No Code Needed | Kalob Hagen | Full Battery Media

In this episode of the Full Battery Media Podcast, I sit down with Kalob Hagen, founder of Luigi Solutions, to talk about something that honestly blew my mind: building an app in one day, even if you have zero coding experience. 

Kalob shares how his experience at an AI hackathon led him to see a huge gap in the market for everyday people, creators, entrepreneurs, and small business owners who have great ideas but feel blocked by cost, complexity, or lack of technical skills. We talk about AI-assisted workflows, app-building fundamentals, product-market fit, customer discovery, and why keeping your first app simple is usually the smartest move. What I love about this conversation is that it is really about empowerment. It is about giving people ownership of their ideas and showing them that technology is no longer just for big companies or professional developers. 

If you have ever had an app idea but thought it was too expensive or too complicated to build, this episode will make you think differently.

What is one app idea you have always wanted to build but never knew where to start?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Yeah, so I'm really grateful because I was introduced to technology when I was 14 years old. I got uh I was able to have somebody from a uh part owner of a large company take me under his wing, teach me about engineering and technology. And so I had a lot of connections at a young age that were knew all the ins and outs of technology and electronics and all that stuff. But basically, once I figured out there was a gap, uh I reverse engineered it from what my knowledge uh currently was because I'd already, like I said, I'd already built uh software applications and websites and things like that. I had just never done it in that short period of time. So after I did that, I was like, okay, cool, I'd love to share this with other people. And I reverse engineered it. I was and I went to at the time Chat GPT, now I don't use chat at all, and I was like, hey, this is what I'm trying to do. What kind of tool set can I make this happen? Um, and with these constraints, and then it gave me the tools, and then from there I went and tested those same constraints, which is the same tools that I that I used at the hackathon, and I just tested it to make sure that it's something I could teach people, and there was, you know, it was kind of made to make sure it's bulletproof before I go teach people it. And uh lo and behold, it was, and so then I made that offer, and people were interested. Uh, and actually, I got more interest than I really anticipated. You know, we had our inaugural event sell out, our our second event sell out. We had sponsors now, too, that are helping. We got a private donor in the northern Michigan region, investor interests in our company uh for what we do. Um, and you know, we've got good testimonials, demand, and so yeah, it really took off. And um, I think I did more than just answer your question.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

Welcome everybody back to the Full Battery Media Podcast. I've got a really interesting and awesome guest with me today. Would you like to tell people who you are and a little bit about what you do?

SPEAKER_00 1:55

Yeah, definitely. Hi, uh hi guys. For those that don't know me, my name is Caleb Hagen. I'm the founder of the Ouija Solutions. Uh, currently, our flagship event is teaching people how to build an app in a day, even if they have zero experience. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Is it possible? Like, I was like reading that. That's wild. You can build an app in a day. That's I mean, sorry, that's fascinating to me. Uh tell me about that. First of all, how did you come up with this business? And uh, how can you build an app in a day, man?

SPEAKER_00 2:27

Yeah, actually the story, I actually actually accidentally uh came up with this idea, and here's how. So in November of 2025, I was invited, actually it might have been October, but I was invited to the IBM AI hackathon, and I had never been to a hackathon before. Um, you know, I had built software previously, uh, but I'd never been to a hackathon. So I went to this hackathon down in Detroit at Wayne State University, and I, even though I had never built an app in a day, uh, I ended up being able to do it by myself. Um and so, you know, after the event, I was like, oh, okay. So there's people coming here, they're paying money to learn, or not how to learn, but to build an app and compete for a prize. And then I was like, well, I don't think there's anything on the market where it's specifically for people with zero experience. You know, hackathons are for people that are already developers, and so I saw the gap there, and I was like, huh. Well, I'm gonna run a test and see if people are interested, uh, and are interested in learning how to build an app in a day, even if they have zero experience. And uh yeah, people were interested. And here we are fast forward. We've taught 40 people about, and yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

What what goes into building an app in a day? Do you have to learn coding? Are you using different tools? What is the the pathway that you guide people through to build an app in a day?

