On vacation, but a quick update on our roadmap...

Plus, Ben is on a 1,000km bike trip vacation...

Every 3 weeks, I share my notes on building Shepherd.com.

I believe that books build better people. I am on a mission to help readers explore & discover books in new and unique ways. I want to create the magical feeling you get wandering around your favorite bookstore but for the online world. And I want to do this while helping authors reach readers in fun and authentic ways.

Three hurrahs for our 699 Founding Members who keep us independent and fund new features. My 2024 goal is to reach 1,000 members to fully fund our part-time developer and designer so we can keep building great new features for our community. 

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Mood check for Friday, May 24th 🤪

I have been on vacation since May 12th and I am currently on a 1,000km gravel bike ride across Spain to France and having a wonderful time (picture below). So, this will be a shorter update than most…

What are we working on?

Adding User Accounts & Personalized Book Recommendation Emails

This is going well, and I hope to have something I can share in three weeks for the next edition of this newsletter. Our part-time developer works 10 to 12 hours a week, so big projects can take a bit of time, but so far, this one is moving quickly!

Audiobook preview links removed for now

We removed those for now, as it is harder than we thought to figure out which books have them and all the subsequent logic. We will take another look in 3 to 6 weeks. If we can get it working, we will add them back.

Roadmap Review

What are we actively building?

• Adding user accounts for Shepherd.com.

• Adding a personalized book recommendation email

• Improving our audiobook preview links

What is next?

• Switching the Book Boost program for Founding Members to provide persistent exposure for their books as a perk to thank them for their continued support.

What is ready for the dev but I am not sure on ETA yet?

• Launching pages around book series and getting that in place.

What are the designer and I working on?

• Playing with some new ads for the Book Boost program to increase engagement.

• Some design improvements for the book recommendation list.

• All the design work needed to expand the bookshelves as a discovery point for readers.

• Finishing the interesting facts/stories design.

• Improving the book section design to expand it.

• The design work needed to switch the BBOY program to our Book DNA format.

What is going on outside of Shepherd?

I am on vacation and in the middle of a 1,000km bike ride from Spain to France.

What am I reading?

I just finished...

• The entire Wheel of Time series - I needed some comfort food and just finished the last book.

I am reading...

• M: Son of the Century - About Mussolini. I am ~65% done. I am digging it, but it is slow reading with much to think about. 

• Nomads: The Wanderers Who Shaped Our World - This is a fascinating account of a group that is part of our DNA, yet we don't know about them because they don't have physical evidence. 

Thanks, Ben

Pictures from my bike ride so far…