I’m not a fan of building an MVP using prototyping tools like no-code/lo-code solutions, or by mashing together things like Google Sheets and Zapier. One of the reasons why I really don’t like it is that it ALWAYS leaves you with “technical debt”.
Specifically, whatever you build in that way to get traction, you will need to replace, and you’ll need to replace it quite soon. E.g. you might spend £5k/£10k building a prototypical solution, but as soon as you start to get traction, you will need to spend £60k/£80k building the real thing.
As a result, that initial spend is wasted. And, I can almost feel the “yeah, buts” in the comment.
My issue with this is that every software project has a percentage of waste. Anything you spend on that prototype, 100% of that is wasted. If you spend out on the real thing first, there’s a chance 0% of that spend is wasted.
The trick, I think, is to spend that £5k/£10k on driving down the cost of the later project. Then you’re not wasting anything…