In this episode of the True Operators Podcast, Alex Panagis sits down with Remkus de Vries, founder of Scanfully, creator of Within WordPress, and long-time WordPress operator, to unpack a question that comes up for almost every builder at some point:
What does focus actually mean?
From the outside, Remkus doesn’t look focused in the traditional sense.
He runs a consultancy. He’s building a SaaS product. He publishes a newsletter, podcast, and courses. He’s active across the WordPress ecosystem in multiple ways.
And yet, none of it feels scattered.
That tension between doing multiple things and still being focused is what makes this conversation worth paying attention to.
Building more than one thing on purpose
Remkus didn’t set out with a master plan to build an ecosystem.
Like most operators, things evolved over time.
Agency work led to deeper technical experience. That experience exposed recurring problems. Those problems turned into product ideas. And the knowledge behind all of it naturally became content and education.
What changed over time is the level of intention.
Today, each part of what he’s building feeds into the others.
Scanfully focuses on site health and performance monitoring. Within WordPress captures and shares the underlying knowledge. Truer Than North applies that thinking at a strategic level.
It is not a collection of disconnected projects. It is a system.
From performance to site health
One of the more interesting threads in the conversation is how Remkus thinks about performance.
Most advice in the WordPress space focuses on surface-level fixes. Caching, plugins, quick wins.
But that often misses the point.
Performance issues are usually symptoms of deeper problems. Architecture, infrastructure, and long-term site health.
That shift in thinking is what led to Scanfully.
Instead of only measuring speed, the goal is to understand what is actually breaking or degrading a site over time. Broken links, broken media, failing forms, unnoticed regressions.
Not just performance. Everything that impacts it.
Turning experience into products
A big part of this episode is how Remkus turns years of hands-on experience into something scalable.
Not just through software, but through education.
His courses, starting with Make WordPress Fast, are not built around shortcuts or tools. They are built around understanding.
How the web works. Where performance issues originate. How different layers interact.
It is deliberately deeper. Sometimes less immediately exciting. But far more useful over time.
That same philosophy shows up across everything he’s building.
Product decisions and what not to build
Another recurring theme is restraint.
Even with a clear roadmap and plenty of ideas, Scanfully is not trying to become everything.
There are obvious adjacent directions. Site management, broader tooling, more features.
Those are not being chased blindly.
Instead, the focus is on going deeper into a specific problem space. Site health and performance, done properly.
That means prioritising features that align with the core philosophy, and ignoring ones that do not.
It is slower. But it is deliberate.
Bootstrapping and control
Remkus also shares his thinking on funding and why he has chosen not to raise external capital for Scanfully.
The trade-off is straightforward.
Funding can accelerate growth. It also introduces pressure, expectations, and competing priorities.
For now, the decision is to stay independent, move at a controlled pace, and build the product according to a clear vision first.
It is not about avoiding growth. It is about controlling how that growth happens.
So what does focus actually mean
By the end of the conversation, the definition becomes clearer.
Focus is not about doing one thing.
It is about understanding why each thing exists, making sure they reinforce each other, and being intentional about where time and energy go.
You can do multiple things.
As long as they move in the same direction.
We dig into
- When multiple products actually make sense
- How Scanfully came to life and where it is going
- Why most performance advice falls short
- The role of education in building better products
- How to prioritize what to build and what to ignore
- Bootstrapping versus raising capital
- A more practical definition of focus
About Remkus de Vries
Remkus de Vries is a WordPress performance expert, product builder, and educator with over 20 years of experience in the ecosystem. He operates across SaaS, consultancy, and education, helping companies build faster, more scalable WordPress products.
