Hinge: Justin McLeod (2021)

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And before we start the show, I recently heard a great business story from the music world. I was interviewing the rapper Macklemore and he took me back to a time when record labels were offering him millions of dollars, and he had to make a choice whether to stay independent with more risk and more reward, or take the upfront cash and the security that comes with that. To hear how it played out, check out my interview with Mac Lamore on my other podcast, The Great Creators. Just search for the Great Creators with Guy Raz, wherever you listen to podcasts. And for today's show, we are running an interview from the archives that is so full of good stories and so full of great lessons that I'm gonna stop talking right now so we can get straight to it. So Enjoy.

We did the relaunch, you know, my first instinct was obviously to like go raise money. So I was talking to every VC. But No one will give me money. Wow. I mean I was begging. Yeah. I had this like one investor that was really holding out for And I remember the partner at the VC firm called me and

She was like, you know. We've never seen a company. That was cool. And then went away. And then was able to come.

Back. And We just Can't do it. Wow.

And I was like Timberlands? Welcome to How I Built This, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements. Built.

Guy Raz and on the show today God Away led Justin McCloud to build the dating app Hinge. and how Hinge led him to the love of his life. In 2019, a very distinguished peer-reviewed academic journal published a paper about human courtships.

The study, led by Stanford sociologist Michael Rosenfeld, concluded That most romantic relationships Now begin. Now If you are, say, under thirty five, then

This may not come as a huge surprise. Pretty much everyone you know either uses or has used or has at least downloaded some kind of dating app. But to anyone older Say people over forty? This study may come as a shock because most of them met their partners at churches or workplaces or school or a party or through a mutual friend or at a bar. And sure, you can still meet your future life partner in any of those ways, but

The bottom line? Online dating now seems like the default, the norm, the And today Dating apps alone are a three billion dollar a year global business.

There is an endless array of them. So How does one app stick out from another? Well, when it comes to one particular app Yeah.

The company's tagline is designed to be deleted. Which at first glance Sounds an unpromising business model. But when you think about it, what Hinge is basically trying to tell you is. We're gonna help you find the one, and then you won't need us anymore. Now like any successful business

Justin McLeod built hinge on relationships. relationships with users and investors and employees. But I think of all the founders we've had on the show. Justin's personal relationships, and one relationship in particular? were inextricably linked to the launch and very identity of his brand.

Now, I don't want to give too much away here because you have to hear his story to believe it, but in a sense, Justin's own romantic life became a kind of litmus test for the way he hoped hinge users would approach dating. Not just as a frenetic swipe left, swipe right kind of a game. But a serious thought intentional first step. towards something lasting and long term.

And the story of how Justin essentially turned his life experience into a brand is, in some ways, so dramatic, so implausible. that you'd half expect to see it on a TV show or in a movie. But We'll get there. Anyway, Justin grew up in Louisville, Kentucky.

He was an only child who attended Catholic school. I think I was a pretty sensitive kid. I was a pretty scrawny kid. I was small. And so Even like literally in second grade. When all the boys would be playing sports.

I would be like hanging out with the girls. I just I just and if I had to play sports, I would usually fake an injury pretty early so that I could be nurse back to health. By the girls. So I think I was I don't know, something about me always I wasn't like a guy's guy. Yeah. Did that continue into high school? Like your kinda

hanging out m mostly with girls or or did that Starts to change. Well, when I was in seventh grade I had this Girlfriend actually. I had a girlfriend in fifth, sixth, and seventh grade. Her name was Kristen.

And I was like totally in love. I mean, I I was like done. I was like, I found my person, I'm like I'm done. This is it. Yeah. And then one day in English class She just turned around in her desk and dumped me. And that was it. After three years. That was it.

And I was so sad and heartbroken and also at my school Because it was so small. It was a little bit clicky. Everybody knew.

