adepty

Finally updated my homepage for adepty.com to provide a better overview of what the platform is about. It's not perfect but fine tuning content etc. It's well received by our early sellers, which have now passed 100. Having spent most of my career working for big tech, I made the mistake of coming across too established and too corporate. Our seller community really buy into the fact we are small, we listen and we are actively supporting them (shoutouts on insta, introductions to buyers etc.) We have created a Whatsapp group between sellers, which seems to have gone down very well. Great discussions, welcome messages etc. I've also engaged a writer to interview our members for content marketing but also to see if there is a newsworthy article in there. I guess the major learning has been beyond the ease of enablement through nocode/locode tech, it can be quite easy (cheap) to create intimacy in our respective communities through chat/phonecalls etc. Ultimately, more than the tech, that intimacy builds a loyal community.

Finally updated my homepage for adepty.com to provide a better overview of what the platform is about. It's not perfect but fine tuning content etc. It's well received by our early sellers, which have now passed 100. Having spent most of my career working for big tech, I made the mistake of coming across too established and too corporate. Our seller community really buy into the fact we are small, we listen and we are actively supporting them (shoutouts on insta, introductions to buyers etc.) We have created a Whatsapp group between sellers, which seems to have gone down very well. Great discussions, welcome messages etc. I've also engaged a writer to interview our members for content marketing but also to see if there is a newsworthy article in there. I guess the major learning has been beyond the ease of enablement through nocode/locode tech, it can be quite easy (cheap) to create intimacy in our respective communities through chat/phonecalls etc. Ultimately, more than the tech, that intimacy builds a loyal community.

adepty is now just over 3 full months in and shy of 100 users on the platform. Everything feels like it takes 3x longer than anticipated which can feel demotivating but then I have to ask myself why did I think it would be x amount of time in the first place? In the cold light of day I now realise that the various workstreams are probably taking a rational amount of time and it's only looking back at how far you have come that you appreciate your own progress. This week I got recurring classes shipped, which is big as it brings adepty closer to providing a broad variety of payment options for our seller. We are reducing the reasons to need another platform to fulfill an important use case for educators, performers and practitioners. Also for those on the platform who hadn't looked beyond 1:1 hourly or fixed price sessions, we are making it very convenient to try it out...i.e. creating opportunity for them. Ok, it's not perfect but we have shipped as a means to hear feedback from our base. Also it's a clear demonstration that we have been listening to their needs and acting on them. Very much tied to the recent progress and acceleration development wise has been unearthing an incredible talent on UpWork, Shane G a backend and not too shabby frontend dev. After a bit of a nightmare on UpWork, from dev's vastly exaggerating their experience and skills, to blatantly lying about who they have worked with...I uncovered a gem. His contribution has given me renewed enthusiasm for the project, as his attitude is action orientated whilst also being comprehensive in detailing the approach. It's all about who you work with. Yes, it's a temporarily working arrangement on this project BUT pulling great people into a project even temporarily can get you through a difficult phase. The next challenge ahead is getting those on the platform super familiar with whats possible, to achieve that we have signed posted the heck out of the site with guided help flows...(contribution from the new found contractor). Also getting sellers from sign up to publishing their profiles was proving problematic, especially with our requirement to complete the ID verification process on Stripe. Our new help flows have got us from a 75-85% drop off rate to already under 50%. At the top of the funnel I'm improving the landing page to be more informative and directive about what adepty is/isn't. I'm also engaging with content writers about appropriate approaches to shine a light on the talent already on our platform and their unique stories. To date I have been shy about promotion as I pursued an excellent product...hard reminder is that it wont be excellent if I'm not actively pushing the platform and growing interest. The classic rising tides, raise all ships. So I better get louder!

Out of the box (ShareTribe Flex) we went with hourly pricing for adepty as 1) we had to start somewhere, 2) it was easiest to do and 3) the tiny cohort of sellers we originally spoke to worked on this basis. Lessons learnt! As we widened our view of who adepty was for and not, it became clear that pricing flexibility would help include more of the types of service sellers we wanted. Also the spirit of what we are trying to do for independents is create flexibility (of working hours, working location, of services provided) so having just one pricing model wasn't really very flexible of us. Loads of work ahead to fix stuff thats broken or doesn't make sense but seeing more traction and learning LOADS! Everyday is a school day!

After ~7 weeks of work, proud to release adepty. I'm mostly working on getting a few service provider friends through the funnel and fine tuning the experience. Already spotted obvious areas for improvement but now that it's out there it feels a lot more real..The premise of adepty is to help solo service providers (or people with skills who need to earn in their spare time) gain access to new income streams and productivity tools. In a Covid world, I decided to take on some risk to lower the barriers to entry for anyone to earn. It didn't feel right asking for a subscription with the uncertainty this exact profile face. I'm focused on building a two sided marketplace for the UK and Ireland to begin with, but any service provider in Europe is free to make use of the platform and start taking bookings and payments. I just won't be helping grow buyer demand for their cities just yet.