Yeah we have all wanted to build a $100 startup, but building it free would be easier, wouldn’t it?
Starting from scratch and building a startup can be hard, but once successful it might all be worth it. Often building a startup can seem to be much more difficult than it actually is especially if you have a few free resources at your disposal.
With an open online community and a free and expansive World Wide Web, founders today are better placed than 10 years back. In fact there can be no better time than now to open a startup. Web and mobile applications have led to a world that is now more connected than ever before. There are endless useful products and tools available on the internet to help kickstart your entrepreneurial journey. To help you in your journey, I have compiled a short list here, of course there are thousands of more such tools and products available in the market.
Mockups & Wireframing
MockFlow – MockFlow WireframePro is a web-based tool to design and collaborate user interface blueprints for websites and apps. It helps to visualize the website’s interface, navigation and structure in short time.
Lucidchart – Lucidchart is created by professionals, for professionals. It’s an online application built on open web standards, so you never have to worry about compatibility. For ease of use, they’ve integrated with Google Apps, Google Drive, Confluence, JIRA, Jive, and other productivity tools.
Moqups – Moqups is a nifty HTML5 App used to create wireframes, mockups or UI concepts, prototypes depending on how you like to call them. They try to make things simple and fairly intuitive so you can unleash your creativity without any obstacles. Just drag-and-drop and edit the contents the way you want.
Design
PicJumbo – At some point, you’ll need some stock photos. Don’t get stuck with the same lame ones every “Uber for X” uses. Grab some free unique images from PicJumbo.
UICloud – UICloud is a place that designers and developers can both benefit from. It collects the best user interface designs from the internet all over the world and provides a search engine for you to find the best UI elements easily and quickly.
Development
GitLab – GitLab is the optimized open-source code collaboration platform that allows a full workflow to create, review, and deploy code simply and effectively. GitLab includes Git repository management, code review, issue tracking, wikis and more, along with GitLab CI, a continuous integration and deployment tool.
PublicAPIs – PublicAPIs is built by Mashape. They make it easy to distribute, monetize, manage and consume cloud APIs. Mashape is building a world-class marketplace for cloud APIs, driven by a passionate community of developers from all over the world.
Raising Capital
AngelList – AngelList is a US website for startups, angel investors, and job-seekers looking to work at startups. It was founded by Naval Ravikant and Babak Nivi. AngelList offers investment syndicates in which startups raise money from accredited investors investing alongside prominent angel investors.
Gust – Gust is a global SaaS funding platform for the sourcing and management of early-stage investments. Gust enables skilled entrepreneurs to collaborate with the smartest investors and angel investor networks by virtually supporting all aspects of the investment relationship, from initial pitch to successful exit.
While bootstrapping is an essential and today a fundamental funding strategy adopted by a number of startups the world over, there exists other alternatives to successfully fund your startup in the early phase. We would love to share our insight with you on funding your startup to commence your startup crusade. Do refer to our “How To Fund Your Startup” eBook to learn more.
