Speaker: Imad Albajaa, Founder and CEO, Balacode
Introduce yourself
Imad Albajaa: Hi, my name is Imad Albajaa I am the founder of Balacode.com. At Balacode, we help small businesses, especially non-technical, small business owner, how to automate their business processes using no code tools- and building apps without code.
What led you to AppSheet, what problems were you trying to solve?
Imad Albajaa: The challenge we have before is when- when we were building a product- Okay software- any kind of software product using traditional program languages, it took us a long time until we get into a stage that we are ready to go to the market now and test the product to see the user, the real users and let them test the product and get us a feedback. But, most of the time that was too late because we spent months building a product and then we go to the market to find out that this is not the product that our customer is needing or is looking for to solve their problem. It was solving the problem from you know, we thought it was solving the problem from our point of view, but it wasn't. So the challenge was that we were looking for something that we built let's say the prototype or the first phase of a ready product- functioning product, and just go to the market and that was why we choose AppSheet. Because it's- you can build a product quickly just like really quickly with a simple database from Google Sheet and get like a ready product- although it's a simple product and just give it to the customer and test it and then come back and modify on it.
What is the most useful app that you or your coworkers have deployed? What impact did it have on your organization?
Imad Albajaa: We've done a couple of good ones but, the most useful ones that is based on the field survey actually. For example the one- the contractors, once they finish building all these units, they send the technician or the engineers with the app and then take a photo of the snags and everything just to give the final report. The concept was okay, I have someone on the field and he's got- he's got an app and he can report everything by typing and by photo and at the same time, send it back to somewhere where everyone can see and you know and have a look at. So that was very useful. The contractor and field service app. Another one, the same concept actually with the team going on field and inspecting the cars, checking the GPS devices and everything and report that to the management. And the thing that the client likes that is more than one user working on the same sheet without making any duplication or an an error actually. So, field service is the most
Imad Albajaa: So they have a good interface now, an app on like mobile or even on the monitor. They quickly enter data into the- into the sheet, so they avoid duplication. So they know if this record- record is already exist within the sheet or not. Now they can use the camera to take photos and just insert the photos, scan a barcode , enter a signature by a client as a confirmation. So, they enter data quickly. And also, the other things is the opposite side how they get the data from the sheet quickly actually, because in AppSheet you can do- create like virtual columns to get more data based on calculation. How much is that and this one- this column, the value of this column plus this column. So you get more and more information and it helps the users and the management to take better decision- decisions actually to improve the work actually.
What’s the future of AppSheet within the organization?
Imad Albajaa: I can divide my answer into two sections. The first one is for the small businesses, small businesses, they will always ask and require AppSheet because it's simple and it can automate their daily processes actually. Also because, they used to go to those SAS software providers where they provide like a lot of features and options, but they don't prefer that because they want something tailored to their needs actually. They always have something that they need to be specific for themselves. Plus, they need to see their data so they need to see the sheet, the database in the location that they can access. With those SAS or those software provider, you don't see the data actually, you might see it but you don't know how they use it actually because you don't own it 100%. And also, the other section is from the like big organizations. So I believe the big companies and organizations they use like heavy software like ERP and such software. But, between those departments there must be a gap like where there is small processes that needs to be automated, that those manual processes needs to be improved. So, we use the AppSheet there and they will need it actually to improve and get better and quick decisions actually.
