Indie business club with Barfield and McKinney

Hello, and welcome to our first full-length podcast episode of 2025 🙌🏻 If you enjoy the show, you can chip in on our production costs at ko-fi.com/indiebusinessclub please and thank you 💖In episode 15 “The Masterplan”, we talk about…how setting goals can help you to protect your boundariesthe power of writing your goals downhow setting a specific number as a target c

On this minisode we discuss the concept of having a "word of the year". In case you missed it, we’re speaking at the Alt Marketing School open day on Thursday 16th January. There are 14 speakers and we’re talking about tone of voice and why it’s important for your brand and your business. Click the pic for tickets.It’s an affiliate link so if you opt for the paid ticket for

Hello, Mel here,We’re rounding off the year with a b-side to revisit LinkedIn. The b-sides are shorter chats than a normal episode, so if you've got any topics you'd like us to chew over for 10-15 minutes, let us know.A brief, unimportant disclaimerTurns out I got my Paul brothers mixed up in this b-side. Apologies to any boxing fans. Though, true boxing fans probably don't know

Hello, Award-Winning-Copywriter Mel and Non-Award-Entering Ben here.Today’s episode is called Handbags And Gladrags. It’s all about industry awards and whether they’re worth entering as an indie business owner. Spoiler: Mel says yes.Industry awards don’t always come with a great reputation. I (Ben) have definitely been a bit sniffy about them in the past. But it’s been a

Today’s episode is called You’re The Voice, and we talk about what tone of voice is, why it’s important to you and your business, and how to get in touch with your own unique verbal identity. It’s a bit of a high-pressure episode because we both offer tone of voice work in our businesses (me as a freelancer, Ben as part of Copy Or Die, the copywriting agency he runs with fr

There’s so much tech around nowadays, it’s hard to know where to start. Today’s episode is called Plug In Baby, and we talk about which software we use in our own indie businesses. Safe to say, we aren’t the techiest of bros. Tetchiest, more like.We’ve got a voicenote from exec VA and all-round processes legend Jo Shock, who talks us through what to consider when choosing

We met up in Norwich this week (thanks, half term) to plan out our upcoming episodes. We’ve got topics up to #20, but we always welcome suggestions. Themes include tone of voice (suggested by Amy Nolan), software, and copywriting (it’s probably about time).Today’s episode is called Somebody Told Me, and we talk about how inbound referrals can boost your business. We picked th

Hi, Mel here,Today’s episode is called Paranoid Android, and it’s all about AI. Specifically, generative AI. Even more specifically, the large language model (LLM) kind. Think ChatGPT and the suchlike. This one's a re-record because my mic - despite being plugged in and switched on - wasn't picked up by the software. Even though the software said it was. I’m over it, though.Q

Hallo, Ben here,Today’s episode is called Shiny Happy People, and it’s all about building a personal brand. Mel and I dig into what a personal brand actually is, and what having one might do for your business.Have you got a personal brand? Do you want one?? Do you need one???In this show, we’ll ask and answer all those questions and more. As a slight spoiler, Mel will say tha

Hi, Mel and Ben here,Today’s episode is called Chasing Rainbows, and it’s all about business planning. There’s a strong theme of “do as we say, not as we do” in this episode 🙃. We both tend to approach our business planning with the start point of, “how do we want our family life to look?” We both have young children and share school run duties with Mr Barfield & M