What advice do you have for others considering Zudy VINYL?

I rate Zudy VINYL eight out of 10.

Zudy VINYL is a fantastic tool and can handle a lot of your business needs. There is a bit of a learning curve - although the training courses can be very helpful. Be sure to take and keep notes that you can refer back to as information is not always the easiest to come by.

Vinyl has been a game changer for our company and our customers. Having started over three tech firms in my career, I wish Vinyl was around a decade ago; we would have launched many more products.

It is really a great platform for all the things that you don't quite get out of cloud-based solutions. They continue to iterate and improve the application. In one of the more recent releases, they came up with a mobile app in which you can build a VINYL application that you can deploy on mobile devices, just like you would from the App Store. Generally speaking, people pick it up pretty quickly. We tend to leverage a lot of the managed services within the Zudy team specifically for that because we're pretty partner dependent. But, it works well because they are able to do things so quickly. Our ability to go from concept to minimal viable product is pretty short, thus relatively inexpensive. Having been a customer of the Zudy team for a really long time, it is always about adoption. Anytime you are introducing new technologies like this into an organization, people don't really quite understand what it is. You try and get your quick wins so people can see the value of it. Once you get past that, then you have the other lesson of how do you control growth, because you can connect to a lot of different things and people are very eager to find solutions to their problems. Sometimes, you have to manage what you are going to do and when you're going to do it, because no one has limitless resources. We, internally, establish a prioritization mechanism where we look at what is happening and where we should prioritize certain requests over others. It is two-fold. There are a lot of low-code development platforms out in the market today, and you are going to see that a lot of them have value. Certainly, the number of data sources that they can integrate with is a huge piece of the decision-making factor, but then it is also the model. I have tried implementing tools like this in other companies, and it's not always easy to get adoption, even to get internal people comfortable with it and use it. If you can have someone who will partner with you in that journey and get your internal teams comfortable, and more importantly, get the business comfortable with the applications that you are delivering, then the adoption and value proposition go way up. It is really about the whole partnership, selection, etc., as you go through the process. I wouldn't be with them this long if they weren't at least a strong nine (out of 10) for me. They are great. I wouldn't give anybody necessarily 10, but I would certainly give them a nine.

The advice that I would give to someone whose thinking of implementing Zudy VINYL is, "Absolutely give it a really strong look. Speak to the Zudy staff about your particular business cases." I think that if you are using Excel spreadsheets or workflows that are primarily dependent on human manual communication, this solution will address so many of those needs. It is definitely a great application that we have brought in. I continue to find new uses for it on almost a daily basis. The most recent version of Zudy Vinyl certainly brought a bunch of new things to the table. I think one of them was the text editor. I think that the general interface for Zudy, when you first come into the product to look for the different apps you've developed, is a little bit more intuitive and organized. We bypassed a lot of that with our employee portal, but when we do have to go out to that interface, it is easy to navigate. On a scale of one to 10, I'm going to give them a 10 for what I need them to do. When I think about not just VINYL but Zudy as a service provider and partner, they are really checking all the boxes for us in terms of the human capital they bring to the table, the flexibility of the platform, and creativity. It is really doing everything for us that we would want it to do right now.

