Every business has the potential to become an online business. A few leading examples now are Grab and FoodPanda. In fact, there’ll be more companies that will invest heavily in digitization after the pandemic. 

In this post, we talked to CJ, who is in furniture retail for 10 years and decided to gain web development skills to digitize his business.

Why website builders don’t work in the long term?

We talked to CJ about what makes him want to learn web development from scratch when there are tons of no-code platforms on the market, and he answered us:

“A website is easy to build with WordPress or by hiring a developer, but sometimes you need to make small updates to the website, which makes the workflow with the web developer difficult. That’s why I gained knowledge in web development. So I can create and maintain a website myself,” said CJ.

As a beginner, it’s natural to seek out website builders, also known as no-code platforms, on the market that helps to turn your idea into reality, quicker. Most use drag-and-drop features to build the website directly on the front end without any coding knowledge – which is cool.

But a website is still a website. That means website builders take care of the coding while you design everything on the front end, but unknowingly, you lose the flexibility of customization. You will face situations where you’re required to add HTML and CSS codes to achieve certain functions and features. 

Sometimes you have to pay for third-party plugins to add functionality. It’s always a risk to build your business website dependent on these builders – in particular, if you’re looking to scale your website, have high volume traffic, or add-on features.

Eventually, you have no choice but to hire a web developer, which can cost you more in the near future.

Is web development easy for beginners without a technical background?

According to CJ, like most knowledge seekers out there, he tried to learn on his own, but the overwhelming information on the Internet confused him:

“From what I have gathered, according to the information on the Internet,  I have to learn so many programming languages and I really do not know where to start. Programming languages seem to be the hardest thing to learn, and it takes a lot of training to master them,” CJ said.

Now, this is a problem. Most of our students who tried self-learning before coming to Zero to Market ran into the same problem. The information on the Internet does not tell you exactly what you need. Instead, you are bombarded with the knowledge and experiences of others. A clear roadmap when learning web development never exists.

For example, can you believe you only need 3 programming languages to build your functional website, and you don’t even need to master them? Watch the following video to understand how a website is really built. This will give you a clear understanding of what it takes to turn your idea into a website.

How can you learn web development faster with Zero to Market?

Eventually, CJ enrolled in Zero to Market, a workshop where you commit to a learning plan to build your functional website in 30 days, with personal coaching calls, community support, and daily learning videos with assignments.

When we asked CJ what he thought about participating in the workshop, he replied, “I enjoyed interacting with more people who have a similar interest in web development as I do,” CJ said.

That’s the beauty of the program. When you’re part of LEAD, you’ll be given the personalized support you needed in each program – while getting connected with a community of like-minded people in our discussion forum called Pro Group.

The Pro Group is a discussion forum open to all workshop participants. With the mixed structure of instructor-led tutorials and peer-to-peer learning, participants tend to learn faster as they spend their time getting help, discussing problems, and collaborating with others.

When you teach someone else something, you have the chance to learn twice. First, when you learn it yourself, and second when you teach it – you internalized what you’ve learned.

Also, CJ mentioned that one of the biggest advantages of the program is that he has a coach who can help him and solve problems with his tasks in the shortest possible time.

“Dr. Lau answered all of our questions during the workshop with great advice. I think this is really important because we are still beginners and easily stumble on simple mistakes,” said CJ.

“My best advice for beginners with no technical background like me is to find a course that allows you to engage with the instructor, because you are going to have tons of problems and questions when you create your first website, and no one is going to answer them if you are in a typical online course where you are just watching and learning from a video,” CJ said.

Launch you’re website in 30 days.

At LEAD, we’ve helped hundreds of people – including CJ. And we can help you too – just by getting 1% better every day. Grow your web development skill set and be capable of building and maintaining serious market-ready websites with Zero To Market today.

Zero To Market helps you create a world-class website like a pro and allows you to set up backend and payment systems on your website. In the previous cohort of Zero to Market, some participants were interested in starting their own business using the knowledge gained from the program.

That’s why in Zero To Market 2.0 we have added new lessons to help you make your first sale, from creating an RM500,000 landing page to building sales funnels.

Join the workshop to improve your skills in a group of learners, build your website and make your first sale in 30 days. Click on the image below to view the workshop.