Interview with Guy Goldstein, CEO and Co-Founder of Check – the Ultimate Finance Management App
In this success stories edition we bring to you an interview with Guy Goldstein, CEO and co-founder of Check. For those unfamiliar with the app (shame on you), Check monitors your credit cards and bank accounts and reminds you when bills are due, allowing you to pay them on the spot or schedule payment for later. Let’s CHECK it out!
CNN Money called Check “The Cadillac of money management apps” and the product is living up to the expectations of its users. Could you tell us a bit more about the idea, development and how everything came together?
We founded Check (formerly Pageonce) in 2007. The reason was simple: I found it extremely frustrating and often impossible to remember the countless usernames and passwords to all of my online accounts. He knew there had to be an easier way ‐ and Check was born.
Shortly after launching in 2008, I noticed signs of the coming smartphone revolution and wanted to be a part of it. Our app was one of the initial 500 apps released on the 1st Generation iPhone. In tandem, users seemed to have a strong tendency toward adding bills and financial accounts (banks, credit cards, investments, etc.) to the application. As a result, we decided to exclusively dedicate the app to become the best, most efficient way for consumers to access their bills and money from one centralized place, on their smartphone.
Today, just several years later, Check is a top-rated app that takes the work and worrying out of paying bills for nearly 10 million customers.
Check has nearly 10 million users and it has recently raised 24 million dollars from Menlo Ventures, making its total investment nearly 50 million dollars. These are quite impressive numbers for today’s app-saturated market. Where do you see Check in 2 years? Are you planning to roll out any additional features?
Looking forward, we envision Check as the clear, well-defined leader in the mobile payments space. We also predict an abundance of new users on the platform and several new partnerships with state and regional utility companies.
Yes, we plan to announce new product developments in next year.
Last year you rebranded PageOnce.com to Check.me. Why did you choose to do this and what are the benefits of using a .ME domain?
The new name, Check, symbolizes who we are today and what we do. When we first created the company, the name Pageonce made sense because customers were able to view all of their data on one page. Since then, we’ve evolved into a mobile payments company and in fact are the only company in the Fin Tech space bringing (1) personal finance, (2) payments and (3) mobile.
Check is short, easily visualized and remembered. This is critical and makes it easy for customers to communicate our brand’s story. There are many advantages to using a .ME domain – for one, it is very personal and consumer-facing.
What is your advice to young entrepreneurs?
Build a phenomenal service, find a distribution engine that works, experiment before you commit, admit it when things aren’t working, and above all, celebrate your successes.
