In episode 718, Rob Walling and Derrick Reimer tackle listener questions about giving up on ideas, competing in crowded markets, and developing painful features. They also chat about SavvyCal’s recent design refresh, finding founder-market fit, and whether Derrick has retired from podcasting.

Episode Sponsor:

Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball?

Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad.

DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin America.

Your elite squad will include between 2 to 6 Full Stack Developers, a technical product manager, plus experts in product strategy, UI/UX design, DevOps, and QA - all working together to make your SaaS Product a success.

You can ramp up an entire product team fast, in your timezone, and at rates 75% cheaper than a comparable US-based team. And with DevSquad, you pay month to month with no long-term contracts.

Get the committed, responsive development team that your business deserves.

Visit DevSquad.com/startups and get 10% off the first three months of your engagement.

Topics we cover:

3:59 – Which feature felt harder and took longer than imagined?
9:14 – When is time to give up on a SaaS idea and move on?
17:51 – Finding customers in crowded markets with large incumbents
23:32 – Has Derrick officially retired from podcasting?
25:57 – Handling competitors that are copying differentiating product features
28:48 – Evaluating SavvyCal’s refreshed design
31:10 – Considering vertical vs. horizontal SaaS for SavvyCal
34:05 – Why did Derrick decide to pursue the idea for SavvyCal?
40:19 – Finding “founder-fit”

Links from the Show:

The SaaS Playbook by Rob Walling
TinySeed
Derrick Remier (@derrickreimer) | X
SavvyCal
Group scheduling mode
The Build In Public Podcast
The Art of Product Podcast
8 B2B Marketing Strategies That Got My Startup to $10 Million (and 1 that FAILED)
Finding My Next Bootstrapped Business Idea

If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cove

Episode 718 | When to Give Up, Open Source Competition, Painful Features, and More (with Derrick Reimer)

Startups For the Rest of Us