SPEAKER_00 4:02

Yeah, definitely. So no, you don't have to know, you don't have to have any experience whatsoever. You don't have to have written code, you don't have to know programming anymore. Uh, there's lots of new tools out there. We now have a proprietary method called the Ouija method where we walk people, uh it's a proven method where we teach people how to do this, and we teach them professional developer tools, we teach them AI assisted workflows, we teach them the fundamentals of app building in a short compressed time, but in a supportive environment where they're with other people that are just like them trying to do that along with subject matter experts, a chance to demo their app at the end of the day, and a chance for a grand prize. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 4:42

Like to me, I think that it's so cool because um you see these apps that come out there, and you think that the gap between where people are like there's this huge gap between being able to create it. And there used to be a major amount of gatekeeping as well. For there was a lot required to put you know, get this all into place, you know. And I'm just fascinated too by I have all these ideas for things that could be interesting or a product that I could service or an app that could be like I've got four different podcasts, right? So I've got my Sean Trey show, which is all about positivity, I've got growing money, I've got full battery media, which is all about content, and I've got barrels and roots, which is about wine, which is a bit freaking much, but you know, I I like it and I love them all. But I was sitting there going, wow, I'd really love to come up and create an app about wine that, you know, um you answer questions and it matches you with your perfect bottle, you know, and in your price range, so you can just start figuring things out or gamify it or you know, gamifying money, because I think all of the financial apps out there kind of suck. And I was just like, but then I was start doing research about what it would take to get that going, and I just I've shut down because the numbers start going up and it's like so overwhelming. But when I saw you, and I was just like, wow, so for content people, people that are making content and doing things, they go, I want to create my own, you know, product. It's possible, and it seems like it's way more achievable than people think.

SPEAKER_00 6:19

Yeah, it it definitely is overwhelming. We've helped a lot of overwhelm people where they don't know where to start or they start thinking about it and start researching it and are like, you know, I have no idea how to do this, or that's too expensive, or this is too hard. All those things come to mind. Um, you know, for example, like Theodore came to one of our events, he had an idea for like two years, and he was stoked after he came to our event because he finally got to bring his dream that he had in his head to reality. And so we're a really good starting point for people to start getting momentum. So, you know, it's a it's a way to build your confidence, a way to get started, it's a way in the door. Um, and so I think that's where we really help people is transforming them from being overwhelmed and overburdened by the process or what they think they may need, but you don't need an education, you don't need a ton of money. Um, and so I'm glad that we've been able to help people overcome that stress barrier and just give them uh uh an open door of like the starting point to where it's like, okay, they have momentum, and we encourage them to continue building after so that way um they can keep building on those skills that they learn at our events. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

And to me, it's really interesting too because you're empowering people, you are giving them the tools to build something proprietary that they own, that they have, that is theirs. And to me, that's power, man. It's powerful to be able to say, yeah, this, this here, this is mine, and and then to to enact it out into the world, man. How did you come up with this idea? Like you you were going out there and you said you you went to that codathon and you were coming up with like where how did you like visualize the tools that would be needed for this too? Like, you know, putting everything into place because you saw the problem, and as you were creating the solution, what where did you go to find you know your inspiration or so?

SPEAKER_00 8:24

Yeah, so I'm really grateful because I was introduced to technology when I was 14 years old. I got uh I was able to have somebody from a uh part owner of a large company take me under his wing, teach me about engineering and technology. And so I had a lot of connections at a young age that were knew all the ins and outs of technology and electronics and all that stuff. But basically, once I figured out there was a gap, uh I reverse engineered it from what my knowledge uh currently was because I'd already, like I said, I'd already built uh software applications and websites and things like that. I had just never done it in that short period of time. So after I did that, I was like, okay, cool, I'd love to share this with other people. And I reverse engineered it. I was and I went to at the time Chat GPT, now I don't use chat at all, and I was like, hey, this is what I'm trying to do. What kind of tool set can I make this happen? Um, and with these constraints, and then it gave me the tools, and then from there I went and tested those same constraints, which is the same tools that I that I used at the hackathon, and I just tested it to make sure that it's something I could teach people, and there was, you know, it was kind of made to make sure it's bulletproof before I go teach people it. And uh lo and behold, it was, and so then I made that offer, and people were interested. Uh, and actually, I got more interest than I really anticipated. You know, we had our inaugural event sell out, our our second event sell out. We had sponsors now, too, that are helping. We got a private donor in the northern Michigan region, investor interests in our company uh for what we do. Um, and you know, we've got good testimonials, demand, and so yeah, it really took off. And um, I think I did more than just answer your question.

SPEAKER_01 10:02

That's awesome, man. It totally makes sense, man. And it's interesting too because I love to hear the story. I love to hear about the mentorship, about how the people, you know, that's the powerful thing. It's like, I think all of us exist inside of a box at times. And one of the coolest things is when you get someone along, someone who comes along and says, Hey, hey, you can get from here to here, but you just need help. And it's like, that seems to be what you're doing on a grand scale with helping people build an app. But you know, I want to ask you this because it might seem very literal, but like, what does it actually mean to build an app? Like, what are you really doing? Are you coding? Are you creating something visually? You know, does it does it work on its own? Is this uh like going into the app store right away? Like, or is it just creating the framework? I I'm so curious about that because again, I would love to do this myself, you know?

