“You don't need a new idea. There's plenty of ideas out there, problems that have been solved that you could improve upon, and while you're improving upon that you might find a niche within that industry. Weightly is a perfect example. I competed with the giants like OpenTable and found a little niche where I can serve the small restaurants that are underserved.”

Skip Novel Ideas And Find The Underserved Niche Inside A Solved Billion-Dollar Category

Joe rejects the 'novel idea' trap entirely. His framework is to pick a solved problem with billion-dollar incumbents, then find the slice they neglect. For him that was small restaurants priced out of OpenTable's cover fees and hundreds-per-month plans — a market the giants couldn't economically serve.