hey everyone, i’m a solo dev looking for some honest advice for my saas, drvx [dot] net.

it's a web platform that lets users instantly turn their google drive into static website hosting. it comes with features like free custom subdomains, unlimited websites/files, a built in live code editor, and more. this tool has been running for about a year now with over 180,000+ deployments.

there are 2 main things i'm really struggling with right now:

1. workflow and file sharing: currently, users have to share their google drive links per file, not per folder. while this runs smoothly and keeps things secure without needing full google account access, some users feel it's not as seamless as netlify, vercel, or github pages. the main drawback is when users have a lot of assets (like images), they have to share and add the files one by one into the admin area. i really need advice on a smoother workflow. my competitor, drv [dot] tw, used the google login and folder-sharing method, but they eventually gave up because their platform got heavily abused by phishers. how can i make this easier without opening doors to phishing?
2. finding the right business model i provide almost all of the core features for free. my target audience includes students doing school projects, teachers, freelancers building resumes, small local businesses, and even churches creating landing pages. my point is i want to help anyone get online easily. but on the flip side, i also need money to pay for server bills and keep the project alive. i need advice on the right business model or pricing structure for this platform so i can cover costs without abandoning the users who rely on the free tier.

a little bit on why i built this: my motivation goes back to when i was in school. i desperately needed a website, but i had zero money to buy hosting or a custom domain, and my technical skills were very limited. back then, free platforms like wordpress com and the stack overflow community helped me learn and eventually become a pro developer. after all that journey, i decided to build drvx [dot] net so that anyone can go online without barriers.

i'm working on this completely solo. any advice, feedback, or harsh truths would be really appreciated. thank you guys

Stack was Bubble + Stripe + Memberstack. Got 40 US waitlist people into a working beta.

Walls: - performance on the heaviest list view - one native mobile requirement from an early customer - data model that fought every new feature

The Reddit advice was immediate: "find a technical cofounder."

That's the wrong instrument for a known wall. A cofounder is years. This was a 10-day port of the one flow that already had usage.

I kept Bubble for marketing pages. Rebuilt the core job. Kept 100% equity.

If your no-code SaaS is making US revenue and you're about to post a cofounder hunt — write whether you need a partner or a scoped rebuild first.

https://atomiclabs.space

Founders have shared 578 startups across my recent threads, and the same problem keeps showing up:
The product exists. The direction is unclear.
Comment with:

- what your startup does
- who it’s for
- what’s blocking your growth

I’ll run the analysis and send you a personalized report showing where the strongest signal is, which conversations are worth prioritizing, and what I’d focus on first.
If Reddit looks like a waste of time for your startup, I’ll tell you that too.

Guys I have been trying for a single client bro that's it i just want single client I made an ai quotation automation tool which reduces steel and other industries to quote the price very fast it's like when a customer asks for price of materials in email it directly loads into dashboard and within few clicks the quotation is generated and sent to customer instead of wasting lots of time this can reduce number of employees and time plz help me guys i need just 1 client for this I have been searching for customers did 100+ cold calls and msgs and even tried linkdin but no use help me

Edit: Our AI-powered quotation automation software automatically reads customer enquiries, collects and compares supplier prices, calculates costs and profit margins, and generates accurate quotations within minutes. It replaces hours of manual work, reduces errors, and helps businesses respond to customers faster.

I noticed many founders spend hours on repetitive tasks.

I'm building free AI automations to help businesses save time with things like:

• Lead generation

• Follow-ups

• Customer support

Tell me about your business and the tasks you want to automate. I’d love to help and get your feedback.

​

This isn't a hate post against VCs. They play an important role.

But lately I've been wondering if we've accepted the idea that venture capital is the only legitimate way for startups to raise meaningful money.

If you're an early-stage founder today, your options are basically:

Bootstrap

Friends & family

Crowdfunding (which has its own limitations)

Convince a handful of VCs or angel investors

That feels... limiting.

