A Look Back - A Look Ahead - 2022 Edition - RD309

A look back at 2022 and a look ahead to 2023.

Thank you for your continued interest in Resourceful Designer. You have no idea how much I appreciate you. Many great resources are available for learning and growing as a designer, and I’m humbled that you chose to spend a bit of your valuable time with me.

I am continuing my annual tradition. This last podcast episode of 2022 is my Look Back, Look Ahead edition. It’s where I reflect and share my year as a design business owner. Then I’ll look ahead at what I want to accomplish in 2023.

A Look Back at my 2022 goals.

At the end of 2021, I set these goals for myself.

FAIL: Talk at more conferences. Even though we were on the downslope of the pandemic, I chose not to travel in 2022. Therefore I wasn’t able to talk at any conferences. I also made the decision not to speak at any virtual conferences. I’ve presented at virtual conferences and found the return wasn’t worth the time commitment to prepare and give my talk.

EVEN: Grow the Resourceful Designer podcast audience. Since the pandemic hit in 2020, my podcast listenership has dropped, but the total number of downloads has increased. I attribute this to older listeners giving up on the podcast while new listeners discover it and download multiple episodes.

ACCOMPLISHED: Grow the Resourceful Designer Community. The Community is my pride and joy. One day, when I’m no longer doing the podcast, I’ll look back at everything I did with Resourceful Designer, and I’m sure the Community will be my proudest accomplishment. The friendships formed and all the freely given help is more than I could have ever hoped.

If you’re looking for camaraderie with fellow designers and are not a Community member, I highly suggest you check it out.

ACCOMPLISHED: Do more consulting work. Several clients paid for my consulting service, both in and outside the podcast space. I added podcast brand audit as a service under Podcast Branding which brought in several consulting clients.

ACCOMPLISHED: Grow Podcast Branding. What started as an offshoot of my main design business has become my main business focus. Podcast Branding is earning me more money than my main business ever has, with much less effort.

Some of my numbers from 2022

Resourceful Designer

• I released 30 podcast episodes. The lowest in a calendar year since I launched the podcast. As my Podcast Branding business increases, it’s become harder to make the time to produce the podcast.
• It reached over 710k total episode downloads in 2022. That’s an 80k increase over last year.
• Resourceful Designer released on Gaana, Boommplay, Deezer, JioSaavn and Resso.
• Resourceful Designer has listeners in 120 countries around the world.

My design business

NOTE: I didn’t actively promote my design business in 2022. Instead, I concentrated on growing my other business, Podcast Branding. I continued working with existing clients but made no effort to attract new ones.

• Worked on 43 design projects for 22 different clients (one fewer client than in 2021)
• Gained one new client in 2022.
• I lost one client due to closure.
• I sent out 27 invoices in 2022 (down from 41 in 2021)
• Revenue increased over 2021.

Podcast Branding

My Podcast Branding business was my moneymaker this year.

• Worked on 66 different projects for 47 different clients (more projects b