Today,
Website Planet had the opportunity to interview Daniel Sternlicht, Co-Founder and CEO of Common Ninja. We talked about company’s beginnings, how it evolved, and what is the mission of Common Ninja.
Please Present Common Ninja to Our Audience
Common Ninja offers the ultimate collection of powerful no-code widgets for all websites and e-commerce platforms.
Currently, the collection consists of more than 50 widgets that can enhance a website’s design, improve on-site engagement, and increase conversion rates.
The widgets are easy to use, fully customizable, perfectly responsive, and require absolutely no coding knowledge.
Please Describe the Story Behind the Company: What Sparked the Idea, and How Has It Evolved So Far?
Common Ninja started as a side project a few years ago, when I encountered certain difficulties as a developer.
Back then, the web ecosystem wasn’t as developed as it is today, and some tasks that looked very simple turned out to be very annoying and time-consuming and had to be repeated over and over for various projects and platforms. The task I wanted to tackle was to build and design comparison tables.
So, I created a no-code tool where you were able to create comparison tables that looked pretty using a simple editor. After having created a comparison table, all you had to do to make it available on your website was to simply copy a chunk of code and paste it on your website.
Within a couple of months, the tool went viral. Thousands of comparison tables were created, and the tool got some exposure and nice reviews in big tech blogs. Then, just for fun, I added a donation button so that people who use the tool could fund my activity. I received two donations within the next 2 months — one was a $25 donation, and the other one was a $75 donation. That was the moment when I realized that maybe I was onto something.
So, I added a user signup mechanism, created some simple premium plans, and added more features. Surprisingly, a day after the new version was out, people started paying for the product.
After that, I created a few more plugins to help people save time when building websites, like pricing tables, RSS & social media streams, a charts creator, and the brackets plugin for managing tournaments and contests online.
When I started promoting these plugins, I realized that it takes a lot of time to make them compatible with various website builders and e-commerce platforms like Wix, Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, WordPress, Duda, etc. Each platform had its own API, capabilities, and demands for building apps.
And, that’s when my partner and I came up with the idea to build a platform that will help us develop cross-platform widgets, apps, and plugins for different website builders and e-commerce platforms, and to make these high-quality apps available to any merchant and website owner — regardless of the platform, they are using to build their sites or stores.
What Services Do You Offer?
We offer an ever-growing collection of powerful widgets for all websites and e-commerce platforms.
What is the Mission of Common Ninja?
Common Ninja’s mission is to make the process of creating websites & e-commerce stores easier and more beneficial by providing highly sought-after widgets of great quality, rich with powerful features, and compatible with all website builders and e-commerce platforms.
What Separates You From Other Similar Websites/Companies?
Firstly, our widgets work on any platform — really, ANY platform. From website builders to e-commerce platforms and landing page builders.
Secondly, we offer top-notch widgets of high quality, which are secure, SEO friendly, easy to use, fully customizable, and responsive.
Lastly, with our superb developer platform, we are able to create new widgets for any platform easily and quickly and are currently working on greatly expanding our widget selection.
What Are the Plans for the Company for the Near Future?
We are planning to significantly expand our widget collection, and enhance the widgets we currently have with additional, much-sought-after features.
