#378 - How Ray Meiring built fanatical customers by choosing exactly who to ignore

A story about passing lucrative deals to competitors—and building something users refuse to give up

This episode is for SaaS founders exhausted from chasing every opportunity—and wondering if extreme focus actually works.

Most SaaS companies don't fail because of bad tech. They fail because they can't stop building.

Ray Meiring, CEO of QorusDocs, discovered this during a meeting with a bank CIO. While trying to find use cases for their generic document tool, Ray realized they had it backwards—they were hunting for problems to fit their solution instead of solving a specific problem.

That realization changed everything. Ray narrowed QorusDocs from "any document" to proposals to specific verticals. He even developed a system for passing lucrative but wrong-fit customers directly to competitors.

And this inspired me to invite Ray to my podcast. We explore how narrowing from documents to proposals to law firms and engineering firms created users who'd "pry QorusDocs from their cold dead hands." Ray shares why moving 10,000 miles to Seattle transformed their network, how building inside Microsoft Office became their differentiator, and why consistency beats constant pivoting. You'll discover how saying no to features actually accelerated growth.

We also zoom in on three of the 10 traits that define remarkable software companies:

• Acknowledge you can't please everyone
• Aim to be different, not just better
• Focus on the essence

Ray's story shows how narrowing your focus can multiply your impact.

Here's one of Ray's quotes that captures his philosophy:

"We were trying to be everything to everyone and just build this very generic product. But as we worked with more customers, we started to see a pattern around a very specific set of documents that were challenging—proposal documents."

By listening to this episode, you'll learn:

• Why the A-B-Z framework beats traditional segmentation
• What happens when you deprecate features instead of adding them
• When proximity to customers trumps remote efficiency
• Why integration beats innovation for enterprise retention

For more information about the guest from this week:

• Guest: Ray Meiring, CEO QorusDocs
• Website: qorusdocs.com