Originally published at: http://community.envato.com/author-ama-alex-spinu-of-indeed-team/
If you were ever wondering about how one can get started as a CodeCanyon author, what it takes to build up a portfolio of great items or how some manage to become a successful CodeCanyon authors in under a year, we organized an event to help answer some of these questions!
Meet Alex Spinu (azzaroco)
I’ve met Alex sometime late last year, when he agreed to have a coffee with me on a cold winter day over in Bucharest, Romania. I must say, I was immediately impressed by his knowledge and understanding of the Marketplaces! From the way he thinks about how his item preview material impacts item sales, onto what can be done to streamline communications with existing customers and more. Everything Alex does is optimize, optimize then go back to the drawing-board and do some more optimizing!
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Alex has been running his own business for nearly 9 years now, almost as long as Envato! Despite this coincidence, he only joined Envato as a CodeCanyon author a little under 2 years ago. His team is currently comprised of 4 team members, and their first project, released as a team was launched in 2006. Around 2012 they’ve found their passion for WordPress and have been addicted to it ever since.
With all the hard work and careful planning, Alex and his team Indeed managed to achieve Elite status in under a year, and currently have quite a few exciting plugins for sale on CodeCanyon. Alex is extremely proud of his latest one: Ultimate Membership Pro WordPress Plugin, which allows you to create and work with multi-level exclusive access for your users, to free or paid packages alike! You can check it out by clicking on the image below.
Community AMA (Ask Me Anything)
Last month we ran an AMA (Ask Me Anything) with Alex and he answered all incoming questions for two days straight. He deserves a huge round of applause for his diligence. Bravo!![image](upload://aI98yFbgKkavUKKB4RTgin8GUUD.jpg)
At the end of the event, Alex selected 3 of his favourite questions and each of the winners was sent a special pack with their very own Envato T-Shirt and matching Envato KeepCup!
Here are the Top 3 questions:
Jimmy Lac (jthemes) asked:
“Is this a strategy to make small packets of plugin? Most of your plugins are tiny ones which are actually useful but must have taken less time to develop.”
Alex S.:
We have small projects and big projects as well. The tiny ones are mainly Add-Ons for main Plugins. Bigger projects are not actually something that takes only a few days to complete. There’s usually a huge structure behind them and most of them took from one to few months to be released.
Surjith (surjithctly) asked:
“How’s your Work Life balance? Are you working from home? I saw a dog in your profile pic, how do you stay focused?”
Alex S.:
I’m still a human, so I need to have a limited work time, but I’m connected to my work all the time. I have my own office, that’s just to remind me that work time is for doing something, not losing your time. Ralf, my dog, came in my life around the same time as Envato. He’s with me all time, even in my office.
Phuong Pham of (WooRockets) asked:
“How do you get ideas of what type of plugin and its features to develop next, among so many kinds of plugins in the market? How do you ensure it fits your customer’ needs?”
Alex S.:
Finding the best idea/product to develop I think is the most important stage of the entire process. The main idea may come from anywhere. I remember that one of my items started from one advertising banner that I saw while walking on a street. After that, I’ve searched to see if it may fit well on the marketing, asked some previous customers and friends “What do you think about it?” and only when I’ve got positive feedback did I proceed to write down the development plan on paper. In other cases, I’ve discovered that there is a gap into a niche and something needs to be implemented for our Envato customers. There are so many ways to get ideas for the next products! All you need to keep in mind is to not pass through this stage too fast because it’s the most important one!
There were heaps of great questions asked by other members of our community, be sure to check them all out! Thanks to everyone who participated, Alex for being so kind as to answer all incoming questions and a big Congratulations to the three lucky winners!