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Al Carmona

What is no-code?

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Software development platforms known as “no-code” technologies enable even non-technical staff to create and deploy their own apps without writing a single line of code. These tools frequently have a straightforward user interface with drag-and-drop capabilities that make it simple to establish the underlying business logic and view the development process.

Who can benefit from using no-code?

  • Startups
  • Individual artists
  • Makers
  • Non-technical founders
  • Company owners and employees
  • Entrepreneurs
  • Solopreneurs
  • Designers

What can you create with no-code?

  • Websites
  • Mobile applications
  • E-commerce stores
  • Wikis
  • Dashboards
  • Internet forums
  • Internal resources
  • Portals
  • Organizing apps
  • Marketplaces
  • Databases and data products

Top no-code benefits

Rapid development
The pace of transformation must be quick in this digital era. It ought to happen instantly.

As the pace of innovation continues, you have to stay ahead of the competition. You simply cannot wait for your IT team to create a new app six months from now.

If development speed is a requirement, no-code development is the way to go. Automated testing is a great feature to have in your app development solution.

Cost reduction
Do away with the requirement for a pricey IT crew to work on apps that don’t require a lot of complicated coding. With a no-code application development solution in place, your workforce can take care of app development themselves.

Reduce the IT skills gap
True productivity frequently eludes us. And the gap you need to cross is coding knowledge. For instance, in process automation, a lot of people are familiar with how a certain process operates and how to depict it on a flowchart. They are unable to create the code necessary to turn this concept or flowchart into a functional application.

Shine a light on “Shadow IT”
Applications and solutions installed without the knowledge of, and beyond the control and protection of, the internal IT team are collectively referred to as “Shadow IT.”

Shadow IT projects put the organization as a whole in danger. With the proper no-code app development platform and appropriate governance, you can easily minimize the amount of at-risk data.

Top no-code platforms

Bubble
You can create any app with Bubble, a truly amazing tool that requires zero coding. Test your idea with a prototype before sharing it with all your customers, all without having to deal with Javascript, HTML, or sizable databases. You don’t even need a web server because Bubble hosts and installs your application for you.

Airtable
Large corporations and enterprises utilize Airtable, a very potent app builder, to handle their data similar to a project management tool. Airtable, a spreadsheet-based tool, enables you to design solutions that are precisely what teams require—nothing more, nor less. The marketing, product, operations, HR, sales, and finance teams all experience increased organization and productivity because to their pre-made templates and user-friendly design.

Appy Pie
With the help of pre-made templates and color schemes that you can modify to suit your needs, Appy Pie is another powerful no-code app builder that enables you to create versatile native apps. It can be used to create a variety of apps. They also provide classes on how to develop applications, for users of all skill levels, including professionals and students,.

ClickUp
The full-service application ClickUp has the audacious goal of being “the one app to replace them all.” ClickUp is a nearly infinite platform with its 35+ “ClickApps,” 50+ action points for automations, documents, reports, project management, and more. It also provides a fantastic no-code solution that links various information sources to build funnels and workflows for maximum effectiveness.

Appsheet
AppSheet, acquired by Google, allows you to design and develop a whole app in a few days without writing any code. AppSheet programs have millions of downloads and can do a wide range of tasks, including capturing images, logging locations, scanning barcodes, generating reports, emailing, and more. AppSheet makes it simple for you to create your application with an easy-to-use manual and videos that you can follow along with.

Summary
The real strength of no-code is not that it offers a novel approach to app development, but the fundamental change in who can create a website or an app. Coding has a challenging learning curve; to create even a basic application, let alone a sophisticated app or product, requires mastering an entirely new language.

No-code development has advanced to the point where capable Citizen Developers can duplicate the labor of a single developer. The potential is still untapped, as developers are attempting to make no-code platforms not only more potent but also more user-friendly and intuitive. This will genuinely democratize access to no-code technology building options.

No-code citizen developer programs

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How to empower more app creators & speed up your digital transformation

Problem #1: a shortage of skilled devs

  According to Morgan Stanley, there are 26 million developers in the world and we need 38 million developers by 2024.

Problem #2: the backlog
A shortage of traditional in-house developers causes an app request backlog and “app gaps”.

  86% of IT Decision makers say the biggest challenge to digitally transforming their business is too few software developers.