SPEAKER_00 10:53

Yeah, yeah, I'd be happy to help you with that. Uh, so it's multiple things. Some of the things you mentioned, one of the first things we do in the day is we build confidence because of what we were talking about earlier, where people don't know if it's necessarily possible. You know, it's a pretty strong claim. Is this just marketing claim, whatever, you know? Um, so first we start by building their confidence. I demo an app that I built in a day, and then I uh give a statistic about how you know there's millions of other people that are doing this, because there is, it's a dev post statistic. And then um after I've uh convicted every all the participants, like like, hey, you can do this, and I know you can. Here's proof that you can, and I've done it too. Um, so there's that, that's the beginning of the day, and then uh we also teach the fundamentals around it, so we give an overall simplistic, the most simplistic view that you can have about app building. I intentionally do that because I already know that these folks are overwhelmed with all the things that come with it. So I figured why not make it as simple and easy as possible, get rid of as much of the technical jargon as I can. And I really just distilled it down into the proprietary method. So we have a framework that we teach the Luigi method that really helps guide people. Um, the entire presentation that I do uh it gives all the participants resources that way if me or one of the subject matter experts are helping somebody else, they can easily have those resources. They get to keep those wherever they go. So if they want to uh uh you know reuse the process that we use, they can build unlimited apps afterward. Um hopefully I didn't go off on too much a tangent. Did I answer your question?

SPEAKER_01 12:37

Totally does, and it's awesome because to me it's like I don't even know how to conceptualize this. You know what I mean? I'm like you you you sit there and you hear stories about people who create an app. It's like, well, what are the steps to that? You know, like I understand steps to make in a video. First of all, I gotta think about what I want to shoot. Then I gotta pull my camera out and do it, and then I kind of film it, and then I come back and I go in the editing suite, and then I go there and I or cap code, whatever you do. But like I it's a whole new world for me, which is fascinating. But you know, you already said that you don't even know have to know how to code, which is awesome. But like, if I had an app, an idea for an app today, what's the first step that I should take? How do I even go down that path?

SPEAKER_00 13:25

Yeah, I mean, it depends on if you had you're using it personally or for business. If you're using it for business, you definitely want to do some research, see if it's a novel idea, see if there's competitors out there, see what your price points can be. Uh, and then if you uh think that it the idea has merit, the very first thing that I typically do is I go and talk to people or create an offer. So that way I can validate that before I put all this time and money and energy into building something, I know that it's going to um do well if it's for business. If it's for personal, it doesn't matter. You just want to get it built and you want to use it for whatever you want to use it for. Um and then after but after those, then what you do is what's called in software development, uh a PRD, which is a product requirements document. This is one of the very few technical things that we teach, and we teach a simplified version of it. And all it is is what's the user input, what's the user output, and uh just a basic overview of the functionality of the apps, the app requirements. And then um I recommend that people draw on a piece of paper or draw on something on what they want it to look like too. So they have an idea of what the functionality is, then they have an idea of what it looks like, and then you get the tools that we we provide for you, and then you start uh building. And we give you know very straightforward, simple steps on that so that way uh people don't get confused. Of course, there's still you know questions that people have, but we're able to guide them right to where they want to go.

SPEAKER_01 15:01

I love that, man. And it's cool because you know, you got the visuals, you got the idea, but you know, I want to ask you because a lot of people have ideas, you know, but you can have a good idea and not implement it right and then have uh something that doesn't succeed, you know. Like so I remember when I was younger, my uncle had this idea, he wanted to do a roller coaster across America, and I was like, wow, you know, first of all, you're probably gonna be killing some people because I think that level of stress is gonna be beyond what the human body can handle. But his idea was like, well, I want to think people want to go fast and they want to go cross country. And I was like, well, maybe a bullet train, you know, like one idea functional, feasible, the other idea killing people. Because I I'm pretty sure I remember watching this special, like there's a point in time where if someone's on a roller coaster for a certain amount of time, they will literally die. And it was like this wild like YouTube video, and it was talking about how like there's a certain amount of time where people just can't handle that stress anymore. And it was like literally, I was like one of the greatest ways to go. You're like, yeah, and you're done. But you know, it's like um, so that was macabre and dark, but yeah, getting back to it, his idea was you know really interesting, but it just didn't have that thing to succeed, you know. But another person comes along and says, Hey, I want to build this high-speed rail across the country, you know, that might be something that people are going for. You know, why do some apps that might serve a similar purpose, one of them succeeds and another one just never gets used? I want to hear your perspective on that because if you're building something, you want it to be something that people want and will use, you know.

