#197 From Coding to AI: Ankur Shukla's Journey in Tech Entrepreneurship

0:00:02 - Mehmet
Hello and welcome back to a new episode of the City of Show with Mehmet. Today I'm very pleased for, I think, the second time or the third time, to have a guest from Dubai, Ankur. Thank you very much for being here on the show, Ankur. You have great experience, you have a lot to tell us and the way I like to do on the show is to keep it to the guests to introduce themselves and tell us about your YouTube. 

0:00:26 - Ankur
Sure, thank you, mehmet, for actually having me here, and I am an entrepreneur who likes to create new products, new services, all the time, and I just work on new ideas and turn them into a useful business. They can be a tiny idea or a big idea, anything that works. So, like recently, we made a story creator app, which is amazing, and we're just getting some early users for it. So, yeah, anything that actually you know works well, we just focus on it and try to grow it. 

0:00:55 - Mehmet
That's great to hear, Ankur, and I will ask a little bit more. Now, tell me a little bit like what? How was the journey that brought you into the tech world and entrepreneurship? 

0:01:07 - Ankur
Yeah, so I've always been excited about, you know, being in tech and you know I used to always play with your laptops and computers when I was young. So obviously I had to get into tech. There was no other option. And yeah, so I just basically wanted to build something, you know, amazing and you know that actually serves a purpose, and also use technology to kind of scale things, because with this you can actually go to a lot more people. So that is the advantage we have with using tech. So, yeah, that's one of the key things that actually drives me, and then if I find something cool, something new, I basically work on that and that gets me excited. 

0:01:43 - Mehmet
That's great, Ankur, now, if you can tell me a little bit. You know how you saw the things changing. You know, since the time you started till now, what were the main technologies you were working with and where you are seeing things going now. 

0:02:01 - Ankur
Right, right, so I worked, you know I worked with you know, as you know things. There was a programming language called basic. I used to work with that early in the days and then from there, just graduated further and further into building something with visual basic and C++ and all those things, and then from there now we work on stuff with AI. I built a bunch of you know like websites. Back in the day I think about maybe 10 years ago I used to own like 150 websites. So all those were basically built using you know, like Linux, apache, wordpress, php, and yeah, and from there I started a WordPress plugins the business, which still runs through the day. 

So I love creating WordPress plugins that solve problems and, yeah, that's about it. So I think a lot has evolved over time and I think, with AI especially, you know, things have become a lot smoother. Things have become a lot, much better. You can get results much faster where it is, you know, as far as coding or content goes. So, yeah, you can use both those things to actually, you know, build anything you want really quickly with AI. 

0:03:03 - Mehmet
That's good to know, uncle. Actually, and you know you mentioned that you worked with, you know, having a lot of websites and you know the thing usually I hear from people is we struggle actually to find ideas. You know they say, well, we cannot find so, so where did you get all these ideas for having 150 websites? 

0:03:28 - Ankur
Yeah, so, basically, you know, ideas are basically all around you, right? So if you just look for things, like you know talking about the latest one that I'm actually working on like I have a five year old son and he would always ask me you know, tell me a story, and you know, after a long day of work, it's really hard to be creative and come up with a new idea for a story. So I built something that uses AI to generate a story and then I started using that for my son and then now we have turned that into a product and then now we have a few hundred people using it right now. So, yeah, that's your ideas are basically all around you. If you see a small problem or a big problem, you can find you know the shortest path to solving that and then try to solve it in a small way and then, if you see that that is useful, then you can actually build things on top of it and make it bigger and bigger and how important Ankur is to validate that idea. 

It is actually really important. Otherwise people will not use it. People will not probably pay for it. So the best way to validate is to just talk to customers and get to know what they're actually asking about and what they're using it for. There's this really cool book called the Mom Test, so if you read that book, it actually tell you what exactly should be asking your users or your early customers, and how do you actually make sure that you're building something worthwhile. Otherwise you might just be wasting your time. 