The advice I'd give people who are looking to implement Zudy is, first of all, know what it is you're having to build. What is it you're really trying to accomplish? But outside of some very small applications or gaming things, if you're looking to build some sort of business-process-driven website, something that you need both to look pretty good on the front-end and where you need a lot of calculations and tables and you need to jump through some hoops, I can't imagine building it from scratch. I'd be happy to go with Zudy, again, by far. There really hasn't been anybody else I've been able to find that has been able to compare with what Zudy has been able to do for me. It's not to say they're not out there, but I wasn't able to find them, and I do a lot of research. Know what it is you're trying to accomplish, try to spell out as much as you possibly can, because the more you spell out, the easier it becomes to implement. Zudy's improvement of their own features has been good. I've been on the platform for eight months and I've read a lot of things on what was version 1, and 2, and 3. But I can certainly submit things that I need to be improved or I need fixed. It does happen. They do listen to it. Obviously, you don't get everything you want, because it's not fully customized. But they're always doing improvements. They're always asking for feedback. I really like that. They seem to take my feedback seriously and implement what they can. They've got good help documentation, and they're asking for feedback on that. I've been happy with their level of iterations and improvements. In terms of the updated UI and UX for version 3.0, I was on 2.3 when I first started and there was a pretty big leap between what they were doing on the UX side with that version versus 3.0. That always takes the user, myself, a little bit of time to learn some of the new tricks, but it's been nicer. The previous one was more technical and it wasn't as intuitive, whereas the 3.0 I'm finding a little more intuitive and it seems to be a little bit easier to use. As for learning the new 3.0, compared to learning the 2.3, it would be easier if you're stepping into it and the first thing you're seeing is 3.0. If you're migrating, of course you're used to a button being in a weird spot, and that's where you're going to go look for it. So when there's a change, it's always a little harder. Whereas, if you're coming in fresh, congratulations, you don't have to go through quite so much of the learning pains that some of us who have been around with the older versions have. But overall, it's been good. I've been happy with it. As for being more creative with VINYL 3.0, that hasn't been my focus right now. My focus is the Quote Kong logic. When I go back to my written documentation that I have it is thousands and thousands, probably close to 10,000, pages long now. The majority of what I've been doing is much more data modeling and logic rather than creativity. But, again, because I have access to being able to edit certain things, it's been wonderful that I can go in and edit it. I don't have to wait for somebody else to move it around and see what that looks like and then decide that I don't like it or make another change. So I've been able to do a lot of those little micro iterations myself, which has been very nice. My rating for Zudy VINYL overall would be an eight or a nine, pretty high. Nothing's perfect, but I've been happy with them. I'm happy that I'm able to work with them and they work with me and we always try and find a solution or we table it to later, which I'm fine to do sometimes. The biggest lesson I've learned from using Zudy VINYL is that there are many things that you have to try and set up when you're coding from scratch that I don't know that I'll ever want to code from scratch again. Not that I'm a coder. I'm not a full-stack developer. I know enough to be dangerous, but even the guys that I had were good guys. They were guys with a lot of experience and they worked really hard and they tried really hard, but we just couldn't get it done. It was just too complex of a problem, on top of all of the other little things that you have to do when you're trying to code from scratch. I liken it to the difference between drawing with paper versus using AutoCAD, or the difference between shingling a roof with a hammer and nails versus with an air gun. Why would I ever shingle a roof without an air gun, unless it's something really small? I've been happy.

Think long and hard about what you want and then be ready for them to come to the table with the solution, to get it to you. It will solve your challenges. You just have to put in the time on the front-end to build it. I fully believe that, based on what we've done together, it can do the same for other businesses too. I have looked into upgrading to VINYL 3.0. it is actually on the radar and will happen very soon. In terms of the updated UI and UX for Zudy VINYL, we've seen it and we're excited to integrate that in. It was our own issue and our own product launch deadlines that caused us to wait a little bit, but we're going to be up in the new version very soon. In terms of data access, user identities, and encryption, Zudy VINYL works with the vendor that we use for that. We have pretty seamless API and have had very few issues with that. It's been a really easy partnership to create. It's a big deal in the software world, but there have been no security issues, no hacking has gone on with respect to our partnerships with Zudy, so that has been terrific. I can't say enough good things. I know I'm not supposed to expound too much about the people involved, but the product can only do what the people tell it to do, and the people involved have been terrific. The people are just as important as the product. In terms of partnership with people and product, it's been a great win for us to be working with them. The biggest lesson I've learned from using Zudy VINYL is that while it takes time to build a custom solution, if you do it with the right partner, and have the right integrations, it can be the game-changer that everyone thinks it can be. When you're sitting around in a room and just writing on a board or dreaming up, "Hey, if we could have one solution that did all of these things, man, our life would be easier. Our bosses would be happier." And that's really what we found. Zudy VINYL has delivered all the things that we've dreamt up and asked. It's been a really awesome 18 months so far, and we're excited for the next 18 months and beyond for where we're going to go with our partnership with them. It's done everything we've asked it to do. We keep developing more with the platform because it does everything we ask it to do. We continue to grow our business with them because it's a price that we think is fair for the value we get out of the product. It's been a terrific product.