SPEAKER_00 16:44

Yeah, in my experience, um, from what I've seen from our participants and from just my personal experience is a number of things. Uh one of which is like I was mentioning earlier, you know, people call it product market fit PMF for short. And right when you go out and do customer discovery, you gotta talk to you know 50, 100 people to make sure you don't just get one yes and you're like, oh, this is a no, you need to talk to multiple people and ask them the right questions. So, what questions are those? I mean, there's there's many questions, one of which is would you use directly? Like, would you use this and how much would you pay for it? If no, and and if you're making it a business, obviously people need to be able to pay for it, otherwise it's not gonna work, and you don't want to waste all that time and energy. So that's a really important one that I've used um and done consumer research projects where uh, for example, on a previous startup I did Luigi Appetizer, I went on and talked to I think it was 30 different restaurants. Um and then I decided not to do it because the feedback was yeah, I don't know how much I'd pay for that. Yeah, maybe I'd pay a dollar for that. Yeah, I don't know. Is it free? So, you know, you gotta really find something that people really want for sure. That's a really big key. And then building it, you also can't be super attached, even though it's your idea and you really love it, you can't be too attached to it. You know, it goes back to the customers every time. It's what they want, how they want it, when they want it. If you can meet that um and people are willing to pay for it, that's a winner. I love that. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 18:23

I think that you know I had a friend who wanted to make a movie, right? And he came in and he described the movie, and I was like, that sounds insane, man. He's like, Yeah, but people are gonna like it. And I said, Well, I don't know. He's like, but I'm gonna like it. I said, those are two different things, those are two very different things. You liking it and people liking it are very different things. And he's like, Well, I'm just gonna make it anyways. And he ended up making this film, and he loved it, and no one else did, and it just didn't go anywhere. And I was like, he was happy he made it, and I was like, Well, that's cool, man. If that's what you were looking for and you felt pleasure and joy from making it, that's awesome. But he's like, But I wish other people had liked it. I said, Well, you might want to think about that the next time you create something, you have to find something that people are actually a needing, wanting, and deliver on that. You know, and it's like one of my favorite examples in Hollywood was a movie that came out at the wrong time. Great movie, interesting movie, but man, it was just before its time. And that was the movie Kevin Costner's Waterworld. Waterworld was this wild movie. You know what? I'm saying I don't know. Yeah, all right. So I'm gonna explain it to you. It was I'm old. I'm old, and it was it was it was before its time, right? Kevin Costner made this movie, and it was one of it was so expensive, it was crazy expensive to make. And it the whole concept was global warming had melted all of the polar ice caps, and now the whole planet was underwater, right? And but at that time, people were like, global warming, that shit's bullshit. That would never happen. There's no such thing as global warming, and it was like in the 90s, and people are like, ah, they pushed back, right? Right, and so and the movie failed. Not because a couple of reasons. One, it was such a huge budget, and like they were filming near Hawaii, and then there was like a big storm and it sank half the set, so they had to rebuild the set as well, which is ridiculously hard. Um, but it was just it didn't succeed. You might make that now, and someone would love it, you know? And so I think that's interesting. But I want to ask you this because when people are making their first build, what's a mistake that often people will make with their first app?

SPEAKER_00 20:47

Overcomplicating it, adding way too many features, way too many, too much complexity, which is part of what we teach, is keep it simple once you have the simple part, then add more if that if it makes sense. I love that because keep it simple, stupid man. I think that is that's hard for me too, actually. So, you know, something that was really hard for me is to keep it simple. You know, like I have advisors uh I'm really fortunate for, and I'll go to them and say something. They're like, nope, don't even do that. Nope, just keep it how it is, keep it simple, like it just and and I can so I'm talking for personal experience too.

SPEAKER_01 21:28

Dude, you and me both, man. I I deliberately tell my editors to keep all of the videos that we do really simple. They love to make them fancy. And I said, People don't need fancy, they need a basic thing and they need it done well. So I one of my favorite apps was I had this breathing app that has since been removed from like the app store. And like it was just like basic inhale, counted for, hold, exhale, counted for six. And then do it again. And I was just like, dude, it was so useful. And it had this little picture of a person, but it wasn't fancy. It was so basic that it was so basic that it was like painfully basic. But it was great and it functioned well. And then all of these other stuff that I've looked at more recently that like have all these add-ons. Do you want to pay for a different voice? And it's like, hi, my name is Charles. And I would it's like, well, I don't need Charles's voice to do this meditation. I'm I'm fine and happy with just like weird music playing in the background. But it's like, you know, they want to sell you Charles's voice. And I'm like, well, Charles, you know, you do have this amazing voice, but it's not what I need right now. And so I love the idea of keeping it simple because I think that if I were to develop an app, I'd probably have 25,000 things I'd want to include in it. And uh maybe I need one or two that actually work well, you know?

