Coding interviews - would you pay for a course to prepare you?
I've built out about 25% of a course, and I wanted to share what I've finished - https://skilled.dev
If you have any feedback or just want to roast the idea, anything would be appreciated.
This is the first time I've launched a paid product like this or taught a course online. I've put a lot of effort into learning how to grow my career and also helping my friends, and I realized this was probably the best way for me to actually monetize a business in a meaningful way. My goal is to help developers level up their jobs and hopefully create a company while doing so.
I think there is a market for it, I have seen a few people already offering that type of courses tailored for specific companies such as Google or Facebook.
Great feedback. Tailoring content to companies could be a great benefit.
You may have a hard time competing with this: https://leetcode.com
Also, I have a general distaste for Google/Facebook style interviews. Apple's seem to be OK. I doubt I'd be willing to pay for a course - I write software everyday - so everyday is practice.
In addition, have you excelled at coding interviews yourself. That would also be important to your customers I'd imagine.
I think https://www.techseries.dev/daily already has a newsletter something like a course that gives you a free problem every day. However, if yours is better quality, I think I would buy it. Try signing up for the link above to see how you can beat them.
Thanks for sharing, I'll go through their course and understand what they're doing.
If you don't mind, I'd love to ask a couple of questions since it seems like you would be a potential customer.
What is most valuable to you - video walkthroughs, text explanations, or a code editor that you work a problem against a prompt? Or maybe it's having the combination of all those?
Is there anything that course or other courses are doing wrong or that you think could be done better?
Also if you're interested in working through the course while it's being built out and providing feedback, I would be happy to give you some additional time for free once it's actually completed.
Hey @treyhuffine! So here are my answers:
I think video walkthroughs are better than a text explanation (I'm more of a visual person). I think a code editor might be helpful if you feel up to the challenge. Everyone taking your course is already going to have a text editor but it wouldn't hurt to have one either. But personally, I think a video walkthrough and code editor are my favorites. Though keep the text explanation for people who would rather have it.
No. I think they create the content how I like it. Check out their course content and try it out.
Yes, I would love to try a preview of your course so I could give more feedback. 😄
Thanks so much, that's super helpful feedback. I just signed up for their course to understand what they're doing.
Awesome, excited have you trying it out! Feel free to connect with me here, through the feedback form on the site, or email at trey@skilled.dev.
Hey Trey,
Just sign up for your course. I think this is what I need.
I'm self-taught developer (with Udemy + FreeCodeCamp video). I did go to a coding bootcamp, but they do not touch much on algorithm.
By the way Github login throws me an error on your site. You may wanna check that out.
Tuan.
I think the github issue was some kind of race condition, but it should be fixed now. Could you try again if you get a chance?
Hi Trey, the github login was ok now. I’d be happy to work through your content and provide feedback :)
Awesome! Any feedback you can provide would be super helpful :)
I have a similar background, so the approach I'm taking to the content is thinking I needed when I was looking for my first job.
If you're interested in working through the content and providing feedback, I would be happy to give you access free for a year after the course is launched if you're interested.
For the GitHub error - was there any information to go along with the error? I'm not seeing anything in the logs but I would love to get that fixed.
Hi Trey,
There is definitely a market for this.
I take such in-person classes for fresh graduates with a weak financial background for free in my city.
I believe the fact that your are covering the soft skills part is so important. Another angle would be include / partner with an english speaking course instructor to give out a basic guideline on how to speak enough English so as for it to not become an obstacle. That would give you a great leg-up to target non-native English speakers from outside of the US.
Cheers and best of luck.
I can provide more feedback once I go through a couple more of your videos.
That's a great point that I hadn't thought of. I'm going to add a lesson on English for the interview as well.
Great. Another point is the pricing. Not sure what is the pricing you are thinking of but do keep in mind the outside US market while deciding the pricing.
I think that there is a real market for this, I know algoexpert that does something like this. How do you plan to differentiate your offer? Would love to try it!
Looking at algoexpert, they are more of a question bank (similar to Leetcode but with videos). The vision for my product is to be much more guided. I have put a lot of effort into planning the questions to include and order in which they appear. Each one is going to have detailed explanations as to how to really think through it and how the learning outcomes can be applied to a broader set of questions. I'll use a combination of text+video+interactive coding.
So I think the value proposition I offer is being efficient with time and being a fully guided process from beginning to end. Instead of grinding through a question bank, I lead users through the entire process and give detailed intuition behind the problems and the thought process to solve, optimize, and then apply broadly.
That's a great question and something I should probably put some real time into answering myself - but does that sound valuable to you?
It is definitely valuable, just wanted to make sure you were aware of the competition. I will sign up for the free lessons to check it out. :)
For sure, I really appreciate that! I've been trying to balance understanding what competition currently exists without putting so much focus on it that it clouds my own intuition.