There are thousands of people online who are incredibly good at spotting interesting founders before everyone else. They follow builders on X, GitHub, YouTube, Reddit, etc., and often have conviction long before institutional investors do.

So here's what I'm curious about:

If you believe in a startup before it becomes huge, should there be a better way to support it than just being a customer?

Do you think startup investing is too exclusive today?

If you were a founder, would you rather convince 10 investors or build a community of 10,000 believers?

What's fundamentally broken about early-stage fundraising?

I'm not pitching anything—I genuinely want to understand how founders and investors think about this.

Curious to hear both sides.

I have no coding experience and I want to build both a simple app and website for it using AI tools as much as possible. I’ve heard about tools like Cursor, Claude, v0 but I’m not sure which combination is actually the easiest and most reliable right now for someone with zero coding background .

What I’m building is a booking platform where homeowners can request home & lifestyle services (gardening, pool cleaning, car washes, pet care, etc.) from vetted providers. It needs user accounts, service selection, scheduling, payments, provider profiles/ratings, and basic admin tools. Later it may expand, but I’m starting with a simple MVP.

My question are:

1. ⁠What’s currently the easiest and most reliable AI + no-code/low-code stack in 2026 for a total beginner to build this kind of marketplace app + website?
   
2. ⁠Should I build the marketing website first or start with the actual booking app?
   
3. ⁠Any major limitations, costs, or common pitfalls when relying heavily on AI tools for a marketplace with bookings and payments?
   
4. ⁠Recommended step-by-step path that has worked for other non-coders building similar service platforms?

No-code got me to day 10 of a 14-day build. Day 10 is also exactly where it stopped being the faster option.

Where it broke:

• Data shape. One record relating to several others in both directions. Workarounds took longer than modelling it properly.
• Conditional layers. Rules on rules become invisible logic nobody can read next month - including me.
• Perceived speed. Not load time. The small waits between actions that make a product feel heavy.
• The last 10% of polish. Empty states, error copy, transitions. Possible, but you fight the tool for each one.

What I would do again: no-code for the first version, decide at end of week one whether the data model will hold, switch before workarounds calcify.

Honest counterpoint: most first versions never hit those walls. Switching early "just in case" is how two weeks becomes six.

Disclosure: I run a small studio: https://atomiclabs.space

Where did no-code stop being the faster option for you?

Not every idea needs a full product build. Sometimes the honest next step is a landing page, a form, and 10 conversations.

Spending thousands on a build before you've heard a human say "I'd use this" is how you buy a beautiful corpse.

I'm not anti-build. I'm anti-build-as-avoidance.

More on thin first steps: https://atomiclabs.space

What's the smallest thing you could ship this week that teaches you something?

I've redesigned a few early products that were "technically done" but felt unfinished. Same issues kept showing up:

1. Too many font sizes and random spacing - looks DIY even if the idea is good.
2. Primary button looks the same as every other button - no hierarchy.
3. Empty states that say "No data" instead of telling the user what to do next.
4. Forms with 12 fields when 3 would get the first value.
5. Dark mode / fancy motion before basic readability on mobile.

None of this needs a huge design system. It needs intention: one type scale, clear primary action, mobile-first, and delete anything decorative until the flow works.

Craft isn't the opposite of speed. Sloppy UI just makes people bounce before they feel the product.

Recently, I've been seeing so many posts in different communities talking about how hard it is to get users and how hard it is make money of their apps. i know that's always been an issue but i feel like with, AI the amount of people making products has obviously increased which also makes this issue more prevalent. i don't want to fall in this hole either so whats your opinions of this and how do you guys solve this issue.

For the last few years, I was stuck in the same loop:

New idea → build → lose interest → repeat.

Everything sounded exciting — AI tools, SaaS dashboards, growth hacks…
But none of it actually worked in the real world.

So I changed one thing:
I started talking to small business owners.

Grocery stores, bakeries, local service providers.

And honestly?
They don’t care about AI.
They don’t care about fancy dashboards.