I would definitely recommend you check it out. It's been a game changer at Collette. It's been really great to work with, and we're very happy with it. The biggest lesson I've learned from using Zudy VINYL is that anything that you throw at it, anything that you dream up, they can probably work with it and get some kind of application going out there. They've got so many ties and tie-ins, so many different plugins, and a really knowledgeable technical support staff. To develop an application within Zudy, it's a pretty quick process. We usually tend to design what the data fields are going to look like, what it's going to look like at the database level, and then design forms around that. That's the general process. We figure out what the functionality is going to be behind the scenes, or perhaps when you're interacting with it what the form will look like. We usually have some data that will trigger a grid and that can select other things. There's also the ability to send emails out from there and trigger workflows. In terms of the ease of use of the solution for non-developers, I can't say that we have business users coming in and creating applications. That's typically not how we work. But we do have other people within IT who are not developers who have made applications. They've had pretty good success with it. Business units will sometimes say they need to look at data in a certain way, and they can build their own application. It's something that's pretty easy to pick up on once you get an understanding of how the framework works. Interestingly enough, I don't really consider the code, or in this case that it's no-code, when I'm picking a solution. I'm more focused on delivering functionality for my team as soon as possible. In a lot of cases, VINYL has been able to help out with that particular functionality. And when the product is complete, it always gives us a professional looking and intuitive interface. We're currently on VINYL 2.7 and we're looking forward to upgrading to version 3.0. The updated UI and UX in 3.0 looks nice and clean. It looks like it's really easy to use. There are definitely some differences in it, but it doesn't look like there is anything that would be too difficult to to learn. I watched a demo of 3.0 and it looked like it was really simple to get things going with creating new forms. They've got a brand new form builder. Some process that might have taken a few hours can be done in a few minutes now. That's going to be really important when we're trying to make a quick proof of concept. Also, Zudy continues to improve the solution's features. I love and look forward to their product updates. There's always some type of functionality that I can take advantage of. One of the things I'm really looking forward to implementing in version 3.0 is the mobile functionality. We have a mobile workforce and they would appreciate it if we could get some responsive sites into applications. The constant improvement and development speaks of the company and the product very well. I love the fact that they're constantly investing into their product and making it better. They're going to continue to grow their users and continue to grow offerings. That is going to be good for everybody. It's nice to see a company that is continuing to make their products better. For authentication purposes, we reach out to Azure ID. We authenticate out there on Microsoft's cloud. It comes back and then we handle the permissions within a VINYL-based security system. Overall, I would give Zudy VINYL a solid 10 out of 10. The application has been really great. The team itself has been really great, and we're able to get stuff out for our customers very quickly.

My advice would be to do your research. Compare what development and the timeline looks like on the big players, the other platforms that are out there which are all great. And ask yourself if it's going to be comparable and can the Zudy platform actually speak to the same things that the big boys do. We've gotten no complaints about the functionality, given that it's a “no code” solution. We've gotten great feedback about how our new system looks and how much less stress [there has been] during our current environment—meaning everything that is going on with the pandemic and organizations being forced to work remotely. The timing was good for us to have run across Zudy, to help deliver what we believe the rest of the industry and probably most industries are going to be going to: offering a paperless solution to deliver or conduct your job. I wouldn't say it's the biggest lesson that I've learned from Zudy, but I really appreciate understanding known-unknowns and what the unknown-unknowns are. In other words: how we approach a problem now versus how we dealt with problems from the old platform. Now, if there's an issue, we know that there is a solution that can be delivered, in short order. In the past, it was hit and miss: We've got this problem; we don't know how long it's going to take to fix it. But we do know now that if we run into problems on this platform, there's a solution that's going to be delivered. In most cases, the end-user doesn't even know that it's an issue. The user interface and user experience are greatly improved. I haven't really heard any complaints from our end-users, but they are loving what they're seeing. I'm really pleased with all of the deliverables and the work so far. There's always room for improvement with any organization, but I like the communication. I like the follow up. I like the constant checking in with me, and the team, on if we're moving in the right direction or if we need to make pivots or changes. And the fact that I can send an email or pick up the phone or send a communication through Slack and get instant communication [means] there is no guesswork. I don't have a complaint. I'm satisfied with everything thus far. I would rate Zudy at nine out of 10 because of the ease of use, the customer service, making me feel like I'm a partner who is valued, and appreciating the feedback that we receive from them.

