Building in Public: The Indie Maker's Secret Weapon

In a world where everyone is fighting for attention, there's one strategy that consistently works for indie makers: building in public.

It's not about bragging. It's not about oversharing. It's about creating authentic connections that turn strangers into supporters, supporters into customers, and customers into advocates.

What is Building in Public?

Building in public means sharing your journey as you create your product—the wins, the losses, the revenue numbers, and the lessons learned.

It's the opposite of the traditional approach where founders work in secret, then reveal a "finished" product to the world.

"The best marketing is telling people what you're building, why you're building it, and how it's going." — @levelsio

The Spectrum of Transparency

Building in public exists on a spectrum:

Closed                                            Open
  |------------------------------------------|
  |    |         |         |         |       |
Secret  Occasional  Regular    Open    Full
         Updates    Updates   Revenue  Transparency

Most successful builders operate in the "Regular Updates to Open Revenue" range. You don't need to share everything—find your comfort level.

Why Building in Public Works

1. Trust Through Transparency

When you show your work, people trust you more. They see you're a real person solving real problems, not a faceless company.

The psychology:

• Transparency signals honesty
• Vulnerability creates connection
• Progress updates build anticipation

2. Free Marketing Engine

Every update is content. Every milestone is a story. Building in public turns your development process into a continuous marketing campaign.

const contentFromBuilding = {
  daily: [
    "Feature you're working on",
    "Bug you squashed",
    "User feedback received"
  ],
  weekly: [
    "Progress updates",
    "Metrics and revenue",
    "Lessons learned"
  ],
  monthly: [
    "Revenue milestones",
    "Growth retrospectives",
    "Feature launches"
  ]
}

3. Built-In Accountability

When you commit publicly to building something, you feel obligated to follow through. Your audience becomes your accountability partner.

4. Early Feedback Loop

By sharing early, you get feedback before you've invested months in the wrong direction. Your audience helps you build the right thing.

5. Audience Before Product

When you build in public, you're building an audience alongside your product. By launch day, you have people ready to buy.

The traditional path:

Build product (months) → Launch → Find customers → Hope

The build-in-public path:

Share journey → Build audience → Launch → Sell to audience

What to Share (And What Not To)

Share: The Journey

Wins (big and small):

• First paying customer
• Revenue milestones ($100, $1K, $10K MRR)
• Feature launches
• Positive user feedback

Challenges (real ones):

• Technical problems you're solving
• Decisions you're wrestling with
• Mistakes you've made and what you learned

Process:

• How you approach problems
• Tools and workflows you use
• Why you made specific decisions

Example Content by Type

The Milestone Update:

🎉 Just crossed $1,000 MRR!

Took 6 months of:
- 3 pivots
- 100+ customer calls
- Way too much coffee

Here's what actually worked:
[Thread]

The Behind-the-Scenes:

Spent 4 hours debugging this issue.

The problem: [brief explanation]
What I tried: [list]
The solution: [what worked]

Maybe this saves someone else 4 hours 🤷

The Honest Reflection:

Real talk: This month was rough.

- Revenue down 15%
- Churn higher than expected
- Main feature delayed

Here's what I'm doing about it:
[Plan]

Don't Share

Things to keep private:

Platforms for Building in Public

Twitter/X: The Epicenter

Twitter remains the primary platform for building in public. Here's why it works:

Pros:

• Largest indie maker community
• Easy to get discovered
• Threads work well for longer updates
• Direct access to potential customers

Best practices:

• Post 1-3 times daily (mix of value and updates)
• Use threads for milestone posts
• Engage with others in your niche
• Don't just broadcast—have conversations

Hashtags that work:

• #buildinpublic
• #indiehackers
• #saas
• #startup

LinkedIn: The Sleeper Hit

LinkedIn has become surprisingly effective for B2B builders:

Pros:

• Less saturated than Twitter
• Higher engagement on long-form posts
• Professional audience = potential customers
• Content lives longer in the feed

Best practices:

• Weekly updates work well
• Focus on lessons and insights
• Professional tone (but still authentic)
• Engage with comments actively

Indie Hackers: The Community

Indie Hackers is purpose-built for builders:

Pros:

• Extremely supportive community
• Built-in product pages
• Revenue milestones are celebrated
• Less noise than social media

Best practices:

• Post milestone updates
• Share detailed retrospectives
• Engage in discussions
• Link to your product page