And everyone knew and I was sort of like kicked out of the cool kids group. And so for seventh and eighth grade I it was like it was just torture. And I was supposed to go to this high school There was like a f it was like a feeder for a big Catholic high school in Louisville. And I just decided like I'm going on a different path. I want to get away from these people. And I chose a a small

private school in Louisville. I mean and let's be honest, seventh grade You're not at your most sophisticated in life yet. I mean this is yours this is still puppy love. Yeah, but it was traumatic. It was traumatic to me. And I know that sounds so silly, but

I just was So heartbroken, and I was so traumatized by the experience and like the social isolation that followed. I was just like, I'm never gonna let that happen to me again. And I think I just determined That like. I was gonna be cool.

And so I turned into like a completely different person. When I entered high school. How so? Well for one

partying. I mean I I was I was actually I mean I I definitely had a troublemaker class clown got a lot of detentions and things in in grade school, but it was always kind of like good natured funny fun or like not doing my homework or being late to class. And when I Got to high school.

the there was like a senior there named Billy who I like idolized. And he was like a big drinker and a big partier. And I literally remember the first. Weekend before school started, my freshman year. We went to a

Field hockey. game, which was the it sport at my high school. And There was like this big party later that night. And I knew the cool kids were going and I went home and this is I mean, this is reflective of who I was at the time. I went home to my mom and dad and I said, There's gonna be a party tonight

There's gonna be drinking. I wanna go. 'Cause I was like really honest. I was like I just I was really earnest and I was like, and I really want to go and they said absolutely not. And I argued with them for like two and a half hours probably. And finally my dad drove me to the party and I got dropped off.

And I remember that night I had Two And I was floored and like passed out in a pool house. And I woke up the next morning.

And I just felt like a golden god. I was I just like thought that was the coolest thing and that began a career Uh high school of being the center of Uh

Huh. I mean you must have Good enough at school, right?'Cause you went to college. you got into college. I did. Well I had this other side of me

That was still an overachiever. Like in in in high school I got both the most attentions in history and the I took the most advanced placement classes. I was the captain of the tennis team, I was the graduation speaker. So I had that whole side. It's not like I was just like Parting and not. Doing any work. And actually really reveled. I think it was a big part of my identity to be able to do both to be able to be this like

overachieving But also At the same time. have this trouble making party side. All right, so you you go to college, went to to Colgate University, which is a

pretty small place in in rural sort of upstate New York. Um And yeah, I guess from from what I understand, like you Continued your Kind of approach to life, I guess, is fair to say, right? Like a lot of partying there.

I think I let the overachiever Go to the wayside. And I and I doubled down on the partying. I mean, I remember around March of my freshman year, I woke up one day and I like reflected and I was like, I have not

Gone to bed sober. This year. And I actually went in m like March or or April of my first year I actually went to go see a drug and alcohol counselor.

At Colgate. And she was like, You know, I think You might have a problem with alcohol and drugs, and I think maybe you should stop.

doing alcohol and drugs and I I looked at her and I was like Don't you think that's a bit rash? I I just wanted to like come and talk about my feelings. I didn't anticipate Having to just stop. And so I didn't go back to see her. Except that I then got referred back to her when I got written up three times in one night l like a few weeks later.

And she was like, I've already met this kid. He needs help. And and that's w how I spent my first summer after college and rehab all summer.

Well. It sounds like you were a kid exposed to this early on and you just A combination of maybe You had a uh sort of a Predisposition to

addiction plus you were young and you didn't quite un know how to handle it or how to moderate your behavior and and so it a combination of that and addiction really Kinda took over. Yeah.

I think that's a good way to put it. I think going back to what I was saying before, I was a pretty sensitive kid and I think I had a lot of emotions and I think I didn't really know how to Express them in a Productive way. Yeah. And when I felt overwhelmed it just felt

The easiest way was to like overwhelm the uncomfortable feelings with This better feeling of Getting higher drunk. Yeah.

Were your were your parents Aware of it. And And if they were, I'm assuming they were worried. Yeah, I think they are worried. I think my mom is especially worried.

