The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Back to feedPost
A working MVP and a production-ready product are not the same thing.
Your MVP may already:
• have the core features
• connect to the database
• process payments
• use AI or third-party APIs
• look good in a demo
But production introduces a different set of questions:
-What happens when an API fails?
-Can users access data they should not see?
-Are webhooks actually verified?
-What happens when two actions happen at the same time?
-Are errors being logged?
-Can you safely deploy an update without breaking existing users?
-Are email, payments, auth, uploads and background jobs reliable outside the happy path?
This is usually where the final 20% becomes more important than the first 80%.
The goal is not to rebuild a working MVP.
It is to find the things that could hurt the product after real users arrive — and fix the important ones before launch.
That is the gap I have been focusing on lately: helping founders move from "it works" to "I am comfortable putting real users on this."
If you are building right now, what part of getting to production are you least confident about?
The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Related posts
The Problem:
Most Shopify stores install a quiz app for $50/month to recommend products. The apps are slow, don't match the brand design, and add to the 15-apps problem.
What I Built:
I built a custom Interactive Ritual Builder directly in Shopify for VERAÉ, my premium textured-hair demo brand - no quiz app.
How it Works - What you see in video:
Start: "Let's understand what your hair is asking for" - 3 simple questions, no overwhelm
Q1: "What would you like your routine to do better?" - Hydration, Definition, Repair, Scalp, Refresh
Q2: "How much structure feels right?" - Simple, Balanced, Complete
Q3: "How often do you usually wash?" - About once a week, About twice a week, It depends
Result: Personalized ritual - Example "Refresh Ritual" - lighter routine for moisture between wash days
Selling: Shows full routine [Wash $28 + Cloud Rinse $29] with total $86 and one-click "Add full routine to cart" - customer builds their own bundle
What I Did:
Built custom diagnostic engine in Liquid - logic analyzes answers and recommends ritual
Built dynamic step-by-step bundling - customers mix-and-match, not forced into one kit
Built conversion architecture - from quiz answer straight to cart with full routine, no friction
Styled to match VERAÉ premium brand - beige, black, editorial fonts - not generic app design
No app installed - faster load, no monthly fee, fully editable in Shopify editor
Tools Used:
Shopify, Custom Liquid, Shopify 2.0 Theme Development, Conversion Architecture, Agency Solutions
Context:
Demo project - VERAÉ is my own self-initiated store to show how I build custom experiences without relying on apps. Not client work. No performance claims.
My Goal:
Fewer unnecessary apps and less manual work. Custom code where it matters, lean app stack everywhere else.
Disconnected or broken systems? Let's fix it.
Went fully freelance in July 2023, no agency safety net, no handed-down client list.
Building custom Webflow templates instead of starting every project from a blank canvas cut delivery timelines by about 30%. Not glamorous work, mostly structuring reusable sections and components before the first real design pass even starts.
Client satisfaction sits at 95% across that stretch, and the UI/UX changes I push hardest for, not the visual ones, the ones about where people get stuck, land the biggest number: user retention up roughly 25% on sites after launch.
Two and a half years in, the lesson that stuck isn't about design taste. It's that the boring infrastructure work is what quietly buys the speed everyone notices later.
What's the unglamorous setup work in your process that quietly pays for the parts clients actually compliment?
I design products for Web3 and SaaS founders.
My own outreach lived in too many apps. So I built one place for every lead, message and outcome.
The problem was never effort. It was too many tabs.
Good design doesn’t add features. It removes the places people get lost.