Burnout

Eight years ago I was doing graphic design for the second run of Zombology with my sleeping daughter in my arms.

Since then I've raised two kids to the ages of 13 and 8.

Worked full time as a Software Engineer, manager of Software Engineers, or Product Owner.

And run Eurydice Games.

Which takes about 2 days a week.

Every week.

I've worked 7 days a week for 8 years.

Matthew Dunstan's recent video about burnout touched a nerve.

The last few weeks we've had advert issues.

Poor website sales.

Stress.

Last year we lost a load of money due to crowdfunding timing and advertising the website being unprofitable.

More stress.

Photo by nikko macaspac on Unsplash

The last couple of weeks I've lacked the mojo to sort out a few boring jobs about running a company.

They are starting to pile up.

Fortunately, I have an amazing wife of 22 years.

Even more fortunately, she has a new job. More hours. And a better salary.

So I've dropped Mondays at work.

I'm going part time.

I'm hoping that will free up some time to relax. 

Recuperate. 

Re-energise.

I'll be able to do some Eurydice work during daylight hours.

Not at the end of a long work day.

After family time and chores.

Hopefully, that'll help with both creativity, productivity and progress.

It starts today! 

Recovery

It's possible the website is fixed.

I think I've found the issue with the false orders.

And fixed it.

Meta is no longer reporting false sales.

And after a week and a half of no orders, we've had 5 in the last 5 days.

A return to normality.

And breathe.

Photo by Max van den Oetelaar on Unsplash

With that load off my mind, I've been able to spend some time on the new roll and write.

The last few changes have been minimal.

It's stabilising.

Which means it's time to do a first cut of the written rules.

Which is required before I can start sending out playtest copies.

And getting some real feedback.

And hopefully some ideas for improvement.

Weirdness

It's been a bad week for the website and ads combo.

We normally get 7-10 orders a week.

Pretty reliably.

We spend a chunk of money on Facebook ads to get that.

Last week we had none.

Not one.

That hasn't happened for years.

We've been spending the same amount on ads though.

And here's where it gets really weird.

Facebook reckon their ads have brought in 21 sales this week.

21!

But we've had none.

What!?

I even placed an order myself to check the website was still working.

It is.

But the ads are screwed.

Need to fix that somehow...

Segue

The recent change to the De Minimis customs rule in the US is a real pain.

Historically, about half our sales have gone to the US.

Half!

Now, anyone buying from the US faces 10% tariffs (it's UK made at least - in Paul's garage).

Plus courier fees, which have been less than $10 from what I've seen so far.

It's a pain, and it'll make future US web sales harder.

So I've stopped advertising to the US.

Which is going to cost us a lot of sales.

But save us some advertising money.

How can we segue to keep things going?

Photo by Beth Macdonald on Unsplash

We've always sold the P&P files for FlickFleet.

And we've now four print and play roll and write games.

They are all tariff-free at least.

Perhaps we need to promote them more?

We can advertise those worldwide.

No shipping fees. No tariffs.

But ads for them haven't worked well in the past.

I wonder if I can improve them to work in future.

Something needs to change!