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59 Comments

No-code exists today. Will there be such thing as No-Marketing?

No-code has become quite popular today for builders to quickly ship a product or those with no experience in coding to test out MVPs.

On a lighter note, will it be possible for something like No-Marketing to exist? It actually is hard but what would you actually expect from it, if it did come into existence?

  1. 8

    I already do no marketing 😂

    Seriously though... There are plenty of marketing automation tools out there already, but so much of marketing involves human interaction and lateral thinking, and you can't automate those. So the closest no-marketing equivalent to an all-in-one no-code tool like Webflow or Bubble would probably be something like a subscription service that uses real people to do your marketing for you. I don't think it will ever be possible to have a complete (and effective) automated marketing strategy where you have full control over the output.

    So you're not getting out of it that easily 😄

    1. 1

      Not sure, Even code requires so much human interaction and thinking, and no code tools would not be able to give you the same control. Similarly, I can see some no marketing tools coming up, which might not give that independence but would work.

    2. 1

      @jlambert That's very true 😂 The Human part of it is what captures the customer's interest. But with Deepfakes and increments in AI, will it be possible to make it indistinguishable?

  2. 5

    No. Marketing is a function, like product development is. Code is the tool you use to accomplish that function.

    You won't get rid of the function. But the tools which accomplish it change.

    There will be a shift in marketing away from building landing pages, writing copy, creating emails and the tools which do this will likely use AI. As others have mentioned, we've already seen that with the likes of Copy AI.

    These tools will reduce the time spent on marketing, but there will inevitably be human input into the core marketing functions, such as speaking to your users, developing a strategy will still exist and product positioning. In the same way no-code doesn't tell you what to build.

    1. 1

      This makes a lot of sense actually. True that creative work requires effort from Humans.

  3. 4

    Nomarketing already exists! Just ask @dagorenouf, all you need is one more feature! 😂

    But jokes aside. I am curious to see where nocode goes. It has been around for ages in different incarnations. WYSIWYG editors to build sites, drag and drop workflows in SharePoint and Excel recorded macros. But none of them panned out. It will be interesting to see how things evolve today with a lot of cloud-based solutions. Maybe the time is right for nocode tools.

    nomarketing has also started. AI companies pitching automated writing. I think those tools will replace the low-end content mills, but people will still need to get involved for more innovative content. The pitch from AI companies sounds impressive, but the reality I am not so sure about. I have seen large consulting companies sell AI to companies for things like product design. But it did not turn out well.

    We live in an exciting time.

    1. 1

      Exciting times for sure! :)

  4. 3

    No-marketing exists: It's called organic SEO.

    If you have a decent product, solid content strategy, and there is an inbound interest and product need, then it can easily run itself.

    The key part that you have to create is the SEO strategy. Which is where I come in 😄

    1. 2

      Well that was a clever segway 😂

      1. 1

        Indeed it was haha

  5. 2

    Interesting idea and I can see why so many tech founders would LOVE it if it would work.

    But first, it's important to distinguish between marketing, advertising and sales. Marketing also does multiple jobs, (build awareness, build connection, build hype for a specific product / event, convert people to paying customers etc).

    Too many people think that marketing is just putting out ads or being generic when in fact, the most successful teams are those who are just being authentic and taking the time to understand what their customers care about.

    While automation can absolutely help with a TON of this, it can't replicate that authenticity and actually if you look at big players with massive marketing teams and budgets, they often fall into the trap of just spamming messaging everywhere in the hope it'll work. Sometimes it does from pure exposure and being big enough to be a status symbol. But no startup is in that position.

    Think of any brand you interact with often and then consider their marketing. How did you find them, why did you care enough to part with money for them? Those answers will often surprise people and they should inform any good marketing plan.

    I 200% agree that successful marketing doesn't need a huge team, but it does need some dedicated time and energy from real humans, however that looks in your setup.

    1. 2

      Your reply actually reminds me of Naval's perspective. We live in an age of infinite leverage and the only way to escape competition is through authenticity.

      So definitely if marketing activities become easy, then it's creativity that wins in the end.

