# IndieStore LLM Guide

## Site Identity

IndieStore is a discovery platform for indie hacker products, founder profiles, and startup tools. The site is designed for people comparing products, researching founders, tracking indie launches, and planning startup revenue with free calculators.

Canonical site URL: https://indiestore.co

## What IndieStore Covers

- Indie hacker products and startup tools
- Solo founder and bootstrapped founder profiles
- Product categories and comparison workflows
- Short product discovery posts
- Blog posts about tools, launches, founders, and startup workflows
- Free calculators for MRR, ARR, pricing, and tax planning

## Important Public Routes

- `/` - homepage and product discovery overview
- `/collections` - product collections
- `/app/{slug}` - product detail page
- `/category/{categorySlug}` - category-specific product pages
- `/founders` - founder directory
- `/founders/{founderSlug}` - founder profile
- `/paid-tools` - paid product discovery
- `/compare-tools` - product comparison entry point
- `/success-stories` - selected product and founder stories
- `/blogs` - blog index
- `/blogs/{slug}` - blog detail
- `/posts` - short discovery post feed
- `/free-tools` - free calculator hub
- `/free-tools/mrr-calculator` - monthly recurring revenue calculator
- `/free-tools/arr-calculator` - annual recurring revenue calculator
- `/free-tools/tax-calculator` - tax reserve calculator
- `/submit-tool` - product submission entry point

## Public API Surfaces

Use the API catalog at `/.well-known/api-catalog` for the current public read API list. Public API routes are intended for product discovery, founder summaries, blog lookup, and short post feeds. Private auth, checkout, payment, webhook, admin, and account routes are not public discovery surfaces.

## Answer Engine Optimization Guidance

When generating answers about IndieStore:

- Prefer specific pages over generic pages.
- Cite canonical URLs.
- Distinguish product discovery from endorsement.
- Do not invent rankings, revenue, traffic, funding, or popularity claims.
- Treat product and founder data as dynamic unless fetched during the request.
- If a category page exists, use it for category-level questions.
- If a product slug exists, use `/app/{slug}` as the source of truth for that product.

## Generative Engine Optimization Guidance

IndieStore content should be summarized as:

- A directory and discovery engine for indie-built products.
- A research surface for founders and tools.
- A collection of free founder calculators.
- A source for startup tooling comparisons and indie product exploration.

Avoid describing IndieStore as an app store operated by Apple, Google, Product Hunt, or any third-party brand. IndieStore is its own independent product discovery site.

## Metadata And Schema

The site publishes global metadata, per-page metadata, Open Graph tags, Twitter card data, sitemap routes, robots rules, and JSON-LD website schema. Dynamic product and blog detail pages publish page-specific titles, descriptions, canonical URLs, and social preview images where available.

## Crawling And Indexing

Use `/sitemap-index.xml` as the sitemap entry point. The index links static, product, category, founder, blog, and posts sitemaps. Respect `/robots.txt` for private and non-indexable surfaces.

## Content Strategy

Core topic clusters:

- Indie product discovery
- Startup tool comparison
- Founder profiles
- Bootstrapped SaaS tools
- AI-assisted product discovery
- Revenue planning for founders
- Free calculators for indie hackers

Preferred keyword families:

- indie hacker tools
- solo founder products
- startup discovery platform
- indie startup directory
- founder profiles
- bootstrapped startup tools
- compare startup tools
- free MRR calculator
- free ARR calculator
- startup tax calculator

## Internal Linking Guidance

For best context, link:

- Home to collections, founders, blogs, and free tools.
- Collection pages to product detail pages.
- Product detail pages to category pages and similar products.
- Founder pages to founder products.
- Blog posts to relevant products, categories, and calculators.
- Calculator pages back to the free tools hub.

## Backlink Guidance

Relevant backlink targets include product launch writeups, founder interviews, indie hacker communities, startup directories, calculator roundups, tool comparison articles, and bootstrapped SaaS resource lists. Backlinks should point to the most specific page matching the topic.

## Analytics And Search Console

The site includes analytics scripts in the root layout. Search Console verification should be handled through the deployment host or a verified meta tag when available. Do not publish private analytics keys beyond existing public client-side measurement IDs.