You know it's really good at holding it all together though. And that's what I would always point to. I'd be like, Well look at my grades. I don't have a problem. You know, I'm I have like a three seven GPA and I'm taking it four hundred level courses my first year. And I hid it well. You know, I wasn't a I wasn't a dummy. I I'd I figured out over time how to hide it.

and how to get away with it. Um During college you met somebody who you started to date. And Kate. And

I guess you kinda you guys dated. Basically. Throughout college, right. I met Kate. Her first day of her first year. And it was my first day of my second year, so I'd just gotten out of rehab.

And Kate. was like the polar opposite. Kate showed up to school, never had a drink, never kissed a boy. Uh so like very different human being than me. And My roommate had

gone out in search of like finding some girls like the very first day of school, right? So he's like going out and like and he finds these couple girls out on the quad and invites them back to our place. And he's walking up the stairs with them and there I am Passed out. in the stairwell, like literally on a landing in the stairwell. Kate, I think, was scared. She'd never seen a passed out person in her life and uh an RA saw us. And Kate got her first. She was in trouble just for being around me. I wasn't even conscious.

That was our first interaction. But later that year she and I had a class together. And We would sit together sometimes and She developed a little bit of a crush on me.

And one night she came over to my Dorm room. We were chatting for a little bit and she asked me to walk her home and I walked her home and We had our first kiss that night, then we were just inseparable after that. But I guess.

Shortly before you graduated from college, you and Kate Split. Was it your decision or was that her decision? Well we had a w we'll say rocky relationship, as you could imagine, uh trying to be with someone like me.

And someone like Kate. And we had this really strong personal connection and bond and really loved each other. I mean really just we're we're really attracted to one another and like magnets to one another. But it was also tumultuous because

I was always going out and getting into trouble and So we broke up. And got back together like six or seven times. During during college. And at the end

We broke up. She actually transferred. She transferred another school. She transferred to Wellesley. And We got back. Yeah.

One last time. And I just like I just couldn't do it. I don't know why. I just let her go and then I I almost immediately regretted it. I wanted to call her like two weeks later and I just said, I have to stay out of her life. interrupting it and messing it up and then leaving again. So I just vowed to like not contact her anymore.

Hm. Alright, so two thousand six. You graduated college, you guys are split. And that's the end of The relationship and

And you obviously had to kind of deal with sobriety, how did you How did you do it? I mean, how are you able to Give up. Mm, drugs and alcohol.

On Graduation day. I woke up. And I've been out partying the night before and now is I woke up Yeah, like a

Stranger's house. And I had to get back home in order to like shower off and meet my parents who were gonna come over and and meet me. And I was walking home that morning. And I just thought to myself, it feels like

The steering wheel. on my life is broken. I I just had this innate sense that I was like supposed to go do something big. And I I d I held on to this belief that I was like destined for success and I was gonna do all these great things. Where did that idea come from, by the way? I don't know but I always had it. I only child syndrome, perhaps. I'm not sure.

But I You know, I was looking at my life at that point and I was like God, like I keep wanting to go in this direction, and yet every day

I wake up and go this other direction and I And It scared me. you know, I hadn't gotten the job that I wanted. I was taking some other random job in D C that I didn't really want.

I've lost the girl. You know, just it felt like Didn't seem like I was on track for success. And And I just vowed that morning to like

Stop. And I did. Well. You know, I participate in twelve step programs and I like to really threw myself into work.

And that was that. I mean it's i in some ways you're really lucky that this happened early to you in in your life and you were able to deal with it early in your life. I didn't feel lucky, you know, I'd go to these meetings. And these old people would be like, I ha you know, I drank for fifty years and you know, you're so lucky and I'd be like

I'd be like, you're so lucky, you got to drink for fifty years, I have to stop when I'm twenty-two. Alright, so you So you graduate and and you move to Washington, D C and and I guess you work um in in management consulting for for a few years.

And then you hit to business school, right? To to Harvard Business School? I did. Yeah. previous experience in a college environment was like Superpartier and drinker and imagine that that's also kind of

that drinking helped you meet people, right? A little bit because it's and and now you're in this new environment. Well you're I'm assuming no longer drinking. What was that like?