  6. 2

    No-Marketing is a thing for over a decade and comes with each own set of cons and pros. There are many well established online marketplaces where you could publish your products and sell them without worrying about marketing them since the clients are already there. You have to bring in a rock solid product though but it's a whole different game with cons and pros. Obviously, this answer applies to a specific set of products!

    1. 1

      We'll definitely have to play a different game for sure if that becomes a reality.

      But curious to know what are some marketplaces like you mentioned?

      1. 1

        A great example would be Envato Market where you can publish your products (themes, templates, photos, web apps, graphics or plugins). You could check out https://themeforest.net/ for more info.

  7. 2

    It will be like elon musk kind of marketing

    1. 1

      You're right. He's got a great personal brand. But would that scale to new entrepreneurs starting out?

  8. 2

    are we talking about tesla?

  9. 2

    Do you mean Low-Code?

    1. 1

      Both low-code & no-code

  10. 2

    You're comparing the wrong things.

    The whole idea of "no-code" is to be able to "create" stuff with "no-code".

    But with "no-marketing" you can't market with "no-marketing", which doesn't make sense.

    Am I missing something, since "no-code" is to "create", what is it for "no-marketing"?

    Haha, I'm just messing around.

    1. 3

      What an interesting thread! 👀

      I think just like no-code tools 'assist' in making apps/websites and the works much faster (not totally removing humans from the equation). No marketing doesn't sound all that wrong. So similar no-code/automation tools can aid in faster copywriting, campaign management, etc. still requiring human intervention, an expert to drive marketing.

      So.. No code (less efforts spent coding), No marketing (less operational marketing efforts).

      As I was typing this I remembered Michael Scott's dialogue - “Sometimes I'll start a sentence and I don't even know where it's going. I just hope I find it along the way.” xD

      1. 1

        Actually yeah currently, we'll have more automation rather than total replacement.

        And at times, I too can relate to Michael Scott's quote 😂

    2. 2

      That's an interesting perspective.

      You're actually right about no-code. But I'd add that it is to " 'create' but with an interactive visual interface rather than having to deal with machine-understandable programming languages"

      Well, people used to "create" with punched cards before "code" existed. So "no-code" is an abstraction on top of "code"

  11. 2

    A lot of AI marketing tools already fill a part of this role. Things like CopyAI etc create very good content already. :)

    But this is a fun question. Something that keeps you thinking.

    1. 1

      You're right, tools to automate the marketing workflows exist. But can the human part of branding & connecting to customers in marketing be built for those new to marketing?

  12. 1

    It's interesting to think about some of the different companies I've worked at. For example I worked at two different VC backed startups. One with a marketing team and one without. I think the former will fail and the latter will probably do fine.

    At the one with a marketing team, I was there when they made the transition from some of the "low lift" marketing people discuss on this thread to a "real" marketing team. There was literally no improvement on anything! In fact, if anything it made things worse because the "low lift" strategy of having devs just tweet a bit and write about the product was WAY more popular. I think because all that stuff was coming from people genuinely interested in sharing, rather than people just wanting to sell stuff.

    I'm not saying marketing has no value. I think it has its place. But I think a lot of indie hackers and small startups are realizing you don't need a marketing department to reach people.

    1. 1

      Interesting observation. Builders do have some power with authenticity. But could this case be generalized?

      1. 1

        These days I primarily work with an agency that specializes in dev-written marketing and they are very successful, so I definitely think it's something that can benefit many companies.

  13. 1

    Isn't that already here?

    No-code makes it possible for more people to use industry expertise to build solutions that solve market problems. Marketing tools exist all over the place that lower the barriers for people to broadcast a marketing message everywhere. No-code doesn't mean you don't have to learn concepts. Just as marketing tools require you to learn some marketing concepts.

    1. 1

      But isn't that also a problem? If marketing messages are broadcasted, people get bored and usually crave for something interesting & creative.

      But in the case of no-code it isn't much of a problem as people just want to complete some action pertaining to a business using a visual interface.

  14. 1

    No code may exist (let's say)
    In my opinion, it exists from the point when CMS like WordPress started.
    Let's be honest: you don't need much knowledge to install plugins to add additional functionality to your website compared to coding in HTML back in the '90s.
    -Are there any services that will create you a website with unique content created specifically for me with a click of a button?
    -No!
    -It will never happen
    -No one knows what you or your business needs, how you want to represent and differentiate.

