[debarshri]

Looking at the landscape of lowcode/nocode platform popping up recently, I can't help to notice that these platforms have started becoming very commoditized. Premise of all the tools is that, building UI is hard and you should use the tool. But if 100s of companies are doing the same, then I'll question the premise. Also, why would you build these solution yourself and not buy a point solution. For eg. CRM, why would you build your own crm when you can just buy a saas that does it for you. It is not that I'm against tools like this. Just some thoughts as I'm venturing into this space. Would love to hear some arguments.

[robjeiter]

You are right about the fact that there is already a specific SaaS business for every use case that can be standardized.

However, what our customers build on Chartmat (also a no code tool) are custom solution: e.g. a therapist who has her own approach & wants to have an app for that approach that serves around 100 people. She could not use a custom SaaS because that would be following the approach of another "guru" in the industry. So there would not be a personal connection between her & her customers. Also for around 100 customers she would not want to hire a web dev agency to build a professional app. So that is kind of one of the use cases where a no code tool makes sense.

Another scenario is the following: let's say you are a small business (<5 employees) & you need a SaaS for time recording, billing, recording expenses, accounting, collecting customer information -> things that many small businesses like law firms need. Now you could have either 5-6 SaaS solutions for this or you could use one no code tool & process everything through one tool kind of like an ERP for small businesses and solo entrepreneurs. So you would end up paying 29$/month instead of 5 x 20$. Additionally you could easily consolidate all the data that matters in one single dashboard.

[debarshri]

Very fair argument. My counter would be that the use cases that you are describing are very apt for a low code tool, but it also sounds like the market for that very niche and small (I might be completely wrong). You are talking about small businesses with 10 or less employees. Cost of acquiring them would keep growing as it looks like the market is getting commoditized, barrier is getting lower and crowded. My argument is very simple, if I am a small business my first intuition would be to find a platform with white-label community management for my customers and not build an app. Similarly, If I am small business I would look for a product for law firm or client management platform not think about building my own platform. I am saying this because if I am small business, I would not have time to build my own platform.

[robjeiter]

what you say makes sense. we have been struggling with finding a customer acquisition channel that is scalable. However, there are situations in which customers prefer to implement custom solutions & not use a SaaS. In that sense no code is more a competition to web development agencies than to a SaaS business. In order to acquire a new customer you need to find someone who wants to build an app now & needs a custom solution

[kfk]

Data and Integrations. Applications are mostly a way to produce and transform data. When you buy a lot of applications all trying to keep data locked in their systems, you cannot easily build BI, ML, AI or simply Automation models because data is all over the place. On the other hand, these low code tools don't make data easier because they don't enforce proper API designs, the SQL on top of React components is fun for a while but not everything is UI.

Said that, I always prefer to buy or use open source solution when there is one, as long as they have a good API and an easy way to get data out of them.

[tyingq]

A fair amount of the use of these tools isn't as complex as a CRM, rather, just a better version of spreadsheets passed around via email or shared drives. But better, as they provide some amount of data validation, more granular roles, notifications, workflow, etc.

[gherkinnn]

> Also, why would you build these solution yourself and not buy a point solution. For eg. CRM

I suppose because you can build a CRM, a time tracker, analytics boards, and an admin dashboards for another service with one and the same tool.

Whether it is a good idea to do so, I don’t know.

[jsmith99]

Most companies demand an enormous amount of customisation from their ERP and CRM systems and will not change their processes to match the system. Many popular SaaS like Salesforce are more like platforms for building a solution.