It was so hard. There I mean, there's just a lot of parting and it's how people connect and how people bond, especially in the early days. And I just felt like a fish out of water. I just felt so I just couldn't be around that. And so I kinda just Stayed away and

And Socially it was very hard for me to be there. Really hard. So you are at um you're at Harvard Business School and one of the advantages of going to business school is it creates a network and a lot of people Go to business school.

With that in intention in mind. Finding their future co founder like you know, Andy Dunn of Bonobos did when he went to Stanford, or you know, F uh Jen Hyman of Rent the Runway found her co founder at at Harvard Business School. Um Was that your intention? to to find like your co founder and and start a business.

When you got there? No,'cause startups wasn't really a thing. I I did have a sense that I wanted to be an entrepreneur. My dad ran his own business. When I was growing up. So he was his own boss. And

He lived this kind of leisurely existence where he really felt in charge of his own destiny and he really instilled into me like you should go work for yourself. How did you start to think about while you were at business school Something connected to relationships or dating. What was the story?

I mean it's so out of left field. I I I had no idea what I wanted to do and interviews were starting. you have like most people have jobs by Thanksgiving. And the consulting firms were interviewing and I applied to all the consulting firms. I got rejected from all of them except McKinsey so I I took the job.

and signed with McKinsey. And so it's around Thanksgiving. And I've gotten John McKinsey and I'm I'm actually dating this girl from HP S. And I just Couldn't get Kate out of my head. I mean everyone that I tried to date

Ever since I'd lost K. That was like four years ago. At this point. I would just compare to her. Well. Which by the way were you in touch with Kate? No, not at all. I wouldn't

I didn't reach out to her. I I just wouldn't. Uh I wanted to. You d you didn't even but did you know where she was? I knew that she had graduated and met someone and moved to London.

With him. Right. That's all I knew. But you but this is now four years after you split up and you're still she's still on your mind. Yeah. I just it was just such a magical relationship and I think every every relationship I had I would compare and Just no one felt.

Like Home. To me in a way that she did. And I'm a business school.

And I can't get Kate out of my head and I'm finally like, Okay, Justin, it's been four years. You've been sober for four years. You've gotten into Harvard business school, you've got a job at McKinsey. Do we think that we can reach back out to Kate? Uh-huh. And so I did.

I wrote her an email. What did you say? I said It was kind of a like an amends letter. It was kind of like a You know, I know that I did not act.

With a lot of kindness or integrity during our relationship. And I don't know how I could ever make it up to you, but I would love to try. Basically. Yeah. And she called me.

Like the next day. And we had the phone conversation. And We actually agreed to meet back in New York that Christmas. I was so excited.

And then she called back the next day and she said I'm sorry, Justin, I just can't. Like If I see you, I don't know what's gonna happen and I have a life now. And I I've just moved in with this guy. We have a flat together in London and

I just can't see you. And it was totally heartbroken. I in the back of my mind, again, I have these like these feelings, but I had this feeling like Kate and I were like meant to be together and we were gonna be together. And when that happened, I was like Oh my God, like it's like over. I've I've messed it up and

I felt like I had like torn the fabric of the universe or something. I mean, I know that sounds grandiose. But I just felt like this is not the way that it's supposed to be. And I like went into this. Total depression. Like

For I think more than a week I just cried. I like went to go see the therapist. I was like to get antidepressants. I just like wanted something. I just felt so horrible. And And then I emerge from that. And Harvard Business School is throwing this

Valentine's Day party. In February. And I back to try to rebound. I was like this socially awkward person who didn't like to go to parties, but there was this one girl in this one class that I sort of thought maybe there was a thing and so I was like really excited to list her as like a it was like a crush party where you like list people that you had a crush on. It was kinda like a last chance dance. Dynamic.

And then one day I'm I'm walking to class in early February With the class president. Brett, and we're chatting. I was like, Oh yeah, and this you know, dance is coming up the last chance dance. He's like, Yeah, you know what? We decided that was just too complicated. It's like thousand people listing people and all that stuff, so we just scrap that whole thing. And I was like What? This is my chance. Uh so

I I build this. And computers are something I really threw myself into as a kid. I I love to code. So I decided

To build an application that would allow people in the class to list their friends on Facebook and if two people matched It would alert them. So I was gonna build that and release it.