0:04:56 - Mehmet
Yeah, 100%. And like are you a fan of, let's say, having multiple ideas tested at the same time, or do you prefer to stick with one idea, validate it and then move to the next one? 

0:05:16 - Ankur
I prefer to at least work on one idea at a time and then just build on that and then take it to market in a very small way and then get someone to pay for it in some way, so that you know that actually people are voting with their wallets and not just with words and thoughts. Right, when you talk to customers you might hear really good words, but then they might not really want to pay money for it, and that is the best validation you can get for any idea. So, zero to one, you can basically go to a small payment kind of thing, just charge even $5 or maybe $10 for the thing. If people pay for it, then you've got something there and then from there you can take it further. Otherwise, just work on one thing and then just move to the next one. 

0:05:59 - Mehmet
Yeah, that's great. Now you mentioned AI Ankur and you used in your latest product, which is. I don't have any kid or son or daughter in that category, but you shared with me and it's really impressive. So, like the use cases looks to me are infinite with the AI now, especially with the negative AI. But from someone like yourself who developed all these products over the years, how do you see it from your perspective? 

0:06:36 - Ankur
I see. So AI is really as a great assistant. I would not say that it might replace a lot of jobs very soon, but then if you can get really good at doing things with AI, you will be able to get a lot better results with whatever you're doing. So, yeah, I'm not sure there's a lot of conversation about AI replacing jobs, and I think AI may not replace as many jobs as people fear it will, but then it will actually get people a lot of people really good at what they do, and then they might actually find themselves having a lot more free time. So, like we used to spend probably like about a week coming up with a sales copy for a landing page or for a marketing site for a new product, and now it just gets done in one day. So now we have six days or five days free for us to do whatever we want from our previous timeline. So, yeah, you can actually have more free time with AI and just look at it that way instead of trying to fear AI. 

0:07:35 - Mehmet
And what about like? Do you leverage AI in developing the product itself? 

0:07:42 - Ankur
Yeah, for like, we have built few Chrome extensions which actually have been built entirely using AI and then oftentimes you know it might get the code wrong and it might not work exactly. It might just build you pieces of the same thing and then you can actually use some knowledge to plug it all together and then make it work. But yeah, like, simpler things can be built very well with AI and then if you're going to build complex things, then you can still use AI to solve smaller problems, right? And also Ankar. 

0:08:08 - Mehmet
I want to ask you, like from like. Now we are seeing you know people, even with AI, from non-technical background, they are able actually to build something. Maybe it's not the perfect thing, but they are able. Do you see this, especially as someone who worked for a long time in this domain? Is it a threat? Or you say no, Like I'd say welcome, move and let everyone with good ideas build what they are trying to do. How do you see it? 

0:08:43 - Ankur
Yeah, like there are a lot of, you know, like no code tools which actually you can use to build a lot of things really quickly, and then you can actually test the market with that, you know, without having to spend a lot of money, like initially, you know, you would need to spend like a hundred thousand dollars building a software if you lived in the US and then after outsourcing, you could build the same thing for maybe twenty thousand dollars. And then now, with a no code tool, you can actually build the same thing for two thousand dollars or maybe a thousand dollars and then quickly go to market and see if it is a viable idea or if people are liking it, and then from there you can probably, you know, build it from scratch again and build it properly, you know, because I'm not sure you might get the same kind of functionality with no code tools. So for expanding on the features, you can build it using other technologies and, you know, with people here. 

0:09:33 - Mehmet
Okay, that's great. Now, from also technology perspective, because you mentioned these no code tools and other stuff, and you mentioned that you had the you know WordPress plugin business, which is still. Are you seeing you know platforms similar to WordPress? Still, you know, on the same level as they were before, or are they on the decline? What are the trends you are seeing in that area? 