We need digital transformation and we need it now
Make no mistake, there is a critical need for every business to rapidly create business applications that:

  • Increase efficiency
  • Streamline business processes
  • Enable better experiences for employees & customers
  • Help you stay ahead of the competition

Here’s a story about how one courageous person helped to solve the “app gap”…

Meet Liz.
She’s a Business Analyst at Slowdevs Incorporated.

She gets by with a little help from Excel
There’s a specific business process that she manages, for herself, using Macros in a spreadsheet.

The process used to be a mess, giving Liz constant migraines, but she’s worked out all the steps and it runs efficiently now.

Too bad she’s the only one that uses her solution
Liz’s solution works great for Liz, but it’s in Excel. Some of the negatives that go along with that are limited/siloed usage, security issues, and value loss if Liz leaves the company.

Time to turn that mega spreadsheet into a real app
After conferring with her boss, Jack, they come to the conclusion that her solution should be shared with as many people in the company as possible. That way, it won’t be siloed and more people can get value from the application.

The app request
Liz submits an app request to IT so they can turn it into a real software application. She sends the request on Thursday, and the following Monday, she gets an email response from the IT DevOps Manager.

Liz almost falls out of her Aeron chair as she reads the email…

“ETA: 12-16 months”

We need more (live) bodies
She thinks, “Are you freaking kidding me? A junior developer should be able to knock this kind of app out in 3 weeks or less. I guess the devs really are busy, smh. I heard they’re having trouble hiring new people.”

Wait in the purgatorial cue or take action now?
Liz and her boss have reached a fork in the road. Continue with the status quo and the Excel solution (that does no good for anyone but Liz), or look for an alternative.

Enter No-code
While scrolling through her LinkedIn feed, Liz came across a post about Bob, a frustrated employee that taught himself how to create no-code apps.

  What is no-code?
No-code is a technology that lets you build applications using visual development tools, even if you’re not a traditional software developer.

Bob built so many useful no-code apps on his own that he was promoted from Business Analyst to Director of Digital Transformation.

He is now in charge of helping other capable employees become Citizen Developers.

Now his company is creating “good enough” apps that get completed in a matter of days, as opposed to months. Enabling rapid changes.

  What is a Citizen Developer?
A Citizen Developer is a user who creates new business applications for consumption by others, using development tools for no-code or low-code.

Liz was so inspired by Bob’s story that she started doing research into how she could quickly become a Citizen Developer at her company. She eventually reached her goals and helped to launch a Citizen Development Program, with the blessing of her CEO.

  What is a Citizen Development Program?
A Citizen Developer Program broadens the landscape, within the company, of who can develop, innovate and deliver value for the business and the customer. It’s a program that isn’t centralized to either IT or a core development group. Ideally, it’s sanctioned and supported by corporate leadership.

Liz and Bob’s stories show how someone at the grassroots level of the company can inspire a culture of innovation.

How can corporate leadership create and manage a formal Citizen Development Program?

  Gartner says the adoption of no/low code apps is growing at more than 20% per year. And that by 2023, will be adopted by over 50% of medium-large companies.

Start by asking yourself these 3 questions…

  • Is there an IT backlog of requests for app development?
  • Is the backlog wait unacceptable?
  • Are these apps considered mission-critical, to people other than the person requesting them?

If the answer is yes to all three questions, then a Citizen Developer Program may serve you well.

  An IDC survey of 380 enterprises shows 48.6% of respondents purchasing no-code/low-code platforms to move innovation forward in-house.

Gathering the ingredients
The department + software + people mix.

Stay tuned for the next part of this post, where we’ll show how to start your own Citizen Development Program…

How making your own little Micro SaaS can help YOU get more leads…

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Illustration by Al Carmona

Most of us have heard of SaaS (Software as a Service), but have you heard of Micro SaaS?

Micro SaaS are web and mobile apps developed for a handful of people as opposed to the mass market.

In fact, you can break the SaaS market down to 3 levels of focus, on a macro level. There are horizontal, vertical, and micro SaaS applications.

Google docs and Microsoft Office 365 are examples of horizontal SaaS, where the software is made for everyone and anyone that needs basic productivity tools.

Something like AirBnB is more vertically focused on travelers and hosts.

Then there’s micro SaaS, something like nomadlist.com, which focuses on a small niche. In this case, digital nomads.

Micro SaaS targets a small set of users (in the thousands), usually charging a lower fee (or free) and having limited, but specific problem-solving functionality.

So how can a Micro SaaS help me get more leads?

Gated content offers, where you ask for someone’s email address in return for a white paper or PDF, are becoming less effective.

