? Trending now: Everyday office productivity tools that we use and love are being used as backend databases and/or content management for websites.

Google Sheets was the first to go down this path. Sheet2site was a forerunner and now there’s so many other competitors. Next came Airtable (like in Table2site), and then Microsoft 365 Excel spreadsheets. It makes perfect sense to use them, as databases are often just tables, isn’t it? Once you can connect up the usual CRUD functions via APIs, not having to wrangle with actual databases and servers for simple sites or web apps becomes a no-brainer.

Then people started connecting their Notion docs to a custom domain and that became a website. And now, using Notion as a backend and CMS to build websites is trending. You can also use Google Docs to create a blog now. Airtable also allows you to embed a card view right now, making it perfect for directory listings sites. Public Trello boards are now product roadmaps, and Telegram recently created a comments widget that you can embed to web forums.

I love this trend because of the lower barrier to entry for managing your database and content. Everyone knows how to use a spreadsheet, so onboarding is almost zero. And tools like Notion and Airtable come with cult followings, so using what you already love to use on a daily basis is a no-brainer.

Bets of all, think about the possibilities if you extend the same principle to other productivity tools and industries? 

• Google Docs to create other types of online publications like magazines, newsletters, content/media sites
• Google Sheets for showing data analytics, visualizations, and reports
• Google Slides / MS365 Powerpoint to design actual websites
• Notion as backend and CMS for project management, documentation
• Whatsapp / Telegram to power live chat on websites and full-featured forums

What other productivity tools do you love using right now, and what would it be great for as a backend/CMS?