Yeah. Trevor Burrus, Jr. Wait, it was a Facebook like a web app, right? Yeah, it was a web app. It was like Farmville. I don't know if you remember Farmville, but it was like you could build an application within the Facebook frame. So that's what it was. And the idea was that you would just People would s would like sign up for this and then it would match them with other people in the app that they knew.

Yeah, it would use the Facebook network. You know, so you log in and you have a list of your friends. I mean this was this is the Wild West early days before there were a lot of privacy regulations and all that. So you know, you'd log in, you'd download all their friend lists from the API, you would display them their friend list, you'd say select the people you have a crush on, you'd s go through and select them. And then if they selected you Then it would let you know that it was a mutual match. Was was the fact that the dance was canceled did that have anything to do with with you launching it or or was it would d was that just kind of

Coincidental. No, I I I mean it's what sparked the idea. I don't think I would have That initial spark would have happened had the dance not been canceled and I hadn't been walking With

Brett. That Wednesday afternoon. Well. So this was basically this idea kind of replaced the dance,'cause the dance was designed to kind of do the same thing. Exactly. But it's just in real in real life. Yeah. The original name of this, by the way, was called Secret Agent Cupid, and it was this whole thing of like you're undercover listing your crushes. It was a terrible name. I can't talk about it. But

It was this it was the beginning of this whole dynamic of this what's called like the double opt-in of, you know, you list someone and they don't find out unless they list you too, or they like you too. And but how was this idea connected to anything in your personal life? I mean, I know you were heartbroken because Kate didn't want to meet you and And you kinda didn't have a whole lot of success dating, but how was the w was th d was this in a sense a way to kind of solve your own problem or was it just an idea that kinda came about and seemed fun? That was totally To solve my own problem. I mean it was very practical. It was very like there's a girl in this class that I have a crush on that I I would I wanna like

wanted to find a girlfriend. I mean always wanted to find I just I don't know why, but I've always just been this romantic who just really wanted to find my person and had this belief that when I found my person, like everything would just be amazing forever. So I built this very practically for me. Alright, so you put this up there and you're at Harvard Business School, so pr presumably it wasn't that hard to get people To notice it'cause you just told people, Hey, check this out, right? Yeah, it's a small class and a bunch of people hopped on and did it and it led to a few matches. It didn't lead to much, but It got me thinking.

I just thought Why doesn't this exist in the real world?'Cause at the time the culture was you'd sort of like creep on your friend's photos on Facebook. You know, you you get on f you know get on Facebook and you go through your friends' photos and you'd see someone kinda like cute in one of their photos that maybe you didn't know it was like a friend of a friend. And so this idea sparked of like If there was a dating app that was connected to Facebook, people would

Use it because it would be so simple. You already have your profile, it's already done, you already have your photo set up, you have social verification. If you just connected something that was really simple and connected to Facebook, I'll bet young people would use it. As opposed to at the time all w dating websites used you know, screen names and you had to sign up and fill out these long profiles and do all this stuff and it was a lot of friction.

excited me. I was like, there's really there's something here. Well I mean this is still like you're still in Boston and at business school and this is like your last semester there, and you have a job lined up at McKinsey. But What happened? To make you start to think that maybe this is something you should pursue after you graduate. Like we're friends.

at business school like finding success, were they m were people saying, Hey, this is awesome, I love this. Like w was that happening? I was obsessed. with this idea. I don't know how to say it. It was like I mean the closest analogy I can imagine is like being you're like pregnant with this idea and it is like coming out of you.

One way or another. And That's what it felt like. It was like I couldn't stop. I couldn't sleep. I just was like thinking about it all the time, about how the algorithm would work and about how you would get people to sign up to it. And I just it was like being possessed. And then I found out that other schools and other people had had this idea. And what happens is a lot of people join, people list their crushes. And then you find out whether you match or not, and then everyone goes away. And then that's when the insight came to me.

