Finding a developer to build MVP

If multiple clients are already asking for the same thing, that signal alone is worth acting on quickly, before someone else does. On the no-code vs. code question: no-code is fine to validate the hypothesis (will people pay for this?) but limits you the moment you need custom data logic, integrations, or AI features. The middle path that's worked well for teams we've worked with: spec out the MVP to a written requirements doc first (even a simple one), then find a developer who challenges the scope rather than accepting everything. Good developers shrink MVPs, not expand them. We've built AI-assisted teams specifically for non-technical founders who need a fast, production-quality MVP without the overhead of managing a dev agency. Happy to share more about how that model works.

If multiple clients are already asking for the same thing, that’s a pretty strong early signal.

Before hiring a developer, I’d first get very clear on what you need to learn from the MVP. Is it whether people will actually use it, pay for it, or whether your current workflow can be productized at all?

For the first version, no-code is often the right move if the product logic is fairly simple. It’s faster, cheaper, and gives you room to validate before committing to a larger build.

When you do talk to developers, don’t just ask if they can build it. Ask how they would cut scope. The good ones usually challenge the feature list rather than just saying yes to everything.

We see this pretty often at Foundersbar, teams usually save a lot of time by defining the smallest usable version before they start searching for technical talent.

Developers are usually motivated by technical challenges. You'll need to share your project ideas and requirements to drum up some interest. Begin speaking with developers and see how the communication goes. I notice you're in Bristol, UK (I used to live there for many years). There is quite a good tech community in Bristol so you might find some luck on Meetup dot com.

It will help to choose someone in the same timezone. Out sourcing projects to far away countries can save costs, but from my experience it can add additional challenges; different timezone, communication issues such as misunderstandings of colloquialisms etc; work ethics differences and expectations with deliverbility.

Each developer has their own opinions and you'll find they wont want to sway from their preferred choice of programming language, database etc. Beware of developers steering you towards proprietary choices that will lock you in to platforms, frameworks or vendor specific infrastructure.

You'll also want to consider the "bus factor" (think bus running over your developer - a bus factor of one). I've worked with many clients who's developers just went silent and disappeared on them. I suspect there was no bus involved, but most likely they got paid as they went along and some "better paid work" came along. In that event, will the project be designed and written in way that it can be continued by another developer.

The last thing you want is to sink money into a project and then have your next developer say "it needs rewriting- I'll need to tear it up and start again". To alleviate this, you could consider having the code they write open source (shared publicly). Then you'll be able to invite other developers to critique it. A good developer will not be afraid to have other look at their code. Depending on your project, you'll not be loosing anything by sharing your code (recipe) publicly. The code is only one part of the bigger picture. The exception might be if your code uses some secret formula to solve a particularly narly problem. That's rarely the case.

I'm not a fan of no-code solutions, but then I'm,a software engineer so I don't focus much on it. My opinion is that the logic has to live somewhere. I've seen companies string together lots of no-code products into an elaborate workflow. Eventually the tangle of components and products turns into a bundle of wires. In my opinion, there is a reason there are so few visual programming languages - because they suck. It's far easier to maintain a succinct set of instructions as text than to use a GUI to drag and drop relations between data. Caveat is, it really depends on your project. Share your ideas here and let's see....

Not enough information to give you specific and applicable feedback. I’d recommend asking around in your personal networks to find a developer who’s experienced, trustworthy, and perhaps even local.

It's a nice idea and should be a really simple building, but... We're not developers. We're content people

Again, you didn’t even mention your app idea—so I can’t possibly tell you whether it’s a better fit for a coding framework or nocode. A developer is better suited to judge the complexity.

You can only truly get relevant feedback if you share the big picture of what you’re working on. And quite frankly, everyone is already busy working on their own gigs, so it’s not really worthwhile worrying about copycats.

I’m building AI-based app prototypes — link’s in my profile if you want to check it out.

Make sure you find somebody competent and align incentives.

Competence

You first need to make sure you know what a good developer is for the idea you want to build:

• Do you need a builder (you tell them what to build) or a consultant that can build (they suggest what to build given the business outcome you seek)?
• Does the developer need any specific domain knowledge?
• What platform(s)?
• ...

Then, you have to find somebody you can trust: can they do what they say they can do?

I'd start from your network: developers are everywhere so I'm pretty sure you have access to somebody who is in the industry and you can trust to ask for help.

Otherwise, you need to put your trust in an agency or a network.

A rule of thumb I use myself is

Believable people are people who have 1) a record of at least three relevant successes and 2) have great explanations of their approach when probed.