SPEAKER_00 23:00

Yeah, and you know, it's one of the lean principles too. There's a book called The Lean Startup by Eric Rise. I have it sitting over there, and it's funny. You read it too? Yeah, love it. It's such a good idea.

SPEAKER_01 23:15

For the people who haven't read it, can tell tell people a little bit about the concept in the lean startup. If people haven't read it, would you mind?

SPEAKER_00 23:22

Yeah, I mean, technically it's old, but really it's new, and I think more people will be should be familiar with it. And essentially, it just was an innovative way that Eric Rise, well, and others came up with on how to build a startup. So, you know, uh traditionally, and by traditionally I mean, you know, 20 plus years ago basically, uh, you know, people would build a company, they would spend uh hundreds of thousands of dollars on development, and they would build out an entire product or an entire whatever they're building. They would build out the entire thing, right? And spend all the money, the time, the resources. And then two years go by, they haven't had a single customer because they're developing. And then they go and they go to the market, and a lot of companies they did this, spent $100,000, couple years of time, went out to the market for their first customer, and they hated it and went bankrupt. A lot of these companies. Well, this guy came up with the idea okay, instead, let's start from the beginning. Let's just build something that's super simple, barely even functions. If not, doesn't even function, then let's take it to the market, see if the proof of concept works, and then if it does, we'll build it out from there, is basically the essence of the book. And it has a lot of methodology and teachings throughout it that really teach how to run a lean startup and how to do it uh in a more effective and efficient way.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

I love that too, because we've got a restaurant near my house that is so good. It's a type of duck noodle soup called boonve. It's boonved, yeah, it's delicious. It's duck noodle soup. Now, this lady, she should have a Michelin star already. It is that good, it is ridiculously delicious. But here's the thing that's all she makes. That's all she needs to make because she does it really freaking well. And if she were to do more and try to put extra stuff out there, it's not needed. But as she gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and she's busy every morning, she is full of customers because her food is so damn good. And I'm talking about this right now. I am definitely going there tomorrow morning for breakfast. Why? Because it's freaking delicious, and she does it so well. But you know, she doesn't have to think about like expanding, and she if she tried to do like 25 different dishes, it would be really tough for her. It'd be tough to maintain that because it takes extra work. And maybe people, like you said, don't like that food, but you have to think about what's gonna really impact people, you know. Like, and thinking about problems, I love thinking about problems people have. So, you know, you you know what I want? I want a simple app that is like this, where I want to be able to figure out what I'm spending and how I'm doing my budget. But like all of the budgeting apps I've seen, they do this. Like, you have to put it in, and then you input the category, and then after you input the category, like you have to think about you. I just want to be like, I bought this, and I don't know what category it goes in, but this is what I bought just now. Tell me what it I did, you know, put it in the place, and then I just list the things and I'm putting them into the app, and the app just like categorizes things for me. And at the end of the day, it gives me this nice little readout, maybe a little uh pie chart or or bar graph. Okay, freaking dude, killing it. That's all I need. It doesn't need to be more fancy than that. So I've got my new budgeting app lined up, you know? And so because literally, like that's all I want. And then at the end of the day, here's the simple things can I gamify that app? So if I spend less less today than I spent yesterday, it gives me a certain number of points. If I spend more today than I did yesterday, then it gives me a warning. And if I do that two days in a row, then I get a problem, you know. So you get this gamify, and all the whole time it's charting what I'm spending, and all I gotta do is tell it what I spent and where I spent it.

SPEAKER_00 27:40

You know, I actually can probably really benefit from that app, I think, especially if I had a gamify competitive like leaderboard like right of the nation or something like that, of the globe of spending release, you're saving the most amount of that would be awesome. I would all day long.

SPEAKER_01 27:57

Oh, see, and then you just you made me think about something. Not only like what are you spending, how much you're putting into the savings, and that gets you extra points right there. So you're like, all right, I didn't spend anything today, but today I put $25 into my savings account, or I put $100 into my retirement account, whatever. Like, keep it simple. Like, but if it's going up or if it's going down, and that's all you're inputting every single day, and it's got to have a memory and track what you did yesterday and last week, and then you get these different micro goals, dude. That's the spending app that I want to build. And to me, I think it's a killer idea. And then because I already have like my financial podcast that gets a ton of people viewing it, I can be like, hey guys, guess what? I'm launching. I'm launching my little spending app. And if you guys want to get out there and use it, come on and watch. And like, boom, suddenly I've got I've got reach, I've got the audience, I've got that, but I've also got the app that is something that people friggin' need. It's not fancy, simple, and little fun, simple little icons or looks, or maybe you don't even need that. Maybe you pick your avatar and your avatar's like, oh, I'm happy, you know. I'm just like the whole Duolingo thing. You just get three different pictures, happy and sad, and then dead. You go to Vegas one weekend and your character dies, you know?