Many start-up SaaS companies use a freemium model to get people in the sales pipeline. Offering limited functionality or a trial-period.

You can do the same by replacing your TOFU (top of funnel) offer with a simple micro SaaS.

Think of a simple problem that your prospects have, and build a basic web application that solves it. Anything that they do in Excel, specific to their industry or job, is a good starting point.

Building a micro SaaS is much easier to do these days thanks to no-code tools (we’ll get into that in future posts).

How design thinking helps you grow your brand

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© Illustration by Al Carmona

Design Thinking is a secret weapon for many of the world’s most innovative companies, such as Apple, Starbucks, Nike, Airbnb, and Netflix.

Design Thinking allows them to better serve their customers’ needs and develop innovative products and processes that keep them #1 in their industry.

Take action on these 5 stages of Design Thinking to grow your business…

1 – Empathize
Research your users’ needs.

2- Define
What are their problems?

3- Ideate
Come up with ideas to solve those problems.

4- Prototype
Start to create solutions.

5 – Test
Try out your ideas with your users and measure your results.

Repeat steps 3-5 to optimize results.

How to grant access to your HubSpot developer

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Hey, all you HubSpot marketing rock stars out there. Today, I’m going to show you how to give your developer access to your HubSpot CMS account so that they can develop inside of your account and work on templates and coding.

The first thing that you want to do is you want to create a user. You do that by going into your little icon here for settings, this gear, click on that.

And on the left side menu in Settings, you’re going to see Users and Teams here at the bottom. Go ahead and click on that.

What you want to do here is you want to create a new user. So click on create user, and it’s saying, “Create new users one at a time.” So enter the email address that your developer has provided to you.

They should have provided you an email address, which is what they use to log into HubSpot. It allows them to get in there and take a look at your account and to work on it. By entering their email address, you’re giving them access to your HubSpot account.

I’m going to create a dummy account here. It’s not a real address, but I’m just doing this for demonstration purposes. What happens is when you create this new user, it sends an email invite to that email address giving them access. I’m going to click on Next, and this is where you set the permissions. Now you want to navigate to these tabs section here and click on Marketing, the marketing tab.

First of all, you want to grant them marketing access. Click on “on” here, and what that does is it sets permissions for access to marketing publishing tools. “A user must have Write or Publish access to at least one of the marketing tools in order to access the calls-to action tool.”

What I recommend here for your HubSpot developer, the access that you need to give them, is you need to give them access to Publish, Write and Read for the blog, which is customized access to the blog tool in case they are developing the blog for you. Email if they’re doing any kind of email templates, Landing page, Website pages.

Go ahead and give access as far as Read, Publish, Write and Read for that as well. You want to give access to Forms because forms are part of the development process, especially if you have landing pages. Not necessarily need to give access to lists. It depends on what they’re working on, but you don’t have to if it’s just development or design and development for HubSpot templates.

You definitely want to give access to Edit code, templates, and modules. This is very important. It grants access to the design tools and the ability to edit templates and modules, which is primarily what developers do. Go ahead and click on that. You want to give access to Edit global content and themes. That’s important because a lot of the templates use global content and themes.

Click on that.

Now Content staging, not everybody has this. It depends on what level HubSpot plan you have.

I would say that if you do have this enabled in your account, then definitely give your developer access. I have a video on the benefits of content staging. It’s a really helpful tool. But for now, let’s just say that if you have it, go ahead and give them access. Not necessary to give access to Edit website settings.

And this is another important one. You definitely want to give access to Files. That means that usually, on the website, there are files that go along with it, such as images that are being placed inside of a template or pages. That’s part of the development process, so you definitely want to have this clicked. Make sure that all the necessary permissions are done, and then click Next.

“Invite your teammate to HubSpot. Send them a friendly invitation with everything they need to get started.”

“Don’t send an email invite when this user is added to HubSpot. They’ll still get access to this account once they log in.”

I would say leave this unchecked because it’s definitely good to know. As the developer, it’s good to know when you look in your email inbox that you have that invite. That means you’ve got that access, and you’re ready to go. You’re ready to get started. So, definitely leave that unchecked.

Press Send. And that’s going to send that email that I talked about earlier. “A new user was added.”

The new user is going to get that email. All they have to do is log into their account with that login, which is usually that email, and they’ll be able to do everything that they need to do in your HubSpot website and what you want them to do in your website, as far as HubSpot template development and coding.

I hope that video was helpful, and thanks for watching.