Build Independently. Win Together: Why I Built IndieCrew

I built IndieCrew because I believe independent entrepreneurship works better when you have people around you. Today, one person can build a product that would have required an entire team just a few years ago. We have great tools, accessible infrastructure, and AI that lets us test ideas that might otherwise have stayed in a notebook. But there is still a huge amount of work between “I built something that works” and “I built a working business.” We need to understand customers, earn their trust, find a path to market, and make decisions no tool can reliably make for us. That is where the right person at the right moment can make a bigger difference than another month of development.

One of the main inspirations for IndieCrew comes from business networking clubs like BNI and BforB. If you spend most of your time around indie hackers and tech founders, you may never have heard of them. Their core idea is straightforward: a group of business owners meets regularly, gets to know each other’s work, and helps one another through referrals, introductions, and shared experience. BNI holds weekly meetings with a structured agenda, while BforB describes regular meetings of an established group, typically every two weeks or once a month. That rhythm matters. When you see someone repeatedly, you begin to understand what they do, who their work helps, and whether you can count on them. Over time, something emerges that advertising cannot buy: people who trust you enough to recommend you to someone else.

What interests me most about this model is how it changes the meaning of a “connection.” Having someone’s email address does not mean you have a relationship. Sending someone a list of potential customers does not mean you have made a useful referral. Imagine someone you know is struggling with a problem, and you know another person who can solve it. You understand both sides, can explain why they should talk, and make an introduction with their permission. That introduction carries weight because you are putting your own credibility behind it. The person you introduce gets to begin the conversation with someone they trust saying, “I think this person could help you.” For a small business, that conversation can lead to a first customer, a lasting partnership, or a clearer understanding of who actually needs its product.

Just as valuable is the help that does not immediately lead to a sale. Someone tells you they read your homepage and still have no idea what you are selling. Someone looks at your pricing and asks the question you have been avoiding for weeks. Someone has already dealt with the same onboarding problem and saves you ten failed attempts. To me, this is the heart of a good business community: people gradually learn enough about each other to offer specific, useful help. You do not have to explain your entire story from the beginning every time. And you can talk about things you might hesitate to share publicly. That you do not know why customers are leaving. That you have a good product but struggle to sell it. Or that you have spent three months building something nobody may want.

I want to bring that principle into the world of independent founders. Our work follows a different rhythm from a traditional local business. A customer might be on the other side of the world, a product can change in a week, and the person who can help us most might be building something completely different. Yet we still need the same foundations: knowing one another, understanding one another, and having a reason to trust that people will follow through. That is why, for me, IndieCrew starts with the person. Who are you? What are you building? What do you need help with right now? And what can you offer others? A project gives those questions context, but the relationship grows between people. I want it to feel natural to say, “I need to find my first three customers,” and meet someone who understands that market or can introduce you to a person worth talking to. I imagine collaboration you can describe in a simple sentence. I will go through your onboarding and tell you where I got lost. You will help me prepare for customer interviews. I know someone facing exactly the problem your product addresses, and I will ask whether I can introduce you. Some help will happen spontaneously, with no expectation of anything in return. Other times, it will help to agree clearly on who will do what and by when. In both cases, what matters to me is the outcome: whether it actually helped the other person. Those are the experiences I want trust in IndieCrew to grow from. When someone consistently helps others make progress, the community should be able to recognize and appreciate that contribution.

I also believe healthy collaboration takes time and a certain generosity. If I help today, the same person may not help me tomorrow. Someone else might. A good relationship might create an opportunity six months later. And sometimes it makes sense to help simply because you can. At the same time, I want IndieCrew to respect the time of the people who join it. Founders have their own work, customers, and commitments. A community has to earn its place in their lives by bringing useful conversations and real opportunities. My ambition is for even a small group of active members to have a reason to return because they have experienced what it feels like to receive meaningful help—and how rewarding it is to offer that help to someone else.

I have a very concrete picture of what success looks like for IndieCrew. Someone finds their first paying customer through it. Someone meets a distribution partner. Someone gets honest feedback early enough to stop building the wrong thing. And someone who already has a working business helps a person a few steps behind them, discovering that they have something to learn in the process too. Those are the stories I want IndieCrew to create. To me, independence means being able to make your own decisions about your work and your future. Having a good crew around you expands what is possible. That is why I built IndieCrew.

Build independently. Win together.