SPEAKER_00 29:13

So I like that.

SPEAKER_01 29:15

That's but I mean, like that to me, that to me seems worthwhile, and it's something that like right there. I just described that app, and you're like, I could use that because I could too, man. And like all of the stuff wine app, every dollar has a job. I that app makes me crazy. I tried to figure it out at the end of the day. I was like, dude, someone shoot me. This is so complicated, it has to be easier than this.

SPEAKER_00 29:39

Yeah, yeah. You mentioned you lived in Southeast Asia after what I'll have to uh help you out. We'll get a virtual version set up or something like that. I'm all for it, man. I'm all for it.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

Dude, we gotta we we gotta talk more.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

Yeah, a competitive uh or a line that I just thought, uh uh a tagline that I thought for uh your budget thing could be like um the most uh the most fun and competitive way to save money or something like that. I don't know. Dude, right?

SPEAKER_01 30:11

Right? See, this is what I'm talking about, but this is where it's empowering to people that you can give them these tools because I sit here and talked, I went and reached out to one team and they're like, Yeah, man, we can help you with that. It's like, oh, cool, because I had this idea for a budgeting app, right? Because it's just something that I want, it's a problem I have. And then when I reached out to them, they're like, that would be $25,000. And I was like, Jesus Christ, man, you know, like, wow, that's really expensive. And it doesn't have to be fancy.

SPEAKER_00 30:43

That's actually cheap. See, that's actually cheap. And so I want to hit on that really quick. That's part of the reason uh why we're so popular, too, is because traditionally software costs uh even for an NVP first, you know, minimal viable product, meaning the first version that you can use, is anywhere from $60,000 to $100,000. Whereas, or you and you don't have control over and you don't learn any of the skills, and they build it for you, and they have full control over. Or you can go to one of our events for a couple hundred dollars, learn how to use the skills, and have that skill with you for the rest of your life to build as many apps as you want. Dude, I love that. I mean, it's in your brainer, right?

SPEAKER_01 31:27

It's empowering people, man. It's empowering people, and that's that's huge. But I want to ask you this because how can an app actually help a small business like a restaurant or or something else, you know?

SPEAKER_00 31:40

Yeah, definitely. So I'll use uh so we've had corporate teams come as well, and so they have built um, and I have video testimonials of this as well, but they'll build internal tools for their company that aren't even customer-facing, that saves them time, makes them more money, et cetera, et cetera, makes their job easier. Uh, like for example, uh Brennan, Brennan from Bed Connect, uh, so they've had their like basically their whole team through our programs, and um he built a tool. You can see this on my LinkedIn too, to those that are viewing. Um, but uh he built a tool for Bed Connect where it basically uh finds leads for them in an automated way. Whereas before, Lindsay, um the CEO of Bed Connect, she would manually go to Google, try to find the leads, then put them in her notes, and then have to track them manually, take hours, weeks, whatever. And now all they have to do is click uh Search O City in the app that he built, where they were trying to find leads, and at lead qualifies them, gives them all the information instantaneously. So now they they have an automated way that saved them so much time, figures out who the biggest whales are, where they're looking for them in their space. And so I'm really happy that uh they are continuing to use the apps that they built at our events and getting value out of them.

SPEAKER_01 33:10

I love that, man. You know, I want to ask you this too, because you know, why do big companies seem to have better tools than small businesses? Like, is this just you know, is it not fair? Because, like, yeah, you know, you see, and this is the thing, like, but I'm gonna push back on that. I I I prep my questions, but as I'm thinking about that, big companies seem to have good tools, but dude, I've looked at all these big companies and none of their budgeting apps are great, you know, like so. Sometimes they have all this extra money and they make something that's way more complex, but it doesn't mean that it's better.

SPEAKER_00 33:45

Yep. So, so my take on this is I think that the little guys actually have an advantage because of the fact that everything's becoming more democratized, and because the little guys typically, not always, more hungry or more willing to go to extremes to get what they want. And then thirdly, the little guys don't have as much or nothing to lose compared to the big guys, where they're like, if we make one wrong move, we can get sued and lose like $30 billion. You know what I mean? And so it's kind of like a little bit different if you're gonna lose a hundred bucks or if you're gonna lose a billion dollars, you know, that's uh a little bit uh different strategy there.