This is a platform which should be considered seriously for rapid prototyping. If you want to build it yourself, at least use them to do the early testing. I would also recommend to consider them for your long-term production platform use. For data management and data visualization, this product is hard to beat. Feature-wise, I haven't run into anything that we just can't do. It accesses our external systems and processes, using them very well. For what they have given me, the product is a 10 (out of 10).

I guess I would say "be open to it." And, if you're a programmer, don't look at it with a programmer's mind. If you're a business person or business analyst, you're going to be able to understand how the tool works. Programmers, coders have a pre-set understanding of how to code, and this is not how to code. This is how to build an APP. So you have to go into it with an open mind. On a scale of one to ten, I'd probably rate it at an eight. It is a young product and still growing. I see it growing the right way. As long as they, the VINYL staff and developers, keep up with changes of the technology and the times, I see it growing to be better than eight, but right now, eight because of some of the limitations it has.

If I were to give advice to somebody researching a solution such as VINYL, I would tell them to make sure that they understand all of the ins and outs, especially on the front end in what the user sees to make sure that VINYL has the capabilities they're looking for from a front end and customer facing perspective. To ensure that it has visuals, its ease of use, its ability to click through and be mobile at the same time as web-based. On a scale of one to ten, I would rate Zudy VINYL about a seven. I'm not too familiar with it yet to give it a more solid rating. We're able to develop things quickly, but at the same time there's been a lot of issues across multiple pages where it should have been fixed once, and it's fixed on certain pages, but not all as we're going through the development process.

If I knew of anybody that was out considering an investment in a low-code or a no-code development platform, I would encourage them to call me and let's have a conversation about how VINYL has changed my ability to lead at IT and it's changed NXC Imaging's ability to run their business. On a scale from one to ten, I think Zudy VINYL is a nine. It's not quite a ten because it doesn't do everything and it can't write itself, but we've been able to do more things in the last eleven months to make our company run better than previous organizations and teams and applications did in the previous four years.

From my perspective at Brooks Brothers, VINYL has had pretty much every function or feature that we've needed. I'm interested to see what they do manage to incorporate on top of that because I'm sure we'll find a use for it. The VINYL Solution has helped increase productivity at Brooks Brothers. We've been able to standardize our processes in the stores and in our factories with a made to measure solution and alterations. In doing so, we've allowed the business to not worry about those and to focus on growing sales. This solution has increased our rate of iterations for deploying new releases from six months or twelve months down to two months or six weeks. So, quite the increase of frequency where we're able to deliver new features to the stores. If researching VINYL versus other similar solutions, I would try to keep in mind really what their strengths are and compare them to each other. From my perspective, the strength of VINYL is clear with its flexibility and its ease of use, ease of development, and that's not to be understated. You can really deliver powerful apps in way less time than other solutions I've seen. On a scale of one to ten, I would rate VINYL probably an eight or a nine, simply because of the flexibility and the power that it has in bringing data to one source, and then reacting to it and building an app you need with those data points.

VINYL has increased user satisfaction. We're bringing the users and getting them involved in the development process. We're making fewer mistakes in the process, and we're also getting them excited about it because they can see what's happening and they have their input. It's the features they want, not what IT thinks they want. They get more excited about it. Our iterations are faster. With VINYL you're talking days or weeks potentially. Another piece of advice I would give to a colleague researching for a software solution is, if you're looking for something that doesn't require a specialized programming language and you want something that you can develop quickly in, and you want something that's going to pull data from a bunch of different places, I think VINYL's a good option. I would rate VINYL a nine. Not a 10, because nobody's perfect, but it's going to be huge for us.

We use it quite extensively within the teams that I support. There are already initiatives underway to expand to additional business units/domains. The product can do almost whatever you need it to do. However, the "how" to do this can be challenging. Leveraging Zudy Professional Services has allowed us to get more bang for our buck using this product.