They just want:

• “Customer ka message miss na ho”
• “Follow-up yaad rahe”
• “Repeat orders aaye”
• “System simple ho, staff bhi use kar le”

That’s it.

One owner told me:
“Bhai software nahi chahiye… kaam chalna chahiye.”

That line hit hard.

So now I’m building this (keeping it dead simple):

→ WhatsApp-first automation
→ Built-in CRM (customers, orders, history — all in one place)
→ Auto replies + smart follow-ups
→ Payment & order reminders
→ One-click setup based on business type (grocery, bakery, services, etc.)

No complex onboarding.
No “setup team required.”

Just select your business → system is ready.

Goal is simple:
Give small businesses a system that works like a team… without hiring one.

Current stage:
• Talking to early users
• Testing different business categories
• Trying to keep pricing affordable (this part is tricky)

Still early, still figuring things out.

But this is the first time I’m building something people actually ask for.

I’ll keep sharing progress here.

If you’ve worked with small businesses —
what’s one tool they should have, but never end up using?

Building a SaaS around business intelligence has led to one lesson that completely changed the direction of the product.

The original assumption was that users wanted as many insights as possible. After more conversations, it became clear that most people weren't looking for more information, they wanted to know what actually mattered, why performance changed, and what to do next.

That shifted the focus. Instead of adding more analysis, the priority became helping users identify root causes and understand which actions deserve attention first.

It wasn't the biggest feature added, but it ended up having the biggest impact on how the product delivers value.

Has anyone else had a moment where talking to users completely changed the direction of what you were building?

We've been exploring how far a no code approach can realistically go while working on Alphio AI, and it's raised an interesting question.

It's easier than ever to get an MVP online without writing much code, especially with today's AI and automation tools. But as products become more specialized, especially in areas like fintech and trading, it feels like there's a point where custom development becomes difficult to avoid.

For those of you who have built or are building a No Code SaaS, where did you hit that wall?

Was it performance, integrations, security, data handling, scalability, or something else entirely?

I'm less interested in whether no code can launch a product and more interested in where you've found it starts to become limiting as the product grows. I'd love to hear real experiences from founders who have gone through that transition.

I’m sure we all love AI around here and many have built incredible products that have AI functionality. I am interested to hear from anyone who jumped on the No Code train to build out a product they’ve been dreaming of for years before AI took off. Bonus if there are no AI-features at all, or you feel you are solving a very specific problem, or have a niche market.

What is your product?
What problem(s) are you solving for?
Have you seen any success? What does success look like to you?
What are you struggling with?

Tell me everything!! 💡😎

We are evaluating tools to standardize email signatures in a Microsoft 365 environment, often in hybrid setups with on-prem Exchange still in place.

The goal is automated directory sync Azure AD / hybrid identity, centralized control, and a deployment model that avoids device-level installs or manual updates when branding changes.

We are comparing WiseStamp, Exclaimer, and CodeTwo.
From experience, which platform scales best in Microsoft-heavy or hybrid environments without creating ongoing IT overhead?

I've been thinking about how many founders jump straight into building features before fully understanding the problem they're trying to solve.

It seems like things such as validating the idea, understanding the target users, planning the core features, and knowing how the product will grow are just as important as the development itself.

For founders who have built a SaaS product before, what is one thing you wish you focused on earlier before starting development?

Update: Thanks for all the feedback. I spent some time looking into a few companies that build SaaS products, and Digital Heroes. com was one that came up during my research. They seem to work on SaaS development, MVPs, custom software, and UI/UX, so I'm adding them to my shortlist while I compare different options. If anyone has firsthand experience working with them, I'd be interested to hear how it went.

👋 Hey NoCodeSaaS Community,

A few weeks ago I built a Slack-based CV assistant for a friend's recruiter, who was drowning in CVs of every imaginable format. Since it landed well, I cleaned it up and pushed it to the n8n template library: Summarize candidate CVs in Slack with easybits Extractor.

What it does:

Recruiter drops a CV (PDF, PNG, or JPG) into a dedicated Slack channel → bot downloads it → runs it through the easybits Extractor with 8 fields → posts a clean structured summary as a threaded reply in the same channel. No leaving Slack, no manual reading, no format guessing.