SPEAKER_01 34:26

Um, so well, man, that makes a lot of sense to me. And I mean, to me, I think that I agree with you. I think that the the little guy does have an advantage, but it's it's also because so many of the little guys are thinking outside the box too. They're sitting there thinking about their problems and going, I could really use this. Like for me, you know, if I was gonna be making a wine app, I love wine, but I don't know a damn thing about it. And so I know what I like and what I don't like. Like, I don't like things that taste. I had a wine the other day that tasted like bread, and I know it's like some type of special fermentation. I think they called Lee's fermentation, so they ferment it like on top top of the yeast, but it tastes like bread. And like my dog, I poured, I didn't finish the whole bottle because I just couldn't handle it. It had some that I poured out, and I was just like, ah, it's too much for me. And plus, I already drank enough. And the the whole the next day my daughter came in and she's like, Why does it smell like bread in here? And I was like, see, I knew it, it was tasted like bread too. And like to me, like I want to figure out like, okay, so I put that into the app and I'm like, I don't like this, this, and this flavor. What would be a better fit for me? And then just try this, or I take, or a picture app, you know, like they have that app that you take a picture of something, and I mean, I know you know you can use search or chat GPT to do this, but like, do the oh, I just had this bottle click, or this is this is good. You take a picture of it and then it searches a database and it tells you, does this match your type? You know, is this a good deal? Things like that to me seem like they would actually be because it's something I need.

SPEAKER_00 36:09

Yeah, no, you're onto something there. I mean, look at the company Scentbird, they do the same thing both clones. I've used Scentbird before, so they match you with the ones you like, they recommend one you like, you can save a list of the ones you like, and I think you can go a step above that, and it uh recognizes the ones that you dislike too. So if you're searching out there for a wine, it'll pop up with a flag that says, Hey, you didn't like this one that was similar to this one, so you might not want to buy this. Instead, try this or you know, something like that. I don't know. But I love your idea. I I think both those ideas uh have merit. You know, I'm not I'm not uh a hundred people, but I'm at least one of a hundred. So if you can get it like a hundred more people saying, Yes, I love that, and I'd pay for it, you're on to something.

SPEAKER_01 36:52

Right. And see, one of the funny things with the wine would be pretty hilarious too. Like, make it funny. I had one of my guests, because that feel is so uptight. Make it funny. You know, like like this one guy, he was a famous Somalier, which is like a wine expert, and he came on my podcast and he's like, Well, this type of wine, well, it's kind of like a uh a Rottweiler in a bottle. I was like, damn, that's a great description. Why don't we have more of that? More people like it has quite a toast, it's spicy. Talk to me. Like this wine, if you're not cool, it's gonna rip your leg off. Like, what? Like it's gonna rip your leg off? Like, that's how I want my wines described, you know. I had so like I went to one uh wine tasting with my friend was a winemaker, and he's like, This wine, it's like Freddie Mercury. And I was like, Oh, dude, like tell me more about what is a Freddie Mercury wine entail. And I tasted it. I was like, and then what I said was like that's Freddie Mercury. I don't know how else to describe that wine. It's the best way to describe it. So is it a rot wire that's gonna rip your leg off, or is it something else? But like, if you can make it interesting like that and not as uptight, I think you're on to something, you know.

SPEAKER_00 38:02

Oh, yeah, I was just gonna say, I actually for me, I have a year, eight months, and I think 15 days sober. I have to check. But so for me, it's like my apologies. No, no, no, no, no, no, don't apologize. I don't care, I don't care, dude. Doesn't bother me. I have no desire to drink whatsoever. I still think your idea has merit. I would have used it if I was still drinking. But I was kind of picky about my alcohol too. So I I think that's part of the reason why I think it's it's good.

SPEAKER_01 38:27

So I appreciate that, man. And see, but that's another cool thing, too. Like, the beauty of this is that all of us have our own place. I started a wine podcast because I grew up in the Napa Valley, and mine I actually don't drink much. But do you know why I love wine? Is because I loved the farmers that were there. I love the winemakers, they were cool as hell, and just watching them do their art. But like, I'll have a glass of wine once a month. And to me, that's the the type of thing, but I still want I don't want to waste my money. That's the bigger problem. So I was like, I I some of this shit's expensive. So, you know that. But like for someone who's who's sober, like what type of app would help you, you know? And I think that the beauty of this is that if you can come from a place that you're building something that is valuable to you and you can share it with people, but again, that's why I love that what you're doing is you're democratizing this process, you know, and you can help people go, you know what, this is what I want, and this is how I can share it.