    Google plans to create ads working with AI
    So one profession may disappear. Ads/campaign creator
    As long as you pay the money you will be able to get attention to whatever you're selling (maybe).

    1. 1

      Loved this one "Are there any services that will create you a website with unique content created specifically for me with a click of a button?"

      But what would it take for something like that to exist? With GPT-3, we've got businesses which are pretty much able to generate a real-life character emoting and speaking with just an input of text.

      1. 2

        I've tried several GPT-3 services myself and none of them gave me exact results out of the box.
        Never!
        That being said: GPT-3 can spit out content, but if I have to work on the article to rewrite it, then what's the point?
        Many times content written with AI is losing the main idea- breaks up (especially long text)
        To leave gibberish text to visitors is not a great idea. People will leave straight away.

        Technology is moving fast, maybe in the future, we will be able to get what we want.
        We are not there yet...

        1. 1

          Well yeah that's the current state. Also here is something, I thought you might find interesting about AI creating content

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WECsbqAQSk

          1. 2

            Cha cha. Thank you,- NO!!!

  15. 1

    Personally I don't think so. Marketing is a wide definition. So the definition should be narrowed down first.

    1. 1

      Fair enough. So in this context, we can refer to those activities done by a seller to get their product discovered by potential customers & increase the likelihood of the customer buying their product.

      1. 2

        It is an interesting topic to think about. So I guess you need building blocks. The first one is to define the audience. Which you might be able to pre-select from a wide range of audiences. Second you need a way to reach them. Basically with automated content creation. Yes I think there is opportunities to get this done this way :D

        1. 1

          Interesting. But if content creation becomes automated, then won't people get bored recognizing the same pattern over & over?

          1. 2

            I don't have the answer. But not all no-code solutions are similar either. So I guess it is about identifying and creating the building blocks.

    1. 1

      Ikr! The answers here are so great that they make you ponder over a lot of stuff :)

  16. 1

    This stuff just cycles.

    No-code and marketing automation solve some problems, but create others.

    I'm a big fan, but they don't fundamentally change the game. The best marketers will always be those doing things better and differently than everyone else.

    1. 1

      I agree. Humans love creativity and the most creative would end up doing better.

  17. 1

    I don't really think that we have an agreed-upon definition of "no-marketing", but here ar my 2 cents:

    There already are tools that save time on some marketing research activities, or tools that make the creative process for marketers much easier.

    However, I don't really think that we'll anytime soon come to a point where we'll not need any people to do marketing activities.

    1. 1

      Could you list some of the marketing tools which have saved you a ton of time?

  18. 1

    All no-code that exist still require a human to somehow use them and stitch thm together. No-code is not no-human or no-work.
    So with no-marketing I guess it's the same. You can have tools to write content, to turn content into video, to find target segments, to write, time and send emails etc.
    But I guess you will always need a person to use those tools and instruct them what to do.

    1. 1

      With no-code, the process of seeding the logic is all that takes place right? The functional app's construction followed by deployment can be automated to an extent.

      But yeah, I do agree that it's difficult to do the same for marketing. I think of a situation (not quite practical) where an app built with no-code is optimized to the right target customers and with a single click reaches to all converting customers who would use it, provide feedback & let the process flow.

      1. 2

        Maybe the next phase is no-customers :)
        The clients are just bots and humanity can go on vacation.

        1. 1

          😂😂

          But then there would be a huge opportunity around vacation if that were true? Maybe even interplanetary travel .

          I think you've actually raised a deeper question. This might pave the way toward Digital Superintelligence since a computer program would very well able to understand human motivation & market products to them accordingly.

  19. 1

    With marketing you need to really understand the customer.

    I know there are AI bots that can write your copy but I never understood how they can be effective without collecting data on and talking with customers.

    I guess it's like no-code. Webflow can't come up with a good idea, but it can help you implement one. There are probably tools that can help you implement marketing copy but the core message needs to come from your research.

    1. 1

      True, it's a creative process and not so easy to eliminate. Product discovery does require effort from marketers.

  20. 2

    This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

    1. 1

      Well , could you elaborate on that ? 😂

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