You know, people mainly just like cruise their friends' photos. And like what if this were actually not about people you already knew, but it was about your friends of friends? It was and that's another piece that I think made it really accessible to the next generation. It's like these aren't random strangers that you're gonna see on this app. you're gonna see friends of friends. It's the same idea of like listing a crush, except now it's just people that You

have a mutual connection with and you can see some of their photos and then so you list them as a crush. That was like The idea that really got me to be like I'm not gonna take the job.

at McKinsey, or at least I'm gonna push back the start date. And See where this goes. So you graduate in May and you decide to pursue this. And and

Did you need Money I mean I have to assume you need some money to try and and get this off the ground, right? So I I got together with a friend Her name was Frances. At business school. She worked at Google.

And we each put in twelve thousand dollars. Which is all Obviously like a lot of money for us both. But it's what I had.

And so We put in this money and we hired a team of engineers down in Argentina to start building a prototype. Argentina,'cause I'm assuming that was a lot cheaper than doing it in San Francisco. Yeah, exactly. And so I followed her out to San Francisco where she was gonna take her job at Google, but sort of half time work with me On

Hinge. And that was all the money you had? Twenty four thousand dollars? Yeah, twenty four thousand dollars. How's that? And so that's what we use to pay these

developers and start to develop prototype and I was sort of the product person imagining what the interface was gonna look like and she would help talk to the engineers'cause she ha she she also coded and so I follow her out to Mountain View. I'm sleeping on her floor in Mountain View. And

Eventually she's like This has been fun, Justin. But you know, I'm gonna stay at Google, this isn't really my thing. So I left her apartment in Mountain View I bounced around for a little bit around

S F and then Berkeley. And then I just was like, This is not my place. I don't know anyone out here. And so I I drove Cost Country back. To D C

where I had worked before and knew people and had a network. And I decided to start it there on my own. And the idea was to build like a website, a dating website initially. Yeah, initially it was a dating website. Initially it was this Facebook Canvas app, and that it was still I think that was primarily the idea.

And it was initially. clunky and complex and it would like ask you like questions about your friends and it had all these bells and whistles features and it was way overcomplicated. But I I was able to Yeah, I ran around.

And I was able to raise a little bit of money. I got into this little incubator in DC called Fortify. Raise like a little bit from my with little friends and family round of maybe like a hundred, a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Yeah, most V Cs of course wouldn't pay attention to us at all. We I mean the we always trying to you know, you come out of Harvard Business School and you think the way that you start a business is you write a business plan and you go to Greylock and then they give you fifty million dollars and then you like and that is not Not how it works. So

We you know, I'd go to these VCs and I'd be like, you know, we're g this we're gonna create a dating app, it's gonna be You know. young people are gonna use it and p and V Cs like Match dot com like owns this market, you know, you'll never be able to beat them and But I you know, I got a few. Believers and yeah, and we just started

Building this Website. And and was it still called 'Cause originally you called it Secret Agent Cupid, was that W you still recalling it at that point in in two thousand eleven?

No, no, no. That was like pretty pretty early on. We moved away from like It went through a few iterations in the early days. It went from like Double O Cupid to Secret Asian Cupid to Two degrees to three degrees. Each of these names had like trademark issues, and I just needed like a placeholder name, and that's where Hinge came from. I was like, I just it was a Friends of Friends app.