SPEAKER_00 39:30

Yeah, absolutely. Uh yeah, it's I'm definitely I'm definitely helping the movement of it being democratized. I wouldn't say I don't know, like I kind of am, it's like already democratized. I'm helping facilitate that democratization. Like, hey, this is something that's real, this is available, and I'm teaching how to do this. So I just want to make that distinction of that. Invent some of these other tools that we teach. I just help facilitate, hey, this is how you can use it to get this result, and you'll have these skills forever, and a chance at our grand prize and get to meet some cool people. Any grand prize is pretty rad too.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

That's what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_00 40:06

Well, see, that's something I meant to bring up earlier, too, that I like uh is you were talking about ownership, and so people come to our events, they get ownership of what they pull. Whereas um, see, this is something that some uh people would probably uh be mad for me saying, but a lot of hackathons are college students, they go there, they come up with these genius ideas, and these universities steal their ideas and give them to other people, and it's not cool. I don't like it. I'm a little bit salty about hackathons, actually. And so that's another cool benefit that we provide is they get to keep full ownership and nobody's taking their idea, you know. Um, so and and and on top of that, the prizes at hackathons are typically like a t-shirt or something like that. Whereas we give you know $500 to uh $2,000 per grand prize. That's awesome, man.

SPEAKER_01 40:55

One of the things too is I really, really, really, really don't like the fact that um I see it with video editing, and now all these people like we're gonna have a video edit-a-thon, and you come in and you edit our videos, and then you might get a job. And I'm like, that's you know, you're getting all these people to do all this free work, and then you get content and stuff out of it, and then they might get something. Like, nah, man, the fact that you're letting people own it is a big, big deal to me. And so I love that. I want to ask you another question, though. Like, for someone who's trying to do it, because like, I mean, you just gave me awesome feedback. Like, oh, I would like that app. That that budgeting app sounds great, but how do you know if your app idea is actually good before you build it, you know?

SPEAKER_00 41:44

Yeah, so the only real thing that you can do is customer discovery and talking to people, and that's where to start. And my recommendation on that is from my personal experience when I did it, I started off by asking too many questions. I would ask people like 50 questions, and I quickly realized I just need to ask like five to ten power questions, and that's how you can, or you can even just instead of uh instead of going from your idea, you can keep it more open-ended and ask open-ended questions that way they just guide you to what they want and need. That works pretty well too.

SPEAKER_01 42:18

That's awesome, man. Well, I got another question for you too. I got questions for days, but you this sound fascinated. But like, you know, you you talk about building something one one day. Do most people really hammer it out in one day, or is it like they can do it in one day, but sometimes they they still need to take things and refine it? Or is it that the major part of the build is done in a day, or is that just a hook, you know?

SPEAKER_00 42:42

Yes. Uh so every so over 90% of people finish their uh app in that day. If they don't finish it, then we work with them until they do at no extra cost. So a majority of people do. And I'll tell you this a hundred percent of people that come prepared and follow the instructions leave with an app that day deployed to the internet with a link.

SPEAKER_01 43:07

Deployed by that's awesome, man. Well, you got me convinced and you got me interested too. I want to ask you one last question. What's one simple thing a business owner could do today using tech to save time or make more money?

SPEAKER_00 43:23

Yeah, absolutely. I'm gonna shout off the boomers right now. So, boomers. So some of you are great and you're like, hey, I'm gonna adopt and I'm gonna learn this technology. For those of you that don't, man, you gotta just start using it. Just start using it, man. Just start using one AI tool. Pick one AI tool, take a day or even a couple hours, and pick one thing that you want to improve in your business and just go at go away at it. I love it, man. Well, you've got me convinced. Where can people go to find out more about you and what you do? Yeah, thanks for that question. Yeah, so you can find more information about me. I'm really, really busy on LinkedIn. Uh, so Caleb Hagen, I think they can see, can they see my name at the bottom here? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Okay. You can let me up there. I'll have your name on on for sure. Awesome. Um so I'm really happy to connect there. Uh, as well as you can look at LuigiSolutions.com to find out more about our company, people we work with, and uh stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 44:23

I love that you got the hats too. I'm not the only person who makes hats for my company, so it's spot on, man. Way to go. I love hats. Rather wear I'd rather wear this than any Gucci or Louis Vuitton. Dude, right, right. Like, that's what I tell people. Like, I was wearing sports hats, but like I was like, that's you know, it's just a team in a city I've lived in. Like, but when I have my own thing and I own it, and I'm sitting there going, this is my company, this is this is what I'm building. Like, it was so much more special for me. And I mean, that's again kind of the motivation to build the app as well. Because to me, you know, there's so much more motivation in it. So, dude, you've got you're preaching to the choir right now, but I want to thank you so much for coming on today. This has been awesome, and yeah, I appreciate you so much, man.

SPEAKER_00 45:09

Yeah, thanks for having me. I uh and uh I appreciate you too. I look forward to uh connecting afterwards and yeah.