0:10:05 - Ankur
Okay, so WordPress, you know, still runs about like 35% of the entire internet. So all the websites in the world, 35% of them, run on WordPress, which is pretty impressive, and so far we have not seen any massive downturn. But we have seen a lot of new people join after COVID who actually have started building things, building websites and building content, building blogs and a lot of those people actually have been using WordPress because that's the easiest way to get started and it is free, so people just use that and then, once they start some growth, they can build something of their own, or they just continue to use WordPress and then enhance the functionality with other plugins. 

0:10:47 - Mehmet
Yeah, some people, they have this. I would say hypothesis. Let's call it that platforms that claim that they can do everything. Actually, they would be weaker. I mean that they would not be focused, because sometimes I have discussions with people, although I'm not in that space. I mean, from technical perspective, I built my own website, I take care of my own, I would say, digital assets. But people tell me, yeah, but it becomes complicated because you have, for example, the e-commerce plugins and then you have a lot of things, but at the same time, it's the 35% out there. Do you see this a problem or actually, do you see it a good thing to be able to cover as much as use cases as possible with a product? 

0:11:41 - Ankur
So WordPress itself is, I would say, a blogging platform, but then with things like WooCommerce and a few other things, it has become really extensive. And then, yeah, if you just add too much functionality to it, it might become an issue with how things work, how things connect and how they work together. And then you just need more and more customization and after a few years you might think that, ok, probably we need to kind of rebuild things from scratch. So, yeah, it might not really sustain everything put together, but then it's a good starting point, I would say, for building anything that you want to start today, and it's free. 

0:12:20 - Mehmet
Yeah, of course, Like people like anything free. You just need to grab the domain and even deploying it, it's one click and you can have it up and down again. I think this is what people look in any product in general, like the ease of use. And this leads to my question, Because now, especially with, for example, this new app that you have the stories for children and in general, how important is the user experience from your experience? 

0:12:51 - Ankur
Yeah. So the user experience is really important because you need to create something that has the least amount of friction. So if you build something which is very seamless and works right out of the box, it is really, really useful for that, because then you can actually get more people to convert into a paying customer or into just adopting the whole thing, because the more you get people to use it and the more they get inside it, the more they are likely to keep on using it and then actually convert to a paying customer. Which is why, like when we build this, we built it as a WhatsApp like bot sort of thing, instead of basically building a different app for it, because people will have to download it, install it and activate it and then try to create an account and all that. So we thought why not just go where the people already are and just build it on top of WhatsApp, because people spend any way two to three hours a day on WhatsApp, every single day, yeah that's very straightforward. 

0:13:52 - Mehmet
One thing which I believe it's underrated when it comes to startups in general is they don't in my opinion and I want to hear your opinion on that they don't care much at the beginning about scalability and security. 

0:14:17 - Ankur
What do you think? So I think scalability is probably not that important in the beginning, because if the idea is valid and then you have talked to, let's say, a few hundred, maybe customers, then you can probably get the money to build it much better and scale it from there. But yeah, security is actually super important. But again, during the initial phases of testing out the idea, you should probably focus on the customer part of it more, versus other things which might slow you down, and then just get the idea to market as soon as possible to the right audience as soon as possible, so you know whether it is something worth spending money on or spending time on. 

0:15:01 - Mehmet
Now I'm sure, like Ankur, you need to within your team to keep innovating. So how do you encourage the creativity and innovation within your company? 

0:15:20 - Ankur
Right. So we obviously give everyone on the team. You know, let's say, we try to solve a problem and then I feel that, okay, this is the best way to solve the problem. But then we have a brainstorming session where we try to come up with different approaches to solving the same problem, and then if we obviously get much better ideas, we go with that, and then everyone contributes. That way they feel there is more ownership of the idea with them and also they are able to. You know, we are able to see solutions that we might not just see from my perspective or a few people's perspectives. So when everyone is on board, you know we get much better ideas. And then everyone, you know, has their own set of things that they bring to it, and then that makes the whole thing much, much better. 

0:16:06 - Mehmet
And Ankur also one question, because we are both based in Dubai how you are seeing the startup scene here in Dubai and in the UAE in general? 

