How no-code can help bring your idea to life
7 mins read

How no-code can help bring your idea to life

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In 2019 I left Google. I moved to Dublin for the role, but after a year I knew it wasn’t for me. I had access to excellent sales training and appreciated the benefits, but struggled to become obsessed with my day-to-day role. I advised companies on their digital transformation strategy, but my entrepreneurial itch just kept getting bigger.

All my life I’ve always had ideas. But I was limited by my ability to do anything with them. I always thought I had to find a technical co-founder or fall back on a non-technical idea. No-Code completely changed my perspective. It gave me the belief that anyone can bring their idea to life. If someone like me can bring a product to market, anyone can!

I used to have an idea and worry about how I would actually make it happen. Eventually the idea would lose momentum and I would see someone else do it and regret not doing anything with it. Now I have an idea and I don’t think about the things that are holding me back; I’m thinking about the fastest way to test it.

There is no better time to start a business. It’s cheaper than ever, resources are readily available, and there’s more support. No-code is the key to this. Instead of spending a year and $100,000 to get started, No-Code lets you get started in a month with a lot less money.

Related: 5 Reasons Entrepreneurs Should Use No-Code

Earlier in my career, I joined Zinc VC as an Entrepreneur in Residence. It is a program involving 50 entrepreneurs to address a specific mission: improving the quality of life in old age. For comparison: There are one billion people worldwide over the age of 60. By 2050 there will be two billion. One of the goals of the program is to find a team. The assumption is that you’re more likely to find the right co-founder because they’ve filtered a lot. They filtered on risk to start a business, passion for the problem area and quality.

But after testing many different co-founders, it just didn’t work. In the end I decided to go solo.

I created Diaspo: live cooking classes by experienced home cooks. We focused on minority home cooks and equipped them with the necessary skills to teach online. The problem was that we couldn’t tap into the experience and knowledge of older adults. I was concerned that we would lose their expertise, skills and knowledge. Food is one of the best ways to connect cultures and generations, so we started with that.

But without team and technical skills, I wasn’t sure how to bring this idea to life.

I went through all the food Facebook groups and reached out to those who were passionate about posting food photos. I had offered to help monetize their skills. When we had a couple of verified home cooks telling great stories, I started spreading the word and we hosted the cooking classes on Google Hangout.

The pandemic struck and everyone turned to cooking, lucky timing. The word started spreading in these Facebook groups. We have updated our product on Wix and the number of registrations has continued to increase.

Related: Happiness and Entrepreneurship: Is There a Connection?

Then Sky News reached out for a global article on how we’re helping people stay connected during the pandemic. The moment it went live our website crashed and I knew it was time for an upgrade. With our growing demand I tried to find a technician but it didn’t work out so I cracked it on my own because I needed to update our product.

Our customers asked for more features. With a limited budget and limited time, I sifted through all the tools available. I came across No-Code and started learning. We built a whole marketplace. Teachers could set up their own cooking classes. Learners could browse different classes and filter by availability and favorite cuisines. They would get the link and prescription automatically when they book. The user experience became seamless and efficient.

Related: 5 Reasons Entrepreneurs Should Use No-Code

When I started working in different areas of the company, I started to outsource our development. But I’ve had such mixed experiences. A few people were great, but many stressed me out a lot. Eventually the lockdown ended and our business changed. We spoke to our teachers and learned that many wanted to sell their food but did not have the means to do so.

That’s when we launched Shopify for Home Cooks – a SaaS tool that allows home chefs to set up their own store in minutes without any technical skills. We built this SaaS tool in a month and it cost us less than $10,000. I never would have thought that this is possible.

The product didn’t work, but without code we were able to experiment quickly. We went back to what worked and focused on corporate courses. We’ve worked with companies like Spotify, Marks and Spencer and Accenture, helping their teams connect through cooking. Today Diaspo still offers team socials and I only spend about an hour on it as most of the process is automated.

That’s why I’m so passionate about no-code. Not only does it allow you to automate all manual processes, saving man-hours. It also allows you to innovate. The ease of getting a product to market means you no longer have to worry about how to build it. You can use no-code tools to test an idea and gauge its traction.

See also: How Young Entrepreneurs Can Use No-Code to Their Advantage

The ability to experiment quickly at an affordable price made me double down on no-code. It wasn’t that the quality was compromised; We created revenue-generating products that people use every day. I was amazed that someone like me – a layman – could finally bring my ideas to life.

I believe everyone should be able to bring their ideas to life, so I’m building Goodspeed, a no-code agency. Agencies tend to get a bad rap, so I’m determined to change that. Having been on the other side of the table, we are building a founder-first agency. I am obsessed with clear communication, proactivity and attention to detail. I want to help more people bring their ideas to life.

Goodspeed has worked on over 100 projects with entrepreneurs, venture studios and corporations. For entrepreneurs, it is the fastest and most cost-effective way to start new ideas and start studios. For businesses, it’s a way to be more efficient, innovative, and productive—whether it’s automating tasks, building internal dashboards, or quickly testing a new product.

That’s why no-code changes my perspective. It helps more entrepreneurs bring more products to life.