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I tend to feel a little intimidated by companies that offer fantastic experiences like this, but then I keep trying to remember this: Algolia looked like shit

I tend to feel a little intimidated by companies that offer fantastic experiences like this, but then I keep trying to remember this: Algolia looked like shit when it started. There was none of this shine and polish. IIRC it was some text styled with Bootstrap 2. Or might have been 1. Stripe also looked like shit when it started. No shine or polish, no developer website based developer experience to speak of, no world leading 60fps animations, no fantastically versioned docs, nothing. Build something people want / something that solves a hard problem and makes people powerful and more enabled. Companies that do this can afford to build fantastic developer experiences after 10 years of doing it, but companies that try hard to build excellent developer experiences will not necessarily be successful.

garry 7y ago
Yes, keep in mind this is seven years of working hardcore on one problem.
ent101 7y ago
The landing page was, in fact, Bootstrap! https://web.archive.org/web/20130613201137/http://www.algolia.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20130613201137/http://www.algoli...
justaguyhere 7y ago
If someone starts a Algolia or a Stripe competitor today, they have to have good user experience to even compete, isn't it? Because Stripe and Algolia have already shown what is possible.
- stickfigure 7y ago
  If you plan to compete using their feature set, then yes. But that's a terrible idea. Find something that Algolia or Stripe won't or cannot do (for deep reasons) and offer that. Stripe has a list of "Restricted Businesses" each of which is a market that would be delighted to be served at all, let alone with some polish. Of course there are complicating factors... but you don't expect this to be easy, do you?
  - Redsquare 7y ago
    Algolia sadly cannot yet do things like "show me the items around/about $200", i don't care if the are +/- a few dollars
    - sarahdayan 7y ago
      Hi there! I work at Algolia and I may have a solution for you: you can filter on ranges to offer that kind of experience. For instance, if you decide to accept a +/- $20 margin, instead of filtering on exact price, you'd create a filter like `price < 180 AND price > 220` (replacing the numbers with your formula to calculate the range). This gives you full power on what is the "error margin" you accept. Hope this helps!
- jrvarela56 7y ago
  Even if you match their level of polish (which is nearly impossible due to manpower), why would someone use an unknown service over theirs? I think this follows the other reply: you should offer something different that's attractive enough for a client to pick your service over theirs. Something you enable or focus on that Stripe can't. Usually this happens because they'd have to sacrifice the experience of a much larger group of clients or your niche is too small to be worth it for a team at a bigger company. The bet is that serving this new group/need will help you a)end up with a profitable group of customers that grows and/or b)end up developing a user-base/feature-set that makes it easy for you to expand to other users/products and steal market from the bigger competitor.
donmatito 7y ago
It was absolutely magical even at the start I was a very inexperienced developer with tutorial-level experience of Rails, and I learned javascript from Algolia client tutorial. I have a 50-emails support thread with their CEO and CTO when they were doing YC. This level of patience and care at onboarding a new dev was incredible and I always rooted for them. I came to know them better a few years later (small world) and they are absolutely adorable, very down to earth and modest despite their tremendous growth But one thing has not changed : when you implement Algolia in a project, it feels like magic. The speed + convenience combo is unbeatable
z3t4 7y ago
> Build something people want Selling to developers is a bit harder then that. You need to offer something they already know they want. (or you will need a good sales team, and or sell to their boss). And something that can't easily build themselves. And something they can't already get for free (or you will have to also give it away for free).

garry 7y ago

Yes, keep in mind this is seven years of working hardcore on one problem.

ent101 7y ago

The landing page was, in fact, Bootstrap! https://web.archive.org/web/20130613201137/http://www.algolia.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20130613201137/http://www.algoli...

justaguyhere 7y ago

If someone starts a Algolia or a Stripe competitor today, they have to have good user experience to even compete, isn't it? Because Stripe and Algolia have already shown what is possible.

stickfigure 7y ago
If you plan to compete using their feature set, then yes. But that's a terrible idea. Find something that Algolia or Stripe won't or cannot do (for deep reasons) and offer that. Stripe has a list of "Restricted Businesses" each of which is a market that would be delighted to be served at all, let alone with some polish. Of course there are complicating factors... but you don't expect this to be easy, do you?
- Redsquare 7y ago
  Algolia sadly cannot yet do things like "show me the items around/about $200", i don't care if the are +/- a few dollars
  - sarahdayan 7y ago
    Hi there! I work at Algolia and I may have a solution for you: you can filter on ranges to offer that kind of experience. For instance, if you decide to accept a +/- $20 margin, instead of filtering on exact price, you'd create a filter like `price < 180 AND price > 220` (replacing the numbers with your formula to calculate the range). This gives you full power on what is the "error margin" you accept. Hope this helps!
jrvarela56 7y ago
Even if you match their level of polish (which is nearly impossible due to manpower), why would someone use an unknown service over theirs? I think this follows the other reply: you should offer something different that's attractive enough for a client to pick your service over theirs. Something you enable or focus on that Stripe can't. Usually this happens because they'd have to sacrifice the experience of a much larger group of clients or your niche is too small to be worth it for a team at a bigger company. The bet is that serving this new group/need will help you a)end up with a profitable group of customers that grows and/or b)end up developing a user-base/feature-set that makes it easy for you to expand to other users/products and steal market from the bigger competitor.

donmatito 7y ago

It was absolutely magical even at the start I was a very inexperienced developer with tutorial-level experience of Rails, and I learned javascript from Algolia client tutorial. I have a 50-emails support thread with their CEO and CTO when they were doing YC. This level of patience and care at onboarding a new dev was incredible and I always rooted for them. I came to know them better a few years later (small world) and they are absolutely adorable, very down to earth and modest despite their tremendous growth But one thing has not changed : when you implement Algolia in a project, it feels like magic. The speed + convenience combo is unbeatable

z3t4 7y ago

> Build something people want Selling to developers is a bit harder then that. You need to offer something they already know they want. (or you will need a good sales team, and or sell to their boss). And something that can't easily build themselves. And something they can't already get for free (or you will have to also give it away for free).