Your Own Blog

A blog creates a permanent record of your journey:

Pros:

• Full control over content
• SEO benefits
• Email capture opportunity
• Professional credibility

Best practices:

• Monthly or bi-weekly updates
• In-depth posts with real data
• Include email signup
• Cross-post summaries to social

Growing Your Audience

Building in public only works if people see your updates. Here's how to grow your following:

The Consistency Formula

const audienceGrowth = {
  daily: "1-3 tweets (at least one original)",
  weekly: "1 thread or long-form post",
  monthly: "1 milestone or retrospective",

  engagement: {
    repliesPerDay: 10,     // Engage with others
    dmPerWeek: 5,          // Genuine connections
    collaborations: 1      // Monthly guest post/podcast
  }
}

Content That Gets Traction

High-engagement content types:

The Engagement Flywheel

Growing your audience isn't just about posting—it's about engaging:

1. Find your people: Search hashtags, follow similar makers
2. Engage genuinely: Add value to conversations, don't just comment "great post!"
3. Be helpful first: Answer questions, share resources
4. Build relationships: DM people you genuinely connect with
5. Get featured: Guest post, join podcasts, collaborate

Converting Followers to Customers

Building in public isn't just about vanity metrics. The goal is business growth.

The Funnel

Strangers
    ↓ [Your content appears in their feed]
Followers
    ↓ [They engage and see value]
Engaged Fans
    ↓ [They try your product]
Free Users
    ↓ [They see enough value]
Paying Customers
    ↓ [They love your transparency]
Advocates

Conversion Tactics

1. Soft CTAs in Updates

Just shipped the dashboard redesign!

Much cleaner now, and load time dropped by 40%.

If you want to try it: [link]

2. Launch Updates

New feature alert: [Feature Name]

Here's what it does: [benefit]

Perfect for: [use case]

Already available for all users 👉 [link]

3. Social Proof

Amazing feedback from @customer today:

"[Quote about how your product helped them]"

This is why I love building in public—hearing
how it actually helps people 🙏

4. Exclusive Offers

Hitting 10K followers this week 🎉

To celebrate, offering 50% off for my followers:
Use code FOLLOWERS50 at [link]

Available until Friday!

What Not to Do

Conversion killers:

• Every post is a sales pitch
• No genuine value, just promotion
• Ignoring comments and questions
• Being defensive about criticism
• Abandoning transparency after launch

Real Examples of Building in Public

@levelsio (Pieter Levels)

• Shares revenue openly ($2M+ ARR)
• Documents failures and pivots
• Builds products live on stream
• Massive audience (400K+ followers)

@jonbrosio

• Daily writing about his journey
• Shares specific tactics and numbers
• Built audience before product
• Converted followers to consulting clients

@marckohlbrugge (WIP.co)

• Created a community around building in public
• Shares everything about WIP's growth
• Transparent about all metrics

Getting Started: Your First Week

Day 1: Set Up

• Optimize your Twitter/LinkedIn bio
• Follow 50 makers in your space
• Find 10 accounts to learn from

Day 2-3: Observe

• Study what posts get engagement
• Note content formats that work
• Engage with others (10+ replies daily)

Day 4-5: Create

• Share something about your project
• Post a "here's what I'm building" introduction
• Ask for feedback on a specific decision

Day 6-7: Iterate

• Review what got engagement
• Double down on what works
• Plan your next week of content

Content Calendar Template

## Weekly Build-in-Public Schedule

MONDAY: Progress update
- What you worked on last week
- What you're tackling this week

WEDNESDAY: Behind-the-scenes
- Technical challenge you solved
- Decision you're making
- Process or workflow share

FRIDAY: Wins and lessons
- Metrics update (if any)
- Customer feedback highlight
- Lesson learned

WEEKEND (optional): Personal
- Founder life content
- Industry thoughts
- Engage with community

The Long Game

Building in public is a long-term strategy. Don't expect overnight results.

Realistic timeline:

• Month 1-3: Building habits, finding your voice
• Month 3-6: Starting to see engagement
• Month 6-12: Audience growth compounds
• Year 1+: Real business impact

The compounding effect:

Every piece of content builds on the last. Your early posts build credibility for later posts. Your followers share your content. Your audience grows exponentially, not linearly.

Building something you want to share? Launch on IndieLaunchHub and join a community of makers who believe in building in the open.