Show HN: Magicdocs – Turn Documents into Websites | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Magicdocs – Turn Documents into Websites

magicdocs.co

80 pointsphemartin22 comments

Congrats on the launch, it's obvious a lot of work went into this :-)

My initial reaction: cool idea, I've seen it done a couple times before, what does this offer that's different? I wasn't able to get that from the landing page so I watched the video.

Watching the video, I was excited because if I could make a good looking proposal without much effort, that'd be helpful. But from the video I got the idea that there isn't much functionality and the output isn't on par with my own quality expectations.

Here's what I would've like to see:

1 - A few real live demos. I don't like watching videos, and I don't see examples in the live site. I just want to answer my first burning question of "How cool is the output?"

2- What other tools do we get in the editor? Some basic things like a table of contents would be mandatory. Something like a slider would be nice, but then you're becoming a bit of a Wix clone if adding a bunch of html widgets.

3 - Why not make it free? You need feedback more than you need money at this point, IMO.

4 - The branding, the name, is solid.

Your killer feature will probably come from the feedback you get. If I had to guess, it'd be an integration and not something 'sexy.' Agencies I work with already have systems they follow and a product owner wouldn't swap to a service unless it either provided massive value, or was able to read PDFs or Google Doc files and make them look good on the web.

Thank you for the feedback!

>> I just want to answer my first burning question of "How cool is the output?"

You can see the live demo at https://magicdocs.co/demo. I'll also add some gifs to help explain.

>> What other tools do we get in the editor?

For now, it's a bit bare-bones with responsive elements and making a page pretty. In the future, we plan to add analytics, payments and crm integrations.

>> Why not make it free?

We are completely bootstrapped, so cash would be helpful. (also getting feedback from paying users) But perhaps a freemium approach could be right.

>> The branding, the name, is solid.

Thanks, I'll take all your input into consideration :)

The site does not work at all (white screen) if the Stripe requests are blocked, eg with uMatrix.

> "TypeError: window.Stripe is not a function"

Not so long ago, a developer would have to test with every type of browser to see if the site was working.

Now that is mostly fixed, but instead the developer has to test with every type of plugin/blocker ...

Sigh.

Testing your sites resilience to missing non-essential assets should always be done.

The Stripe CDN could be down. Or blocked by some overzealous corporate firewall.

That shouldn't lead to a whitescreen.

Love the idea. It's simple, does a specific thing and seems to do it well.

A couple of suggestions:

1. Maybe have the 'DEMO' tab be more visible on the landing page. like a big "try it out" button would be nice. I had to loiter around for a minute or two to notice the demo button hidden away in the top. Also, maybe let people preview the demo before needing to signup or commit in any way.

2. Gifs on the landing page. It makes a huge difference. People don't want to click on videos. But gifs auto-load which is great. (Legit speaking from experience and stats, we did user studies to confirm this...but it is to an extent, common knowledge in the UX world)

3. Think about finding a way to export PPTs to your editor. Most proposals get made in Powerpoint, so giving your user a convenient way to bring preexisting work into your environment is IMO, the fastest way to get new users. Especially the non-techy kind who have all the $monies$.

Thanks for your input. Adding explaining gifs and 'try demo' CTA is a nice touch. Also, I added importing PPT to the roadmap, makes total sense! :)

A few questions I'd like to see answered

1) who is the proposal for? What type of proposal is this ideal for?

My initial thinking was a client proposal like for a marketing agency, but then I figured they can probably need to WOW the customer more than this proposal doc would.

2) Why not just use SquareSpace, Wix, or other html page builder? What benefit do they have in using this?

Somebody else in a similar space is Qwilr.com, have you seen them?

I think you're probably on to something, but I'm not completely getting it. Congrats on the launch!

If he makes money with this, then it's a prime example of how you can turn an idea that exists and make it better (Google Docs can do something like this as well).

I don't think "better" is the right word. Perhaps "better for a particular purpose". Google Docs can do much more, e.g. allow multiple people to edit a document simultaneously.

Magicdocs is essentially different from google docs. While g-docs is more focused on collaboration and creating PDFs, magicdocs is a simple no-code tool that enables anyone to create beautiful responsive websites.

It's much more focused on sharing client-facing documents. We also plan to foster doc interactivity with like notifications, payments, and buttons (things that pdfs can't do).

On a slight tangent, does anyone know what the deal is with the phrase "beautiful responsive websites"?

The number of google hits for the phrase is enormous, and it kind of sticks out like a sore thumb every time I look at a new web template, framework or generator. Every single one uses exactly the same phrase.

I have never looked at a website and thought to myself: "That is beautiful responsive website". Most people would describe sites as "good looking" and "easy to use" instead.

Did some marketing person back in the mists of time dream up the term and everyone has been blindly copying the same old tired phrase since then?

Responsive is a technical term that means it adapts to multiple screen sizes.

In a nutshell, it just means the website works on mobile and works well.

It's technical jargon, sure. But it means something important to web designers/creators. I'd run away from a web framework in 2020 that wasn't responsive.

I'm confused, perhaps by the title more than the product, is there any functionality that actually converts documents into websites. Or is it just a web editor, to products simple web pages?

This nice, and I like the fact that you covered everything in your terms of service including customer's data confidentiality.

Privacy is paramount in the current day and age. Glad that you took a peek into it.

I know the product is for non-tech people to be able to use this, still would be nice if you had functionality for custom CSS.

Why the 7 requests to stripe.com on every page? And why the spinning loader?

Is there an export to file functionality?

>> requests to stripe.com

I'll take a look at it. I'm still polishing some rough edges.

>> why the spinning loader?

I use it while it's fetching user data and displaying to the user 'hey, I'm here'. But again, rough edges :)

>> export to file

Pdfs exports are on the road map, but you can only share w/ a link at the moment.

For pdf exports, is there any benefit to rolling your own implementation vs using the browser's print and "Save to PDF" feature?

How is this different from Webflow?

Very different. Webflow is a tool to build your main website/blog. On the other hand, magicdocs is geared towards client-facing documents as websites. They're websites, yes, but flexible and ephemeral.

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