Jeremy Blalock

I got into no-code before no-code was nearly as popular as it is today. But that was back in 2017 and I really saw the rise of design tools with Figma, Sketch, and Invision — all those tools becoming really popular. But there wasn't really anything that took what you built and translated into a real product. So what I wanted to do is basically take that and build a product that let you build a fully functional mobile app, but not having to know how to code.

I think that these days, a lot of people are clumping together a lot of things that wouldn't traditionally have been called no-code and putting it in that mix. I think, really, what no-code is, is technology that enables people to build technology. It enables people to build things that they would not have been able to build without code before.

En fait, cela a vraiment commencé probablement au début de 2019. Toute l’équipe de Product Hunt, vraiment, à mon avis, a inventé l’expression parce que Ryan Hoover, le PDG de Product Hunt, a publié un article de blog sur le no-code au début de 2019. Et peu de temps après, Ben Tossell a lancé Makerpad. Donc, d’une manière ou d’une autre, il y a eu de la magie au sein de l’organisation Product Hunt qui a eu l’idée de cette chose, mais je ne sais pas exactement comment cela s’est concrétisé autrement.

I think it's just the hashtag — #nocode — all one word.

I think for startups, it really just lets you get your first product built much quicker than you would have been able to do before. When I started Adalo, it took me about seven months before I actually had a product shipped that had real users on it. And I think that obviously took a little longer because we were building no-code tool. But, I think that that will go down so much. I know that there're companies, already, that have built tools with Adalo that have shipped their products weeks after getting started.

For small businesses, they will be able to build apps themselves that can be useful for various things — like restaurants can build ordering apps, and stores can build curbside pickup, and things like that. But I think there's also going to be a whole segment of startups that serve their needs a lot more specifically, because it's cheaper for those startups to build products.

I think that within larger enterprises, there's a lot of things that people want to do and there's a lot of initiatives that various teams want to build, but they just have never gotten the development resources to really do those fully. So as a result I think it enables them to do interesting things that they wanted to do for a long time and kind of that — what you would call a digital transformation, but just things that aren't the top of the spear.

Je pense que la chose dont j'ai toujours parlé avec les développeurs, c'est que les développeurs aiment vraiment construire des fonctionnalités qui sont réutilisables, et à usage général, et qui peuvent être utilisées pour beaucoup de choses différentes. Ainsi, la plupart des développeurs que je connais et qui sont vraiment compétents, préfèrent écrire un composant à usage général qui peut être réutilisé quelque part, ou une bibliothèque open source ou quelque chose comme ça, plutôt que d'écrire cette chose unique qui ne sera utilisée qu'une seule fois. Je pense que le fait de tirer parti des compétences des développeurs pour créer des fonctionnalités réutilisables qui peuvent ensuite être ajoutées et appliquées à quelque chose comme Adalo, qui fournit la fonctionnalité standard de base, est vraiment le meilleur des deux mondes.

Pour les concepteurs, il va y avoir une sorte de changement où les lignes s'estompent entre les phases initiales de conception - comme la phase de conception jusqu'au prototype, jusqu'au développement avec les développeurs, jusqu'à la production. Si ce que je décrivais avec les composants devient vraiment une réalité, alors les systèmes de conception combinés aux outils no-code signifieront que les concepteurs pourront réellement construire le produit dans une certaine mesure, et ensuite brancher les choses que les développeurs construisent.

Pour les chefs de projet, ils n'auront plus à demander la permission, ils pourront simplement aller construire quelque chose eux-mêmes et ensuite dire, hey, le concepteur m'aide à réparer cette chose. Plutôt que de devoir passer par le canal traditionnel - je veux construire un produit, je dois faire appel à un designer, à un développeur, à mon patron pour autoriser ce projet. Ils peuvent juste aller le construire eux-mêmes en un week-end et ensuite le montrer. Cela va totalement transformer la vitesse à laquelle les organisations peuvent évoluer, car souvent, l'une des choses qui ralentissent le plus les gens, ce sont les dépendances au sein d'une organisation et la disponibilité des ressources.

