Why I Rejected a $XX,XXX Bubble Project and Built an MVP in One Day Instead

Last year, a potential client approached me with what seemed like a dream project: build a comprehensive two-sided marketplace platform using Bubble. The budget was substantial, the technical challenge was interesting, and it would have been one of my biggest freelance projects to date.

I said no.

Not because I couldn't deliver—Bubble is incredibly powerful and could absolutely handle their requirements. But because their core statement revealed a fundamental misunderstanding about what MVPs should accomplish in 2025.

"We want to see if our idea is worth pursuing," they told me. They had no existing audience, no validated customer base, no proof of demand. Just an idea and enthusiasm for no-code tools.

This experience taught me something crucial about MVP development that most founders are getting completely wrong. Here's what you'll learn:

• Why building on Bubble can be the wrong first move (even though it's amazing)
• The real purpose of MVPs in the age of no-code platforms
• My one-day MVP framework that proves demand without code
• When to graduate from manual validation to Bubble development
• How to use no-code strategically (not as a shortcut)

Let me share what I told them instead—and why this approach can save months of work. Understanding the difference between building and validating is crucial in today's fast-moving tech landscape.

The conventional wisdom around MVP development on platforms like Bubble sounds compelling and straightforward:

• Build fast and iterate: Use visual programming to create working prototypes in days
• Test with real users: Get a functional product in front of customers quickly
• Scale when validated: Add features and complexity as you learn
• Leverage templates: Start with proven UI patterns and workflows
• No technical debt: Visual development means easy changes and updates

This approach exists because no-code platforms solved a real problem—the old way of building MVPs was expensive and slow. Why hire developers for months when you can build and test in weeks?

The logic makes sense on paper. Bubble's visual editor, database management, and API integrations can genuinely create sophisticated applications without traditional coding. Platforms like this have democratized product development.

But here's where this conventional wisdom falls short: it confuses building capability with validation necessity. Just because you can build quickly doesn't mean building is the right first step. The real constraint isn't technical anymore—it's knowing what to build and for whom.

Most founders using this approach end up with a working product that nobody wants, built efficiently to solve a problem that doesn't exist.

The client who approached me had heard about Bubble's capabilities and wanted to test their two-sided marketplace concept. They were excited about the visual development environment and how quickly we could build their platform.

Their idea wasn't bad—connecting service providers with customers through an intelligent matching system. They had some business experience, understood their target market, and had done initial research.

But when I dug deeper into their validation process, red flags appeared everywhere:

• No existing audience or email list
• No conversations with potential users
• No manual version of their service
• Just market research and competitor analysis

They wanted to build first, then find users. This is backwards, even with powerful no-code tools.

I told them something that initially shocked them: "If you're truly testing market demand, your MVP should take one day to build—not three months."

Yes, even with Bubble's rapid development capabilities, a functional two-sided platform takes significant time. But if you're genuinely testing demand, you don't need the platform yet.

Instead of accepting the project, I walked them through what their actual MVP should look like. The goal wasn't to build software—it was to prove that people wanted their solution enough to pay for it, even when delivered manually.

Here's exactly what I recommended instead of building on Bubble:

Week 1: Create a Simple Landing Page

Not a platform—just a Notion page or simple website explaining their value proposition. The goal was to see if anyone cared enough to sign up for their service.

Week 2-3: Manual Customer Development

Start reaching out to potential users on both sides of their marketplace. LinkedIn outreach, industry forums, direct conversations. Not selling—just learning about their problems and current solutions.

Week 4-6: Wizard of Oz Testing

Manually fulfill their service proposition. When someone wanted to find a service provider, they'd do the matching themselves. When providers wanted customers, they'd make introductions personally.

This is the crucial part most founders skip: Your MVP should be your marketing and sales process, not your product.

The goal was to prove three things before touching Bubble:

1. Demand exists: People actually want this service
2. Willingness to pay: They'll pay for manual delivery
3. Scalable value: The results are good enough that automation would improve, not replace, the core value

Only after proving all three would I recommend building anything on Bubble.

The beauty of this approach is that it forces you to understand your business model before committing to any technology solution. By the time you're ready for automation and platform development, you know exactly what to build.

This isn't anti-technology or anti-Bubble. It's pro-validation. Bubble is fantastic for building validated products quickly. But it shouldn't be your validation tool—it should be your scaling tool.

The client initially pushback against this approach. They wanted to build something impressive, not run manual processes. But three months later, they contacted me with an update.

They had followed the manual validation approach and discovered something crucial: their original idea was only half right. The service provider side worked well, but customers wanted something completely different than they'd assumed.

Through manual delivery, they'd learned:

• Customer needs were more complex than their research suggested
• The matching process required human insight, not just algorithm matching
• Pricing expectations were different from their projections
• The real bottleneck was onboarding providers, not finding customers

Had they built on Bubble first, they would have spent months building the wrong platform. Instead, they spent three months learning what the right platform should actually do.

Six months later, they did hire me to build on Bubble—but we built something completely different from their original concept, based on real customer feedback and proven demand.

This experience taught me five crucial lessons about MVP development:

1. Building capability doesn't equal validation necessity: Just because tools like Bubble make building easy doesn't mean building is the right first step
2. Manual delivery reveals hidden complexity: What seems simple in theory often has nuances you only discover through hands-on delivery
3. Customer feedback changes everything: Real user interactions will always surprise you, no matter how much research you do upfront
4. Technology follows strategy, not the reverse: Choose your tools based on what you've learned, not what seems exciting
5. Patience with process pays off: The extra time spent on validation saves exponentially more time in rebuilds and pivots

The biggest mistake I see founders make is treating no-code platforms as validation shortcuts. Bubble, Webflow, and similar tools are incredible for building validated products quickly. But validation itself requires talking to humans, not building interfaces.

If you're considering MVP development on Bubble, ask yourself: Are you building because you've proven demand, or because building feels like progress? The honest answer will guide your next step.