03. No Code Intro
Estimated Time
- Reading: ~6 minutes
- Video: ~38 minutes
- To Do: ~TK minutes
To Do
- 🔲 Sign up for Bubble [https://www.bubble.com/twist]
- 🔲 Complete the Bubble tutorials [https://bubble.io/lessons] ~51 minutes
- 🔲 Create a Wireframe or mockup of your application
No-Code during Founder.University
- The main goal of Founder.University is to help founders launch a Minimal Viable Product (MVP)
- We will spend the majority of the 12 weeks building and iterating on your MVP
- One of the most efficient ways to launch quickly is to leverage No-Code solutions
- There are several no-code platforms that you can leverage to build your MVP
- We have partnered with Bubble, one of the top no-code solutions, for Founder.University
- The examples we provide will be on their platform
- A lot of founders are asking how to get started with no-code
- "Curious to start learning how to build using no-code. Where can I go to learn and what are the best resources to leverage?"
- There are a lot of great responses to this question on this Twitter thread from @lolitataub
- Bottom line - use whatever solution works for you
- If you are familiar with coding and want to go that route - great!
- The concepts in the coming sections will still apply to you
- At the end of Founder.University we want you to have a working MVP
- We will provide suggestions and offer insights
- But with so many unique founders and ideas we simply can not say what will work best for everyone (nor do we want to micromanage)
- Select the tools that work best for you!
- So what is no-code?
- Jason's interviews with a couple founders will set the stage
Episode Date: November 23, 2020
[video] E1143 indie hackers
Top Insights
- You don't need permission to build your idea
- Anyone can learn skills online (free or inexpensively)
- Add skills to your toolbox
- Build something with value for another person
- They can choose to use your product
- Then they will give you money
- Indie Hackers started with a blog as the MVP
- They added a community forum, mailing list, and podcast after
- The community forum is the focus today
- It started small with an MVP and a couple of users
- Cortland and Indie Hackers identify a few key points to being successful as a founder:
1. Commit to Goal
- The most important is having a goal - why?
- Achievement inspires people - it is motivating
- It is hard to start a company and easy to quit
- Having goals helps to know when to call it quits or when to keep going when things are tough
2. Find a partner
- Having a partner helps with accountability
- When you no longer have a "boss" - many people struggle to stay focussed
- Having another person also is a great way to fill skill gaps
3. Brainstorming an Idea
- You have to know what you are going to build
- Who are you solving a problem for?
- How you are going to build it?
4. Build in public
- This helps with accountability too!
- Transparency is also inspiring
- It can build trust with your users
- Being transparent with what you do can magnify your success
5. Create an MVP
- Stay lean and start small
- Every version of the product needs to deliver value
- Find Courtland's full interview here - E1143 on This Week in Startups
- More information on Courtland Allen's Indie Hackers
Episode Date: December 4, 2020
[video] E1148 apps without code
Advantage of No-Code
- You don't need to be a developer to build a startup anyone
- Use no-code tools and APIs to create quickly
MVP with No-Code
- Understanding logic is the biggest requirement in no-code
- "If this happens, then that will happen" within the app
- No-code opens doors to people who have industry expertise in non-traditional "builder" industries
- What skillset is needed with no code?
- For the most part, anyone can use no code to create an MVP
- If you are relatively comfortable with technology will help
- Proximity to logic in your experience makes no-code easier
- Job with a logical oriented role helps think in this way
- Like project managers, health care (doctors), lawyers, etc.
- Even though you are not coding, you still have to think like an engineer
- Mainly using "if this, then that" workflows
- You can build an MVP in 4 to 5 weeks with appswithoutcode
- Find Tara's full interview here - E1148 on This Week in Startups
- More information on Tara Reed's appswithoutcode program
Bubble Resources
- In the coming sections, you will take the first steps to build your MVP
- Before building the MVP you need to become familiar with the no-code platform you are going to use
- 🔲 Get started by creating a Bubble account and completing the Basics of Bubble:
- Deeper dive to learning Bubble (bookmark for reference later!)
- There is a thread from @jakesing_ on Twitter that introduces some key features of Bubble.
- "Learn Bubble in 10 tweets, even if you're a complete beginner. Bubble is the most complete no-code builder for dynamic and interactive websites. With Bubble, you can build practically anything! In honor of their massive fundraise today, here's how to get started"
- If you learn better by example
- Bubble wrote about applications that you can build in the blog: What can you build with Bubble?
- And the Bubble Youtube channel has a ton of great tutorials.
Before Building an MVP
- The Bubble Basic Lessons will lay the foundation for your MVP on Bubble
- You may need to continue to learn through their Academy for more advanced features
- Building an MVP is more than learning new tools
- You need to turn your idea into a reality - into an application that others will pay to use
- There is a lot of logic that goes into building a no-code MVP
- Before you jump right into building it is a good idea to have your idea mapped out
- What you are planning to build?
- How it will work?
- If a user clicks on each button where will it take them?
- We previously looked at tools to help build this
- But even a simple piece of notebook paper and pen can get the job done
- 🔲 Create a wireframe of the core features of your product
- Career Foundry's Definitive Guide to making a wireframe has great insight and examples to get you started
- You will use the wireframe in the coming lessons as you begin to create your MVP
- Here is more info on the difference between a wireframe, mockup, prototype, MVP if you need it
Learning and Building in Public
- Learning and building in public are becoming bigger trends among entrepreneurs
- If you are unfamiliar with the learning in public or building in public it is essentially documenting your journey
- Either on Twitter, via blog, with YouTube videos, or similar mediums
- Building in public does a few things for you as outlined in this How-to-Guide
- It invites feedback on your idea
- Builds trust with your audience
- Documents your progress
- It is up to you how public or private you want to be with your learning and building journey
- You eventually will want users to be able to find you online and buy your solution
- An online presence where users can learn about your journey and understand your expertise can help
- Having a landing page also builds credibility - it is the first place users will go
- It can be a basic page that explains the problem you solve
- If you do decide to build in public keep in mind that you are representing your new startup
- Your reputation extends beyond yourself to the product you are building
- You do want to represent your company in a positive way
- You also do not want to overshare your secret sauce before it is built
Companies launched with no-code
- It isn't just Bubble that is making noise in the no-code space
- The chart below is from the article: Decoding the no-code / low-code startup universe and its players
- It highlights several of the no-code products that may be of use to you as you build out your product
- The information in the chart is also available in an Airtable view per the article.
Additional Resources
- Want to go deeper in no-code?
- The site no-code.ch wrote about The 10 Most impressive startups built with no-code
- Discover what you can build with Bubble by taking a look at the Bubble showcase.
- "Bubble builders have launched and grown their businesses by building data-driven, fully functional apps with our simple visual editor."
- Webinar: How to Launch a Startup before Writing a Line of Code
- Learn from a founder and the process he used to launch a no-code MVP
- He walks through finding the problem, designing a solution, and how he "faked it until he made it"
- He also discusses a few of the tools he used
- Links to the Y-Combinator videos he references
To Do
- 🔲 Sign up for Bubble [https://www.bubble.com/twist]
- 🔲 Complete the Bubble tutorials [https://bubble.io/lessons] ~51 minutes
- 🔲 Create a Wireframe or mockup of your application