And I was like, I just need a name for something that connects two things. Like it's the thing in the middle. And I was staring at a door and I was like, I'm gonna call it hinge. Oh I just called it hinge. That's interesting. I did not know that. So uh so that's why,'cause a a hinge connects the door to the door frame. I was'cause I when I first heard the name hinge, I was like, huh, it's sort of a it's like the, you know, the door swinging out back and forth, like you're coming in and out of the door, like one date, two dates, three dates, four dates, five dates like the door on the hinge keeps swinging open and closed. But that's wrong. That is not where hinge comes from. That is not where hinge comes from. It was just It was a like a placeholder name. I honestly don't love the name. I mean it it's kinda stuck now, but

It was just it was a placeholder. I was like, I needed something that connected two things that wasn't already trademarked. And I anyone any founder who's probably tried to name something before and spent lots of time on USPTO.gov. Trying to find a name that hasn't been trademarked, especially in like the love and dating space is no joke. Yeah. So you uh are you got a little bit of money, you're in Washington D C and did you have an

an office or were were you working out of the accelerator in Washington D C? We worked out of the accelerator. I mean, first I was just working out of my apartment. And then when we got into the accelerator, we I started working out of the accelerator. Got it. Yeah. We are there like four of us. And what was the I mean

Like I'm trying to think in twenty eleven when you started to look for potential investors and I think would be a little while before you got Real money. I would say to you what differentiates you from Match.com? Why would somebody use or or OK Cupid or J Date or whatever was out there and I don't even know if Tinder was out there yet. What makes you different? And you would say

What? We're gonna be stigma free. There was a lot of stigma around dating. websites at the time. I think a lot of times VCs think

by analogy. And they're like, that dating website has stigma. So like dating websites has stigma. Like that's just how that goes. But you have to look at like the principles underneath that. Like why do dating websites have a stigma? And the stigma was because it was difficult. The stigma was because You would have to spend a lot of time setting up a profile, answering long questions, pay a lot of money. So no one would do that unless they were really struggling. In their dating lives. And had to resort to that.

And no one wants to admit that. Like no one wants to admit to themselves or certainly to other people that they like struggle in their dating lives and can't meet people. And so the idea was People still wanna be able to meet new people. You just have to make it frictionless. You just have to make it easy. If you make it easy and you make a one click sign on, it won't have stigma. And if it doesn't have stigma, you're gonna unlock the biggest single market. Which is people who are twenty to thirty five. when those people didn't use dating websites. So that was the pitch. But how would you match people I mean, when you were pitching this to investors in two thousand eleven.

Or two thousand twelve. Like why would somebody Why would people use hinge, when they ask you that question, you you would say, Okay, it's easier, but then you would say, I I I would say, Well, but how do you match people if it's if the if you're just one click? So that is where the complexity of the original idea came from. We would ask you questions about your friends that we would use for the algorithm. So we'd show you

Susie. I mean say Would you describe her as More Athletic. Or more

book smart or more uh something. Like and and you would you would answer that. And we'd like build up these sort of like personality profiles based on quizzes that we would give you about your friends. And so we would show you someone and then let's say you someone liked your friend Susie, tell her to join Hinge. And then you'd tell Susie and then she would join Hinge and then she would start answering questions about her friends and would unlock more people for us to have access to. And it was it was complicated and people were a little confused'cause they were like, Well, I'm joining us to find new people, why are you asking me questions about my friends? But That is how

It worked. In the early days. But but but basically originally you were saying there's gonna be no friction, no nothing to answer, but you did ultimately you did have to have a way to gather information about people, right? Yeah, but it was these fun personality quizzes about your friends as opposed to these like long. So it wasn't filling out a bunch of forms. It was just answering questions, like a quiz you would get. Exactly.

So W what kind of feedback were you getting? I mean it was still you still didn't have a whole lot of people using it, but was the feedback at least good? No. Not really. It was people were weirded out by it. People weren't used to it. Like people didn't understand why you had to answer these questions about your friends. They

You know, people were Nice. And they'd sort of nod their heads. But You know, it you could tell like they didn't really get it. Like and there's just no way that we're gonna be able to sell one you know, maybe at the end of like an hour long focus group we would have sold someone on like how it works and why it's uh why it's great. Yeah but

You know, we weren't gonna be able to do that with Thousands or hundreds of thousands or millions of people. When we come back in just a moment. How Justin decides to simplify Hinge and winds up building an app that A few years later.

He'll decide to pretty much rebuild. From scratch. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz and you're listening to How I Built This. And PR.