0:16:16 - Ankur
Yeah, I would say there is a lot of support for startups here and that's really really good, and I would say that there is a lot of you know really good teams and funds available who actually want to invest in ideas, so that's a really good space to be in. I would say it's good to have a startup here where you want to raise funding and kind of go global. I'm not very sure that this is probably a very big market for any startup in general because overall, like the country is quite small and there is like a less number of people there. So, yeah, you can definitely it's a good market to validate an idea just here and then probably go global from here, and that is how I would probably say. 

0:17:04 - Mehmet
And if we want to discuss, you know from you know you want to tell fellow entrepreneurs about what they should be caring about in their early stages, what you can tell them. 

0:17:22 - Ankur
I would say they should care about, first of all, having enough runway for their startup for at least a year to actually, you know, keep on doing what they're doing. And then I would say, just try to go to market as soon as possible with the most key aspect of your idea, as soon as possible, so that you can test that idea in a quicker way, before you know you actually waste too much time on it. Otherwise you have probably wasted a lot of time and you're like money on it, and then you later realize that this might not be the thing that you want to work on, and then you might have to, you know, change the idea to something else and then build that again. So, the quickly you can, you know, as soon as possible you can achieve the product market fit. You should do that. And then, whatever is required to do that, you should focus on that, you know. Basically start with the smallest segment of your audience and then go bigger from there. 

0:18:21 - Mehmet
Great. And let's talk about the great audience. I mean the small audience, where they should start from. Where they should start. Should they spend, you know, money on ads at the beginning? 

0:18:33 - Ankur
I would say there are a lot of ways to get users organically as well. 

So I would say, if you're building something that applies to you know, let's say, a million people, you should try to find the smallest portion of that audience which has that pain or that problem in the biggest possible way and then try to solve for that first. 

And then basically you can find all those people on different Facebook groups or different Instagram groups and all those things. So you can just identify them and then you know, go there, try to pitch your idea in those groups, try to build a landing page and then try to send some traffic there from those free groups and then try to see how many people actually convert through. So even if you don't have, you know, a product to actually try, you can just see how many people actually take action from going the main landing page to the sign up to something else after that. So if there's a three page sequence that you can build which is completely fake, you can probably just test to see how many people convert from page one to page two, to page three, and then that might give you a really good idea of if people actually want this or not. 

0:19:39 - Mehmet
Yeah, and this is very good point. I would say, Ankur, because you know previously you mentioned that you don't have to spend $100,000 and then figure out that actually no one needs your product. So this is one of the easiest way and actually, you know, I shared about it a couple of days back you know, like you don't need to spend that amount of money to build something, because I mean not to build for sake of build, because you don't know yet if people would be interested or no. And actually, if you allow me, Ankur, like the way you validated your idea was to reach out to your friends, like you send it to me, like you shared it with others, and there was plenty of ways, as you mentioned, where you can validate the idea without even paying money. Actually, because I feel very sad, and this is why I'm repeating this I feel very sad when I hear people spend on ads very early, right, so still, you know, as you said, they need to have a runway of one year, maybe. Second, they spend on development. 

Guys, maybe I repeated this story a couple of times, but maybe, if you are a first time listener or viewer here, go search for some of the most famous MVPs. You will be surprised. For example, I can give you an example Dropbox. So Dropbox, they didn't have the product, they just had a video that shows the outcome of the problem that they were trying to solve. Then, when people signed up, they said, ok, we are up to something, let's build it. So this is how you start and always validate the idea, as Ankur mentioned, with your friends, with some groups maybe you are part in, and this is the question I want to ask you, Ankur, how important also because we met through a joint friend and then I figured out that also you have your own meetup. So how important is networking when you are in this entrepreneurship journey? 

0:21:37 - Ankur
It's actually really important to be around people who actually motivate you and who actually work with you, give you ideas. 

