Monarch Money · B2C · personal finance and budgeting app
Talk candidly on Reddit to a closing rival's users about your plans and gaps
Founder says users found it authentic and trusted them; no separate numbers
Workedcommunity
What they did
With no marketing team, the founders communicated with Mint users mainly on Reddit: shared the philosophy, that they're in it for the long haul, and admitted flaky institutions and missing features ('20% into our journey'). Explained what Monarch does and what's being added.
What happened
People found them authentic; mattered to users who felt betrayed by Mint.
- Stage
- growth
This shipped together with other changes, so the result can't be credited to this alone.
In their words
Sub Club by RevenueCat · Learning and Profiting from Black Swan Events — Val Agostino, Monarch Money“but what we did do well was we really communicated with the Mint folks, primarily through Reddit, and just said, "Hey, like here's kind of our philosophy. Like this is why we're doing it. Like we're in it for the long haul.”
“And I think people liked that. Okay, these folks sound authentic.”
Related topics
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More from this episode
- Monarch Money: Charge users a subscription instead of running ads, so users are the customerFounder says it keeps the product improving; no numbers
- Monarch Money: Let users vote on your roadmap from a Feature Requests link in settingsOver 15,000 votes and long comments that guide what gets built
- Monarch Money: Show clickable prototypes to the users who voted for a feature before buildingSlower up front but fewer release cycles; founder's claim
- Monarch Money: Ask 'why' 3-5 times about requests to find the real emotional needFound users want a sense of control; marketing changes still to come
- Monarch Money: Define user types, from students to retirees, and choose which to targetFounder says it helped decide focus and messaging; no numbers
- Monarch Money: Run a year-long private beta with a few hundred power usersPublic beta followed in early 2021; growth took off from there
- Monarch Money: Publish a founder blog post the night a rival's shutdown leaks, with an importer readyDaily signups jumped 20-30x and stayed there (shutdown itself drove most demand)
- Monarch Money: Pause promised features and re-rank everything when a sudden opportunity hitsNew import extension shipped in ~48 hours vs 6+ weeks for rivals; ~70 minutes downtime
- Monarch Money: Grow the support team from 3 to 20+ people during a signup surgeBacklog of days to weeks at first; now back to 24-hour replies
- Monarch Money: Open Canada in beta after Canadians fake their location to sign upMixed: weaker bank connections frustrated some users, who were offered refunds
- Monarch Money: Build a content team teaching the personal finance basics schools skip
- Monarch Money: Keep the team small and aim for break-even even after raising VCTeam of 13 was ready when demand spiked; no financial numbers
- Mint: Offer a free finance app paid for by credit card offersLost money on every user due to data costs; offers hurt the product
- Monarch Money: Keep an 'open role' on your jobs page for people who don't fit a listingNearly half the team was hired this way