I think that we've already seen a lot with what are the “new” no-code agencies, so that's a new thing that's already sprouted up. I think for existing dev agencies, they will often want to leverage this as much as possible, because it's a question of, how can I do something as cheaply as possible and still charge the same amount, right?

I think the design guys are a little more interesting. It's TBD what will happen there, but I think there's an opportunity for them to kind of go upstream and do more of the development themselves.

I think that there's a lot of things where consultants are supposed to solve some of some specific initiative, and they have a limited amount of time to do it and a limited amount of resources. And so a no-code tool is a perfect way to prove something out and show that it's possible. I think no-code will start to be super, super popular within the Accenture's and those kinds of companies.

I think that this is a great example of something that can provide a way for smart, creative people to work, where they didn't previously have a way to actually make a reasonable income. Previously, you could be an entrepreneur and if you wanted to be in technology, you could either make a billion dollars, or you could make zero dollars, and most people made zero — so you kind of had to choose. Now, you can make $10,000 a month and really support yourself and your family but not have to be raising venture capital or on that kind of level of constant uncertainty around the next phase of your business.

I think that we've already definitely seen that kids are some of the people that pick up Adalo the fastest and I'm sure it's true with the other platforms, as well. When you grow up around technology things that are little builders in themselves, you just have a deeper understanding and each next generation will be better at it. I think that now people in high school have the opportunity to make money and try things and do things of their own that are totally entrepreneurial and unique.

I think that no-code enables more people to build more products that serve smaller individual customer bases. So rather than having Facebook and Google that each have billions of users, I think you're gonna see a lot more companies that have a few thousand users, and are a two person team that built that product. And I think that does really help the economic disparity part of it. And it also just helps a lot more people actually take themselves out of poverty or kind of provide a career for themselves and generate new ways of working.

I think that with some of the tools that are out there, you already see it happening pretty frequently. I think that will probably happen within the next three or four years, I think, where the audience of no-code apps will be greater than the audience of people listening to or watching PowerPoint presentations.

There's a lot of need and interest there. It's just a question of when, when the teachers and when everybody involved gets around to thinking that it's the right thing to do and it'll probably have that next couple years.

I think we've already gotten to the point where at least a third of the things that launch on Product Hunt on are no-code or related in some way, or built with no-code — one of the two, I think we’re basically already there.

I think that adoption is gonna start for enterprises for no-code really in full force sometime in, you know, 2021, 2022. People are trying to really do important things, they'll be looking at no-code tools to do that. And the low code tools just won't be able to keep up. And so we'll have to either modernize or adapt or go away.

Probably more on the five to seven year time horizon. The reason being, it takes three to five years to build that tool, just from a growth perspective. And so even if you got started next year, it's still gonna take you a while to get to the point where you are a fully competitive, massive market player.

I think that's probably the same time (as to get high popularity), it's like five to seven years.

I think that every freelancer and agency needs to use no-code tools to stay competitive, just starting in 2020. So probably this year already, like we're kind of already there, where it really matters, and people are asking for it.

I do know that an app that was built with our platform, Adalo, is already in talks with one of the government agencies in Europe. I know that there have been a couple others that have been in final stages of an RFP processes and those kind of things. I don't know that they necessarily knew that they were no-code, and that's okay. But I think no-code will be very important in terms of just job growth, like I mentioned before, and I think that will be what gets talked about most.

I think what never fails to surprise me is just the amount of different types of things that people build with no-code. One of the benefits of no-code is that it lets people who actually have the problem solve the problem. And so I, as an engineer, I'm not the one gating this and saying, like, that's a bad idea. I don't think you should do that. You get to make your own decision and build whatever you want. And so I think that the number of different things is really the most exciting.