2014 - Year in Review

Discussions
#1

Thought it might be nice to have a thread where people can talk about how their year went.

What Did You Get Out Of Your Year?

So. How did it go? Your year? Was it good, did you meet your goals? Did you have goals? In this episode, aside from trying to recover from that debacle of a last episode, Brecht and Scott evaluate this past year and provide some guides on how to execute a productive yearly retrospective.

#2

I will definitely write up how my year went, but feel it’s still a bit too early :wink:

#3

I’ll probably write up a more personal/all round post on my blog but we did a bit of a review of the year at Perch in our recent podcast: http://grabaperch.com/blog/archive/review-of-the-year-2014

It’s a good exercise to look back I think, as it can feel like pretty slow progress in a one or two person business, then you look back and realise just how much you achieved.

#4

Here you have ours from Team Password Manager (slightly copying Rachel’s format): http://teampasswordmanager.com/blog/farewell-2014-welcome-2015/

#5

I don’t have a fancy pants blog, so I’ll just put the content right here in the post.

In the last year:

  • Went from zero to a product that is at worst “on par” with our competitors. Failed to get too many features that blow them out of the water. Started on many, ran into issues, haven’t finished any. Not tooo happy about that part, but the problems are legitimately hard to do at any sort of scale at all.
  • Iterated at least three times on the design (I am not a designer), each one better than the last, though I still can identify tons of rough edges.
  • Got only a single super fan (this is the part I’m least happy with).
  • Identified a relevant subreddit, got included in their sidebar. So far this is my biggest source of first-time visitors that doesn’t rely on my time. (That is to say that I get more when I actively promote).
  • Identified a sister site of sorts and formed a sort of partnership – we both use eachothers APIs, gain features, and have links to eachother in relevant spots. So far this is looking promising as a passive traffic source, but it’s very early.
  • Got the confidence to reach out to someone that could singlehandedly triple my stature in the relevant community with a sneeze. Have not heard back yet, but that was just sent yesterday and he’s a busy man. We have previously had email conversations and this isn’t an unusual delay yet.
  • Have reached a point where I have solid plans for next year that are both higher risk and higher reward.
#6

http://www.kalzumeus.com/2014/12/22/kalzumeus-software-year-in-review-2014/

(Not mine, but I imagine it will be of interest.)

#7

I wrote up my Review of the Year on Christmas Eve, so here it is

#8

Here’s mine. This is a great idea. It helped me take a step back and look at some aggregate metrics that I don’t usually look at.

http://www.waltschlender.com/poets-corner-2014-year-review/

#9

Posted mine yesterday: http://doubleyourfreelancing.com/annual-review-2014/

#10

Saw this one for a content-based business: http://joelhooks.com/blog/2014/12/24/bootstrapping-egghead-dot-io-to-feed-my-family-2014-in-review

#11

I posted mine yesterday as well:

“Before you make plans, take a look at what’s already working.” - Hiten Shah

http://justinjackson.ca/2014-a-year-of-making-stuff/

#12

Posted mine yesterday: http://www.it-engelhardt.de/year-review-2014/

There’s also a list of all the posts here: www.startupclarity.com/blog/bootstrappers-2014-year-review/

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#13

The year in review from the solo developer of Dash, a Mac “API Documentation Browser and Code Snippet Manager,” with good numbers and charts.