Let’s first start with lots of praise. I was able to create the most impressive product directory within a few days. Had I access to a valid sheet it would have taken under an hour.
That alone should be your tipping point to success, but then I thought it would be a good idea to watch a few more tutorials.
Even though I am technically adept, and just love seeing and hearing Jack speak, I feel that you are missing out on the mass market of people, those who can easily create a basic app, by instantly turning app creation into something apparently complex, even to me.
Clearly there is a high level, high competency, need for such an app builder, but if you want to be successful you need to cater to the masses with a fee structure that ranges from very low to what your initial market of GSheet gurus will bear for certain features.
I would try to focus on the basics, which are by themselves amazing. Charge $3/month for any app that doesn’t have sales or relational capabilities. $10 for relations and $19 for that and sales.
I know my opinion means squat but you really should run a poll. You already have devoted fans that want to see you succeed. Get their opinion. They know what is fair and just.
I’m not sure whether I understand your first point. Are you saying Glide is hard to learn despite the tutorials? If so, what areas were tricky? What could we explain better?
Jack I think what he’s trying to say is you’re missing a large segment of the market that most of the videos go right over their heads. This extremely large segment needs to be shown, an extremely stripped-down version of creating a simple but powerful app. There needs to be a dead simple video that plants the seed in every regular Joe’s head that makes them say: hey I can do this! While the current tutorial videos are awesome and great for someone who’s technically proficient, they’re lacking in the magic factor for the everyday person who doesn’t think it’s possible.
It would be super helpful to me to know what you think might be inaccessible about these videos - too fast, needs more repetition, too many concepts etc…
I think speed could definitely be slowed down. There have been a few times (especially with gifs demonstrating new features) where I’ve had to watch over and over several times because the mouse clicks are rapid and too quick to follow, or I lose track in a gif of what’s the beginning and whats the end of the gif animation. Just a matter of slowing things down. I think most of the tutorials are great though. Maybe a good addition to the intro series would be a longer video (15-30 minutes) that goes through all steps from beginning to end, like creating and filling a spreadsheet, how each column translates to a component, to creating an app with an overview of all of the components and settings in the builder. Just a beginning to end recreation of one of the templates for example. I also agree that maybe more repetition would help people absorb concepts better.
I’ll give more thought to this but I’m thinking of taglines like:
“Got a Spreadsheet? Then you’ve got an app!”
Or
“Every spreadsheet is an app just waiting to happen.”
Could be playful with it in lots of different ways.
Don’t show the spreadsheet first, show the app and how elegant it is, get them hooked on what could be, THEN back out to what’s under the hood to show them HOW LITTLE there is that goes into the beautiful app they think would be impossible for them to create. Wow them.
I’ve got dozens of apps and SaaS programs for such things as FAQ and Help Desk and such but the minute I start using them I realize that they create a disjointed mess and I get so concerned about having ten apps doing the same thing that I end up using none.
It boils down to having stratified and segmented data that can be restructured and multi-purposed in a million ways with Glide using properly structured sheets.
It’s complex for most, a challenge for some, and just a great joy for others.
@JackVaughan Your videos are nothing less than Hollywood production level and those from others are inspiring. Just consider creating five tiers of training. Super noob, basic, intermediate, advanced, expert.
I haven’t been so excited about a program since the last one with such similar issues.
If you are looking for an angel investor with small wings I’d truly consider investing $10k when you need it enough to treat me as early staff.
Had I only been able to provide advice or funding worth gratitude and early shares to Tobi Lutke at this stage of your potential pre-VC success, I’d be just as happy as I am now but with a better cocktail conversation.
In any case, please remember your early supporters and unpaid advisers as more than just people you wave to from your Jag.
@JackVaughan
I’ll second what @JWhiteside and @Jeff_Hager have said about videos and gifs. The production and quality is awesome, but the speed at which they move along is where I think we’re losing people (me included at times).
Along the lines of what someone else suggested, building one of Glide’s templates from scratch would work great especially since everyone has access to the sheet and could create their own “project files” so to speak. You could maybe explore stopping points in your videos where you suggest viewers pause the video, go re-create what you just showed them, and then resume. This works well for me and I suspect a lot of people.
I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating. The one thing that really stands out about Glide is how approachable and accessible everyone is, from the top down, and how much everyone values user feedback. It’s very rare to find a company that is this engaged with their users and it’s something that sets Glide apart from many others. Keep up the awesome work…and great tutorials videos!
One more suggestion would be some basics on database design and how to structure sheets so they work well with Glide and allow for easy relations between sheets.
I agree with what most of people say here: the videos are great, but there is an audience that could be helped with slower / easier stuff.
I think a lot of people have used a spreadsheet, but without going beyond making lists
When you start making an app, you have to think about the data structure and how you translate that in a logical spreadsheet. One you have that logic up and running, using Glide is pretty straightforward. But a lot of people have difficulties with the starting data.
I think, besides the present good video’s it would help to have realtime videos: make a recipe app in an hour. And than just take the time. Or make a holiday app in an hour or whatever.
I love the videos, but there is room for improvement
Can someone say more about the videos moving too quickly? I don’t quite understand this—you can pause, rewind, rewatch, or even slow down the playback in YouTube. So how is video speed an issue?
For me personally, it’s maybe not so much the videos that are fast as there is commentary and you can control the playback, but the GIF animations, like on twitter, feel fast and take me several views to figure out where the animation starts and ends, then to figure out what is happening because whoever creates the animation is doing it quickly. They already know how the feature they are demonstrating works, but the rest of us are still learning and absorbing it.
Of course you can do that, but why did Steve Jobs first tell us what we were going to learn, than told us what the messages was and after that summorised what we had seen? Because that helps getting messages across. Taking the time and telling again in a different way is different than rewinding and trying to find the right point in time.
Maybe you need to require that everyone has read the basics from https://docs.glideapps.com/all/ before being allowed to build an app?
No. Then make sure they see what you want them to see first and not some random video on a super complex level that shows up as a YT suggestion.
Your videos and docs are fantastic but you need to force people into a learning pipe if YouTube is screwing up the flow.
And maybe, for this forum, create Categories/sub cats that are grouped into conceptual Basic (introductions) / Intermediate / Advanced (spreadsheet magic). I have no idea of how as I’m just thinking out loud.
