Chad Sakonchick’s story is one of perseverance and adaptation in the world of entrepreneurship. Starting with traditional coding, he discovered the power of no-code tools to build and scale his business, Better Legal.
In his 20s, Chad embarked on a series of entrepreneurial ventures. He learned the hard way that traditional coding was expensive and time-consuming.
He spent tens of thousands hiring developers and chasing them down to complete projects. It was a frustrating process that yielded limited success.
The Birth of Better Legal: A Need for Efficiency
The spark for Better Legal came from helping a lawyer friend compete with online legal service companies. Chad built a prototype in a week using no-code tools like Asana and Zapier, automating tasks and streamlining business formation processes.
This initial success proved the concept and led to the founding of Better Legal. But while functional, it had limitations. Changes required manual editing of lengthy legal documents, hindering scalability.
A switch to Salesforce offered some improvements, but it came with high costs and limitations.
Seeking a more robust solution, Chad hired developers to build a custom application from scratch. This approach sustained the business for five years, but it came at a price:
- Rising Costs: Each new feature required additional development resources, driving up expenses.
- Slow Development: Development cycles were lengthy, hindering agility and innovation.
- Founder Dependence: As a non-technical founder, Chad relied heavily on developers, creating a vulnerability.
There simply had to be a better way…
Regaining Control of Better Legal
Faced with high operational costs, Better Legal had to re-evaluate its development strategy. Enter no-code platforms like Bubble. Chad discovered a treasure trove of tools that empowered him to rebuild Better Legal in just 90 days.
The rebuilt Better Legal is a testament to the power of no-code. Here’s the new tech stack:
- Bubble: The foundation for the entire platform.
- Productivity Sweet & The Masonry: Enhancements built on top of Bubble for faster development and reusable code blocks.
- Zapier & Make: Automation engines handling over 100,000 tasks per month.
- Twilio & Lob: Communication and document management tools.
- Internal Bubble Apps: Replacing third-party subscription services like Asana for task management and Twilio Flex for the contact center, offering significant cost savings and improved functionality.
The Competitive Advantage of No-Code
Better Legal thrives in a competitive legal tech space but no-code gives them an edge with reduced costs and the agility and flexibility of rapid prototyping and iteration.
Plus, by using no-code they have freed up resources to focus on delivering a superior user experience.
Monthly recurring revenue is up 58% after gaining full control over product design with Bubble.
And the company continues to release new features, such as an AI-powered contract analysis tool.
Chad Sakonchick’s journey is an inspiration for anyone looking to build software. It demonstrates that even without a traditional coding background, powerful no-code tools can empower entrepreneurs to create successful businesses.
Wondering what software you might consider building right now with no-code tools? Consider creating an app for Apple’s new Vision Pro.