I've wasted 44 hours building a non-functioning PR workflow--should I fire N8N?
Hey everyone, I'm at the end of my rope with N8N. I’ve spent +40 hours trying to build a relatively simple PR workflow that takes 1) a Telegram message, 2) Sends it to an AI brain to analyze a prospect, 3) Then drafts custom pitch emails in my voice for books or podcast appearances.
I went the route of building this from scratch as opposed to copying someone else's template. As a veteran open source web dev, I thought I could probably learn N8N and build a functioning workflow in 10 hours. Now I'm thinking if I had just done PR stuff for 44 hours, I'd have a hell of a lot more to show for it!
I’m hosting n8n on Hostinger, and while I generally like them as a host, I’ve had nothing but endless, frustrating technical issues, from webhooks failing to my container unmounting entirely; randomly, one day they just deleted the workflow I'd been working on. (I could apparently jump through some steps to restore it, but I'm taking it as my sign to move on).
I've heard about "vibe coding," and THIS was the opposite of that. This was a flashback to my 2010 web dev days; squinting furiously at my screen, trying to find the errant syntax. My copilot in the development was Google Gemini; was this a major mistake? Should I have worked with Claude?
Are the other agentic tools like these as finicky? I had considered Open Claw or Hermes for my AI PR agent before settling on N8N. Somehow, I thought AI workflows would be "smarter."
My wife volunteered to do my PR; so basically, I can just take the workflow and templates I've built, give them to her, and she'll be the one getting my "trigger messages." There's no way she'll be a worse PR agent than what I built.
I might be convinced to stick with it if others here can reassure me that an N8N project doesn't entail a ton of ongoing maintenance. If I knew I was just a few more hours away from this thing working reliably with little to no ongoing maintenance, I might stick with it.
OK, ok, ok I'm kind of just venting here. So let's wrap up this ramble with a question that might provide value to everyone...
Do N8N workflows of average complexity work reliably once set up correctly?
Or do most N8N workflows have little things breaking all the time, randomly?
Is a working workflow set-and-forget, or will it take hours of upkeep a month?
I’m just about ready to fire the AI and hire the wife!