I Built OlPart - A Car Parts Finder for UAE (React + Back4App)

#startup #webdev #react #javascript

Hey dev community! 👋

I want to share a project I've been working on: OlPart - a car parts directory for Dubai and Sharjah, UAE.

The Problem 🚗

If you've ever needed a car part in the UAE, you know the pain:

Drive to industrial areas (Al Quoz in Dubai, Industrial Area in Sharjah)
Walk shop to shop asking "do you have this part?"
Call 20+ shops hoping someone answers
No way to compare prices

It's 2026 and finding a brake pad still feels like 1995.

The Solution 💡

OlPart is a simple directory where you can:

Browse verified auto parts shops by location
Filter by area (Al Quoz, Sharjah Industrial Area 1-6)
See shop details, hours, and contact info
WhatsApp shops directly
Compare prices across multiple shops

Tech Stack 🛠️

Frontend: React + Vite
UI: Mantine components
Backend: Back4App (Parse Server)
Hosting: Nginx on VPS
SEO: Custom prerendering script with Puppeteer

The Biggest Challenge: SEO for SPAs 😅

React apps and SEO don't mix well. Search engines (especially Bing) struggle to render JavaScript.

My solution: I wrote a Puppeteer script that prerenders key pages to static HTML during build. Now Bing and Google see real content, not empty divs.

// Simplified version of my prerender script
const browser = await puppeteer.launch();
const page = await browser.newPage();
await page.goto(http://localhost:4173${route});
await page.waitForSelector('h1');
const html = await page.content();
// Save as static HTML## Lessons Learned 📚

Local SEO is competitive - Established businesses have years of backlinks
Structured data matters - JSON-LD for LocalBusiness helped a lot
Content > Code - Writing location-specific pages (Sharjah Industrial Area guides) drove more traffic than any technical optimization
WhatsApp is king in UAE - Nobody wants to fill forms, everyone uses WhatsApp