Align incentives

Structure the collaboration in a way that encourages everybody to do an excellent job. Or distribute the risk in a way that you feel comfortable with.

For example, most developers charge by the hour and give you an estimation of how long the work will take. I've never seen a developer (including myself) nailing an estimation. Most of the time, it's too conservative, which means you end up paying (much) more than the initial number.

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I worked as a technical lead and CTO for small product teams in the past. Feel free to reach out for a chat. I'm always happy to meet fellow indie hackers.

You can find developers here on indie hackers, parter up section, share you idea and people who are interested will get in touch. I'm a developer my self with a few micro-saas experiences and I don't think building your MVP nocode is good idea for many reasons, you can't really build any product in nocode so that would have a big impact on the product itself, negative impact mostly. plus the product will be hard to scale unless have a custom codebase, a well designed codebase.

Hey George, totally understand your painpoint. We should defintely chat. My team was full of founders with technical background and we think building things out is easy... and marketing is hard. ;-)

I agree with fromtheexchange's advice, but I'll add - if you haven't already, it might be worth creating a clickable prototype. That would help you in a few ways:

1. You can get aligned on the preferred version of your solution internally before bringing new people into the mix.
2. You can validate the solution with your existing clients before you start building.
3. You'll have something to show to a potential developer, which will help them make a good decision about tech stack and also show that you're serious about this idea. Developers get pitched to build a lot of half-baked ideas. :)

Depending on your budget and expectations, you could also consider working with a freelancer through a platform like Upwork. You might have to try a few folks out to find someone reliable, and you might end up throwing away your initial MVP once you're ready to hire a full-time developer if they have a different vision for the technical platform, but that can be a good way to get moving while you search for a permanent partner.

Best of luck!

Non-technical founders with no technical co-founders are at a huge disadvantage in this world.
It’s unfair especially when they carry so much talent.
Since you're not developers and you're looking for high quality, speed, and reliability you need tapflow.app

There are a couple avenues you can go down and knowing which one will work in the long run is very difficult to predict unless you have a clear vision of what you want to build. The first example below is an explanation for an app that could be done with no-code as a web app. The second is the same but for an app that would probably have to be done using code but you may be able to get away with building it with low code depending on how enterprising and ambitious your freelancer is.

Hypothetical example 1: I want to build an app that will help you decide what specific area to relocate to based on cost of living alone. It will take all the local economic data, crunch the numbers, and with the use of machine learning, tell you that neighborhood x, y or z are good candidates. This, I can imagine, would be a good candidate for a no-code platform. All you need is a viable database, a machine learning algorithm, a profile and potentially a map if you want. Bubble could do this and it could be cheap to turn into a web app and you could, in theory quickly iterate and build a non native app MVP that you could use to pitch to investors.

Hypothetical example 2: I want to build the ultimate shopping app that will take what products you are looking for and scour the web continuously for any place where they product is being sold online, regardless of the kind of merchant. Not only that, it will use a sophisticated machine learning algorithm using a statistical calculations to predict, to a reasonable degree, when these items are likely to drop in price and even possibly by how much. It will make Pricepulse and ShopSavvy look like a chrome extension. That would probably have to be coded or at least build using low code by a developer or multiple developers to realize a solid proof of concept MVP. Platforms that come to mind are Wappler (super powerful) and Flutter.

No-code freelance developers can be found on all the popular marketplace talent platforms (Upwork, Fiverr, Codemap, etc). You could also write a proposal and blast it out to a bunch of no-code agencies which Bubble lets you do.

As far as traditional coders go, there are talent firms that are essentially digital staffing companies (no physical locations) that will connect you with a broker/agent who will talk to you and then will look in their talent pool for freelance devs (Toptal, Upstack, etc.).

You will be able to find someone, but it is always a good idea to clearly define your vision before meeting with them and knowing precisely what you need and want from them.

Also, keep in mind that if you go the no-code route, you will be fundamentally limited as far as design goes. Adalo has the best reputation when it comes to design versatility, but I’ve never built an app using Adalo. Overall, no-code is a solid route if you can express your vision clearly, at the very least give them a taste of it, while needing to apply only minimal design elements and just enough technical building blocks so that they can experience your fundamental value proposition.

I'd recommend using one of the many "no code" platforms to get your MVP launched.

Give up on some features and do it that way for now until you show proof of concept / get some $ in.

I am a developer and i was one of a team which build learning platform SASS
Wecan connect and discuss more details if you want any help