Initially, make sure you have a good structure for your database. It's not necessary, but it makes the integration a little easier. Once you have that, the best way to learn is just to play with it. Build a simple app. Work on building your tables. It's good to have a goal in mind. You focus on making that app, a very simple one, but one that is also working well. Once you get that working, within a couple of weeks you'll be a pro and you can be running through apps and developing on some level. Beyond that, it's just fine-tuning those skills and learning what other features VINYL offers. We have five people using it. Only I am really developing on it. Perhaps there's one other person developing on it. The goal is to have the majority of people using it in some capacity to replace all of their miscellaneous spreadsheets and to replace a lot of the interfaces that they're using. We want to make everything more consistent and centralized around one application that everyone can use. In terms of maintenance, it takes two or three people: one on their end to make sure they're okay if something happens; one on our end to make sure our systems are okay, and one person to develop. There isn't much day-to-day maintenance. I don't really have much to compare it to. This is the first time I've used a no-code solution like this. But in my experience, I'd say it's a nine out of ten. It doesn't get a ten because there are some features that seem to be "hidden" behind the terminology. The more you play with it you learn it but sometimes those features are not very up-front. It's not until you dig through the user manual that you get to understand what those features are about.

A full-stack developer can easily understand VINYL because it covers almost all areas of development. We can develop our own code and push it inside VINYL. If a database developer goes into VINYL, he's used to a different set of rules, a different set of charts, etc. So that is different. This tool is particularly suited for a full-stack developer. We have some 1,000 users of VINYL. The deployment took just one person within our company. Two people are enough for maintenance of the solution. For us, it is maintained by our solution architect and senior solution architect. Our future plan is to enhance more applications inside VINYL. The current applications that we are taking care of have some bugs that we're looking into, to make sure everything looks good. VINYL is helping to implement the process quickly. I would rate VINYL at seven out of ten. We still need some more improvements inside, as I mentioned, such as the UI. In coming versions, I'm sure this product will rock. It's continuing to develop and mature.

Definitely make sure that internal staff learn how applications are built. Zudy does provide free training and I highly recommend it so that you can bring all development back in-house, be a little bit more self-sufficient with it and not reliant on Zudy. From the very beginning, learn the platform as much as possible and learn from Zudy developers that you work with. The entire time we've had VINYL, we've had Zudy developers contracted to our company, so it's actually Zudy employees who have been doing the development. I've never actually built one of our own solutions but I did attend a Zudy training session to learn how to build solutions. Our applications are so much more advanced than what we covered in the training but I can see how it all fits together. It's like breaking apart coding and development into an ultra-configuration tool. I wouldn't say that it's relatively simple. You do have to have a developer mindset about bringing all the pieces together. I wouldn't say someone brand new could be given this tool and build an application. You do have to have some understanding of how the different layers in the VINYL platform work together. And even then, there are just so many more advanced features that you can use that really get into how we're using it. As far as anything really basic goes, even then you would need some level of training to be able to use the tool. In terms of how many users are currently using VINYL in our organization, most of our applications have been targeted to very niche users. Originally, it probably wasn't more than 50 or so, but we've been working on soft-releases and rollout of one of our other applications for that "Customer 360" view and, eventually, the entire company will have access to that. We have close to 400 employees. We're an insurance company so the roles of the VINYL users are anything and everything. For our event management, there's an underwriting tool and that's used in agency relations. We've got another tool used by underwriting. That department has been the primary user. We've got an application that simplifies calculations of insurance premiums for very very specific policy types. Our underwriting compliance team use it to track their filings. We have a deductible-billing application, which is one of the ones that is consuming information and putting it into a new, modern output. That's used by our finance department. There's another agency relations application we use that tracks progress of our top agents and it tracks extra commission that we can provide to those agents. And the "Customer 360" can be used by any department, mainly our underwriting and claims departments. It really is flexible. Maintenance is very minimal. With our live production applications, they just don't break, which is great. We love that. There's zero-to-little maintenance required. We've got quite a few applications in production now and we've got more in development. There are a few more on the list to go into development. We've still got a sizable backlog to work through. Overall I would rate it a seven out of ten. I love how customizable it is, how easy it is, how fast it can be. The downside is that scalability and the troubles dealing with large data sets.

