Making a No-code App with Adalo
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Sebastian Hoffmann
Product Manager and No-code Instructor
Tech stack used:
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Adalo
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Zapier
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Airtable
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Figma
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Carrd
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Gmail

Maker: Sebastian Hoffmann Best Place to Find Him: Twitter Project stack for Memoly can be found here. Project link for Memoly

TL;DR
Making anything new is hard. Making a no-code native mobile app can be intimidating when you think about submitting something to the app store to be approved and listed. Find out below, what lessons Sebastian learned from shipping with Adalo and getting it launched. Find out what is the single biggest takeaway that’s even more crucial to do than actually making your idea. 
You’ll want to learn and apply these lessons so that you next idea to launch has a greater chance of success. 
 

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your story?

SH: My name is Sebastian, I’m a passionate digital product and business builder. Currently a Senior Product Manager at DAZN during the day and indie maker at night. I’ve had the chance to learn in different roles and industries, from management consultant to founder, from early-stage startup to hyper-growth scale-ups.

What did you make?

SH: In 2018 I’ve co-founded CoinMirror with some friends, a cutting-edge platform for investing in digital assets based on the blockchain. It was our attempt to democratize investing by piggybacking with professional investors.
Most recently I’ve created Memoly, a subscription-manager app that reminds you when it’s time to cancel.

What problems were you trying to solve, your story, your motivation to want to make it, or your why specifically for this project?

SH: My idea for Memoly stems from a problem I’ve faced myself. We are living in a subscription economy where a monthly or yearly plan is a common business model. As a consumer, it’s hard to keep track of all the monthly costs from a variety of subscriptions, which really sums up. So last year I forgot about the deadline for a yearly plan and it renewed automatically for like 150 USD. I wasn’t even using the app anymore. That was really annoying so I decided to do something about it – Build an app where users can track all their monthly costs and get reminded when it’s time to cancel before renewal.

What is your no-code tech stack? 

SH: AdaloZapierAirtableFigmaCarrd, and Gmail

Why this stack? Can you talk specifically about why you chose those tools? Were there any others you considered or failed with at first?

SH: I tried two other no-code tools before deciding on Adalo to build my app. Glide was easy to use but lacked many features like the option to launch in the app stores. I also played around with Bubble but found it confusing and hard to get something out quickly. Adalo was the obvious choice for me in terms of building something quickly, level of customization, third-party integration, and publishing options. I used Adalo mainly for the frontend and data structure. They offer an integration with Zapier which was useful to trigger and automate workflows. For instance, on new use signup I synced that via Zapier to Airtable, which I use as sort of my lightweight CRM system.

Can you tell us more how you used Figma? 

SH: –In order to test my idea and the flows early on with users, I used Figma. Not a no-code tool per se, but really useful as it’s drag-and-drop and you can share your prototype directly with users.

When building anything there is always something unexpected that occured. Can you talk about what surprised you?

SH: When I built the first version of my app and I wanted to deploy it to the Google Play Store and Apple App Store, it just didn’t work on Adalo’s end. Their team, who is really responsive by the way, and I worked together troubleshooting and resolving the issues. Eventually, they fixed everything so an automated deployment is now possible.

What was the most difficult part or biggest learning curve for you that you’d like to share?

SH: I had quite a hard time getting my app published on the Apple App Store. It took me countless iterations after getting rejected. Some of the reasons include: Third-party payment method (Stripe), Offering the option to donate money, and even because my app required users to sign up. Memoly’s architecture requires user input such as the country to derive the currency for example, but Apple did not accept this explanation. Every time you get rejected you need to wait for one day until they do another review round so you can imagine this caused quite some delay to my launch.

My takeaway is that it’s so crucial to building more interest or even hype before launch. A solid base of people to support your launch is crucial. Even though you follow all of ProductHunt’s launch recommendations, your network will play the most essential factor in your launch.
Sebastian Hoffman
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What would you do differently building it or something valuable you learned you’d like to share with other makers? 

SH: Before launch, I ran a Beta phase where I received quite some interest from a bunch of people. However, when I officially launched on ProductHunt, the response was disappointing. I got like 35 upvotes and did not even make it to the day’s front page. My takeaway is that it’s so crucial to building more interest or even hype before launch. A solid base of people to support your launch is crucial. Even though you follow all of ProductHunt’s launch recommendations, your network will play the most essential factor in your launch.

Please provide what links to your project website, your twitter, where can people return the love?

Memoly website: https://memoly.app
Memoly for iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/memoly-subscription-manager/id1491184147
Memoly for Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.memoly.android
My course on how to build an MVP without code: https://www.udemy.com/course/launch-an-app-without-code/?referralCode=A1684660396160775C8B
My personal page: https://iamseb.io
My Twitter: https://twitter.com/sebionic
My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shoffmann85/

Is there anything else you would like to share or some feedback/request/action that you’d like to ask the Side Project Stack Audience to do for you?

SH: It would mean the world to me if you guys would check out my Udemy course where I go into detail on how to build an online business and app without any code Find it here

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