Season 3 kick off and introducing The Germany List

Hey everyone! Season 3 is FINALLY underway.

Also, big announcement! I'm excited to introduce The Germany List. 

This came out of the need to connect and support the expat business community in Germany, this open directory is a centralized resource for international entrepreneurs, creators, and service providers. 

Together with my co-founder, Lindsey, we're publicly building a platform that aims to make finding and promoting Ausländer English-friendly services easier than ever. 

Tune in to learn more about the Germany List and how you can add your business, service or community group if you have one and discover new ones nearby.

Links:
https://thegermanylist.de/

Add your business:
https://thegermanylist.de/add-your-business/

You can find this episode and all episodes as well as show notes for each at https://thegermanylist.de/the-germany-expat-business-show-podcast/

Starting or running a business in Germany as a foreigner? Already running an online business in Germany as an expat? Wanting to grow your German-based business? Working as a freelancer in Germany? You'll love my guide with over 30 resources for expat business owners in Germany.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Hi, I'm Eleanor Meyerhofer, a native Californian designer and digital strategist. In October of 1999, a few years after graduating from design school, I flew from San Francisco to Munich with a fistful of Deutschmarks, a dial-up connection and an extremely vague plan. Twenty-plus years later, after a 10-year stint at a global agency agency, freelancing and launching two online businesses, I'm still here Now I'm talking to other expat business owners to share knowledge, stories and inspiration for other non-Germans running businesses in Germany. Hey everyone, I just want to drop in and say I know it has been a very long pause since the end of season two, but season three is coming. I have a lot of episodes in the hopper, including interviews with Ausländer, entrepreneurs from India, romania, portugal and a couple of guests that are like fourth or fifth culture people that I feel kind of mean asking them to explain their story in two minutes because they're from all over the place before. They lived all over the place before settling in Germany and starting their businesses here. There are a few reasons for this long pause, but the main one is that this podcast will become part of a project that I have been working on since the spring, so when I first moved to Munich at the end of the 90s, the only game in town for finding help or meeting other foreigners was Toy Town, munich, so I think it's even still around.

Speaker 1: 1:39

But after a while came Facebook and all the social media and bigger platforms like the Local and I Am Expat, but what I've found is that the downside of these bigger platforms is that a lot of information on where to find other international businesses or events or services and groups is really fragmented. It's either buried in Facebook groups or it's a behind a paywall or in Slack channels. And the example I always like to give is there's a woman in Dago Fing who makes these Christmas hams that are like American style Christmas hams, and I always have to go into a different Facebook group and type like Christmas ham when I'm trying to find this person. And so what I've also learned is just launching websites for people starting their businesses in Germany is the thing they most want is clients and business, and it seemed to me that there was missing a kind of Craigslist for expat businesses and you know not businesses that are just financial planners or international schools or relocation companies. Those are great, but those places have places where they can advertise or get their name out, get their business out.

Speaker 1: 2:49

So, through this podcast and my work as a web designer and a digital strategist, I have come to see there is a rich and diverse and very large ecosystem of organizations, micro business, service providers, influencers and creators here, and I wanted to create an open and centralized place for all of them. So I partnered with my friend and fellow American, lindsay, and together we've founded something called the Germany List and we've launched the most minimum of minimal, viable product websites and we're adding businesses. It's a directory and we're adding businesses to it daily, and if you'd like to add yours, I will leave the link in the show notes where you can do so. Right now, we are focused on building out the directory, creating content, building an audience and driving traffic to the site so that it's valuable and everybody wins. So, again, I'm going to stress, the site is in a very beta state.

Speaker 1: 3:49

If you see errors and you will please let us know we're operating under the advice that I always champion which is done is better than perfect. So we just wanted to just finally ship this thing, and so, for all you listeners out there, nothing's going to change. You're going to see the episodes in your app, as always, and the only difference is that the show notes will now live on the Germany List website instead of my own Eleanor Meyer Hofer website. So I will see you again in a couple of weeks with the first official episode of season three, and thanks for listening. Bye, thanks for listening. You can find this and all other Germany Expat Business Show podcasts at thegermanylistde. Bye.