already in the groups, & their comments on what works and what doesn't is quite valuable.
Pros:Dope community, veterans & beginners all come together for the common goal of shipping stuff, usually every day!
Cons:Lack option of collecting emails or any means of gathering interest for your products among the community itself
Thanks for your review Ashish! Adding email capture is an interesting idea for sure. Might add it at some point!
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