In Case You Missed It: December 2023 Recap
Building side projects with real-world potential, succeeding in coding bootcamps and more!
Hi, Dimos here.
I hope you had a great Christmas break with the people you love 🎅
For this month's recap, we’ll review some of the best advice the last three developers gave us.
Read time: 4 minutes
Peter, how do you build and grow a community?
Get to know the people in your community personally, and even if the numbers grow, don't become a faceless company. People join a community because they want to interact with others. No one wants to be just number 3,533.
How did you teach yourself to code?
I just set myself a goal. I wanted to make something and then I searched on the internet. It sounds completely stupid, but Google and Stack Overflow are your friends.
In the beginning, you'll mostly be copy-pasting, trying to see what works. But if you keep at it, you'll soon build a foundation exploring different patterns and libraries, finding out how things work just by doing it.
Savvas, what’s the side project you are working on?
We’re building easywedding.gr, a platform that connects wedding professionals with couples. It took us more than a year just to build the first version, but in 2023 we helped organize more than 2000 weddings, have 700 professionals listed, and one full-time employee.
How did you attract vendors in the first place?
We started making phone calls. But it became clear pretty quickly that this method wasn't working for us—people were simply hanging up when we called. Eventually, we shifted our focus to using social media, and this worked much better for us.
How did you use social media?
We simply found vendors on Instagram and told them: “I’ll get you clients if you sign up for our platform”, and they did. Once you follow one account, Instagram automatically suggests other similar accounts, and for us, every suggested account was potentially another vendor to reach out to. The Instagram algorithm acts as a discovery tool.
How are you attracting couples?
We have a blog. That’s our main source of traffic. Especially early on, the blog was the only way we could get organic links since the directory keywords are congested and have many sponsored ads, making it difficult to get on the first page.
How do you figure out what to write?
We look for trends mostly from popular wedding blogs outside of Greece. It helps us understand which topics are gaining traction and are likely to pick up with readers. We also look at what drives traffic for our competitors. We understand which keywords work for them, and then write content that targets these keywords.
Eric, what are some of the challenges students face when learning to code?
Most students, especially in an intro class can’t get past an if statement. Then come loops and finally recursion that blows people’s minds. If you can get past these hurdles, you’re already ahead of most people.
How can one get the most out of a bootcamp?
Students who commit full-time tend to perform very well. If you just do the bare minimum, you won’t have a portfolio when you come out.
You should also use all the resources that are available to you, and this includes your fellow classmates. Network, help each other, and work on stuff together. I always tell my students one of the best ways to learn something is to teach it. And a lot of them take that to heart.
Do you have any tips for interviewing?
Research the company you're interviewing with. Spend some time on their webpage to understand their business or their tech stack. Being authentic and showing genuine interest in the role rather than just the paycheck helps a lot.
All done! If you enjoyed this, I’d love to know!
Until next Tuesday,
Dimos
🚀 Shoutouts & Recommendations
I’ve started reading the Weekend Web Dev newsletter by Devan. Each week he shares one project tutorial you can build over the weekend and three cool project ideas for when you’re looking for inspiration. The latest issue uses React to build a movie rating app.
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🤔 In need of advice?
I can review your CV, cover letter, plan of getting a job, or Github repo. Anything that might be holding you back from getting your first, or next job in our industry. Just buy me a coffee and email me afterward.
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