Building tech and product for marketplaces (with Rover cofounder Phil Kimmey)

“There’s often a desire to keep adding features because ‘Oh wouldn’t it be cool if we could do this or that?’ The reality is if a customer is only spending five minutes with your product, they’re only going to interact with a very tiny subset of your feature set. And so, you’re better off usually improving something that 80% of [customers] interact with that is really core than things around the edges that are more functionality.” - Phil Kimmey We are very excited to be joined by Phil Kimmey, one of the co-founders of Rover (and a frequent member of various 30 under 30 lists), who designed Rover in its infant stages at a Startup Weekend! In this episode, we dive into Rover’s initial design, how the business model was proved, and wrap up with a lengthy discussion on Value-Add Features vs Data-Driven Features. Phil also provides his opinion on what makes new tech and development teams successful and explains why PayPal still sends Rover’s monthly summary statements to his parent’s house. Sponsors:VantaBe sure to follow the Acquired Podcast:Follow Acquired: @AcquiredFM, acquired.fmLinks from the Show:Conjoined Triangles of Success