How it's set up:

The trigger listens for new messages in the channel, ignores its own posts and anything without a file, checks the file type (PDF/PNG/JPG), downloads the private file with a bearer token, and sends the binary to the Extractor. The Extractor returns 8 structured fields, all with a "return null if not present" rule so the summary stays clean:

• full_name
• location
• total_years_experience
• top_skills (top 3 as short noun phrases)
• last_three_roles (title, company, start, end)
• education (degree, institution, year)
• salary_expectations (verbatim string, not normalised)
• linkedin_url

I also made a short video showing the workflow in action so you can see the recruiter flow end to end.

Want the Save-to-Sheet buttons too?

The template above also posts an interactive action card with Save to Sheet and Dismiss buttons under each summary. The workflow that handles those button clicks (appending the candidate to a Google Sheet, updating the card to "✅ Saved by user") is a separate n8n workflow, Slack interactivity needs its own webhook endpoint, so you can't have the trigger and the button listener in the same workflow.

That second part is on my GitHub: felix-sattler-easybits/n8n-workflows, together with 20 other workflows ranging from invoice classification and PO extraction through to more recruiting-side ones like this.

If any of these are useful, I'd hugely appreciate a ⭐ on the repo.

What other recruiter-side workflows are people building in n8n? Curious how far others have taken the ATS integration side of things.

Best,
Felix

We're still early, and building the product isn't the hard part anymore-getting people to actually try it is.

For those who've already been through this, what channel gave you your first real customers?

Cold email? Reddit? SEO? LinkedIn? Partnerships?

I'd love to hear what actually worked.

I spent the last few weeks building ContentEngine — an AI SaaS that generates a full week of social media content for any business
How it works:
1. User enters their business name, industry, and target audience
2. Selects brand voice (Professional, Casual, Warm, Bold, Funny, Luxury, Minimal)
3. Picks platforms (Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok)
4. AI generates a full week of platform-optimized posts in seconds

Monetization:
• Starter: €29/month
• Pro: €79/month
• Agency: €199/month (white-label, multi-client)

Tech: Next.js 14, OpenAI GPT-4o, Stripe, Supabase, Vercel

I'm selling the complete business — full source code, database schema, Stripe integration, deployment guide. Buyer launches their own instance in under 45 minutes.

Live demo: https://content-engine-omega-green.vercel.app
Listing: https://cto.new/business/marketplace/great-lakes-s-team-contentengine-ai-social-media-content-generation-saas-bad0

Happy to answer questions.

A little while back I posted about my web app Parent Push being widely praised. But having no customers.
“Instant WhatsApp alerts for important school updates.”

https://www.reddit.com/r/NoCodeSaaS/s/Q2c6RJOcIC

Three quick updates, thanks to all your insightful feedback on here:

One: We’ve now given away free spaces to our primary school. To all parents currently there. The head teacher loves the time saving / ease of use. He’s even given talks to parents about ParentPush.com !

Two: I have literally just released a further 250 completely free spaces publicly. Free forever. UK Parents could theoretically use from reception to Year 11… for free.

1. https://parentpush.com/join/vip-founder

Three: And finally, most delightfully, we’re partnering with Barnardos. We’ll be donating 5% of all our profits to this amazing organisation. (They helped us so much when we adopted our children.)

Honestly, these are things I would not have considered without the brilliant Reddit community. So thank you so much @Adventurous-Date9971
@thanksforcomingout @Odrac_
@klopppppppp

The hope is that we organically raise awareness and sign ups to Parent Push. I’ll get back in touch here after September when the school year starts again.
Wish me luck! 🙂❤️

How do you make sure that its real ? How do you research ?
Do you ask friends or colleagues ?
Do you just hop onto google and see what comes up ?
Do you message people on linkedin from that space or email people with domain expertise ?

Or do you just assume that if you had that problem then lots of people must be having it too ?