Consider Zudy, at least when you are getting started, because their people listen and deliver what you ask them to do. We love the tool. I like it enough to introduce it to another division of the company. They have added some security features at our specific request. We are told that other customers are very receptive to those security features. We have had minimal problems with the product and a high degree of success with their consultants, service providers, and technical support people. In addition, the success that we have experienced with recommendations that we've suggested to improve the product. They are easy and fantastic to do business with. They don't have to be micromanaged.

Discuss your needs with them, make sure they understand the end goal. Then they can customize it to your needs. With us, we kept changing what we wanted, how to use it, so we had to keep going back to the drawing board. But they're extremely willing to find a way to make what you want, as long as they know what you want. There is some patience required in getting it set up because it's different for everyone. Everyone uses it differently, so you do have to be patient with the initial setup process. When I was brought on it was because we had to find a way to go from our system, take our numbers, and figure out what it was we wanted to see on the screen, and how we could get them from our system into VINYL. We don't really do inventory the normal way with our company, so we had to find a way to get inventory displayed through VINYL. Be patient and communicate, explain what your needs are, and figure out where the data come from in your system to be able to project it into VINYL. The way we use it is so heavy on finance. We need our numbers to be precise. Everything comes down to precision and numbers for us. We're able to get that and it's helped us for sure. I really like VINYL. I would rate it a nine out of ten. I see the advantage of it and I also see so many ways we could use it more here. I want to keep pushing for us to use it in more ways because I can see how it can be so beneficial if we start pulling in other systems. The fun part is, the messier it feels for us, the more excited they sound at wanting to solve the problem.

Have meetings with the developers, and make sure that you're clear on exactly what you need before you start to have them develop it. Be really clear. I would give VINYL an eight out of ten, and I would say that it's great. The eight is because it's pretty user-friendly, it's clean, and it's reliable. I don't know if there are other things out there that are better than this, but for what we have needed so far, based on what I've seen so far, this is pretty helpful.

The product itself is very solid. The places where we've had issues are internal, with regards to a cultural mindset shift, because the business was not used to getting solutions this quickly. They have to think differently about how they engage with these projects. They have to move into more of an agile mindset and move away from the old waterfall mindset of saying, “Hey, if we're going to do this design for three months, build for three months, test three months, then in nine months we'll get a tool.” Instead, these are rapid sprints where, every few weeks, we're delivering new capability. That, to me, has been the biggest adjustment for us. The technology piece is relatively straightforward. It's really the change management and people management that you have to work on. Make sure your business is ready for it. People have to be willing to move quickly and change their way of thinking so that you can deliver value incrementally, as opposed to trying to boil the ocean and do everything in one go over nine to 12 months. We've been very happy with it. I would give it a nine out of 10. I never give anyone a 10. I think for every product there are things they can continue to build that will help the customer. I'm sure there are other things Zudy could do which would give us even more things we could do with it.

You need to have buy-in from both the business team and the IT team. Anytime you implement a new platform like this, if you don't have people internally who are going to embrace the product, it's going to fail. I'd call VINYL an eight out of 10. It does what it's supposed to do. It continues to improve. We're getting good usage out of it, and I think it's a great value for the price.

Try it. Sometimes, the use cases are not evident. Start slow and pilot it and the value becomes evident.

They give you a free trial of what it can do. Go in with something that's easier, not harder, because that is going to give you an idea of what it can do, and you can basically work from that point on. I rate it an eight out of 10. There is always room for improvement. If they could just make it a little bit easier for the customer to learn how to use it themselves, that would make it better.

The sky is the limit. It is able to pretty much do anything and everything that you thought a computer couldn't do. You should just really embrace it. It took me a while to embrace it but they're a really great company to work with. I would rate it at eight out of 10. I think a Gantt chart would probably put it to a nine. I don't think anything's ever perfect. I'm feeling concerned about when we end our relationship directly with Zudy and just work with our own IT department, how quick the changes will be. Overall, it's a really great product. It's able to tie into different departments. From my understanding, it's what they were intending for this. We're able to use it across the board, all the departments.