So, which is why I have the group for the meetup because I wanted to just meet like-minded people, and it's always good to share your ideas, get some feedback from people. That might be the first circle of people who you might want to talk to about your ideas, so, even if they might not be the target audience, they might be able to connect you to someone who might be the audience. So I spoke to a friend of mine about my idea and he said OK, I know this guy who runs a company who has half a million people who are parents and that's his business and that's like the perfect market for my product. So I might go there in the future. But then initially I'm just trying to make sure that my idea is valid before I go there. So I'm just talking to, let's say, 100 parents to just make sure that what you're building is right and they would want to use it, and then after that we might have other avenues where we might be able to scale this up without even using paid ads or any Facebook ads. 

0:22:47 - Mehmet
As we are almost coming to the end, ankur, just I have a few things on my mind. So you're building on top of AI and there are a lot of emerging techs and someone like you seen it all same as me. So what do you expect the technology would be looking like in? Let's say? I don't want to go very far. I will not tell you after 10 years. I will ask you maybe two, three years from now. Where do you see things heading? 

0:23:21 - Ankur
I think in two to three years probably specifically to AI. I think it will help us do a lot more things in a more automated fashion. So, as you can see writing, we are already using it for writing marketing copies, for creating Facebook ads, for creating a list of products or features. I have been talking to about 100 parents in the last two days about my product. Now I didn't know what questions I can ask them to get deeper and deeper into basically what we are building. So I just used AI to create a series of questions and then with every question, it gave me three potential answers that a person might give, and then I asked AI to give me a follow-up question to every answer I might get. So that gives me a really good framework of how I can actually study my customers and my users to actually get the right input from them in terms of my idea and feedback. 

0:24:17 - Mehmet
And how people can find about your application. 

0:24:21 - Ankur
Yeah, so it's a bedtime story teller for kids. It's called Ask Moli and it's available for free at askmoliin and they can go to the site and there is nothing to install. You can just press one button. It adds to your WhatsApp and then you can chat with it as a friend, basically. 

0:24:41 - Mehmet
I will put that in the link. So if any parents are listening or watching us, so go give it a try. I've seen it, although I don't have a children in that age, but of course I can relate. I used to be there as well and, yeah, it's a fantastic idea. And Angkor well. People can find more about you also. 

0:25:02 - Ankur
Yeah, so I have a site called AngkorSuclaircom so they can go there and basically learn more about me. And yeah, that's about it. 

0:25:09 - Mehmet
That's great. I have a very famous final question. Is there anything you wished? I asked you and how you would answer it. 

0:25:19 - Ankur
I don't know. I think you covered pretty much everything and that was quite a good interview in a very short span of time, so that's really good. I think you've done this a lot of times, so all that comes from that experience, right. 

0:25:31 - Mehmet
Yeah, so thank you very much for this feedback, angkor. I'm not sure at the time of releasing this episode what will be the exact number, but yeah, I can tell you that, as per the day we were recording, I hit 186 episodes. So, yeah, it's something I'm enjoying doing trying to get people like yourself who are up to something, who has story to share, building interesting products, and yeah, so this is what it's all about. Really, I enjoyed the conversation with you, angkor, today. Very good highlights about the main topics I asked you and, as I mentioned, the links will be in the episode description and this is for the audience. 

Guys, let me know if you have any questions and if you have any questions to Angkor, reach out to me. I will pass it to him and, as usually also, I would say, if you are also interested to be guest on the show, don't hesitate. You can reach out to me directly. You can see, by the way, people will love and this is what I like about what I'm doing. So when I'm recording, I see the handles up. Actually, I discovered when I published they are down, so you can see all the links my social media handles. You can see them down. I was saying up and figure out it's down, but anyway you can see them on the screen, so reach out to me. I'm pretty much more active on LinkedIn, so you can tell me if you're interested in being on the show. I will be more than happy to arrange for this and, as usual, thank you for your time. We'll meet again in the next episode. Thank you, bye-bye. 

0:27:14 - Ankur
Yeah, thank you very much for having me. It was great Thanks. 

Transcribed by https://hello.podium.page/?via=mehmet