One more thing before we get back to the show, please make sure to click the follow button on your podcast app so you never miss a new episode of the show, and it's totally free. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This. I'm Guy Raz. So it's 2012, and Justin is trying to take the friction out of dating by building a site that's meant to help people meet friends of friends. But in order to do that He's gotta raise some cash. I was mainly talking to investors in

Washington D C. You know, there's some a few V C firms there and the amount of money we were looking for wasn't like Sand Hill Road Money. It was just. A few hundred thousand dollars.

Right. And I guess. You didn't have a whole lot of success with them. No.

Wisdom at the time was that There was a saturated market. You know, Match dot com and e Harmony owned it and it would be impossible to break into. Which I you know, I looked at it and I'm like, I am in my mid twenties. None of my friends use. dating websites. It is not saturated.

But they were saying no no match Mash at Come's owned By IAC, right? Yeah, and even if you get big, like they'll copy you. Et cetera, et cetera. I mean d did that in any way

discourage you? I mean, did you ever feel like God, I really Maybe they're right. It frustrated me. But it did not discourage me because I had A strong thesis that they were not

Dismantling. They were just drawing these other irrelevant analogies. And so A big part of being a great entrepreneur is being hopelessly idealistic, but ruthlessly practical at the same time. You really have to balance these things. And

I was being ruthlessly practical. I was like No like there isn't a clear market opportunity here. And so I wasn't discouraged because they weren't dismantling the argument. You're a year in. Now.

And It's really not getting much traction. And you're burning through cash. What can you You know, from not just getting depressed or or anxious about the possibility that this would just collapse.

Well, I mean I was definitely depressed and anxious. I I I I know, I was worried and I I was concerned with w the feedback that we were getting. And at a certain point it became pretty clear that like iterations weren't gonna get us there. And Around

Thanksgiving. This is two thousand twelve. We have like twenty five thousand dollars left in the bank at this point and we probably raised like a hundred and fifty or something like that. It's pretty clear this isn't gonna go anywhere. So I had this kind of crisis moment over Thanksgiving.

And I call the team and I'm like Let's start over from scratch. This needs to be Simple.

We gotta get rid of all these questions. And by the way. It's two thousand twelve, so the world's going mobile. And this needs to be a mobile application. And that was because

By twenty twelve, you yourself, presumably and all your friends were using iPhones? Yeah, it was starting you know, the app store was starting to become more popular. There were more companies starting to develop things for the app store. So it just felt like if we're the

Dating Company of the future. the dating company in the future is probably on mobile. And I and I think again the simplification It dovetailed with the simplification of the interface, which is that. We'll just make this thing really simple. And if it's really simple, it should fit on mobile. It's almost like a good forcing function to make it simple because you can't fit that much on a three and a half inch screen.

And so Let's just distill it down to like a photo. Age. Location A few interests.

and just like yes or no, do you like this person? move to the next person and if it's a match we'll let you know. So all right, so The idea here was to Just do a pivot and focus on

Building a mobile app. I'm trying to figure out how you did that though because In twenty twelve, building a mobile app was a lot more expensive than it is Today. How did you guys do that?

We used at the time there were these I don't want to get too technical but there was a way to essentially build a w website that looked like a mobile app. And behave like a mobile app that you could package as a mobile app. So

that is essentially what we did. What was your strategy in terms of getting it out into the world? So my one of my really good friends from Colgate had moved down to D C with me. His name was Bennett Richardson. He were he and I were original roommates when we first moved to D C And he was just very plugged into the social scene.

And so we just used his email lists and his and we were just like hustling to get people on and telling them to tell their friends. When we started with just IOS. And We When we just burned. I mean, we just we just worked all day and all night.

'Cause we'cause we had to be when we were gonna run out of money. which was February, twenty thirteen ish. And we took our last twenty five thousand dollars and we threw a two thousand five hundred person launch party. N D C We set the date and we just work backwards from that.

Alright, so so this party that you're talking about, you you Working on the app. And And I guess you decide we're gonna relaunch the company. With a party. We're gonna throw a big party, invite everybody we know.

And hopefully people would download the app. That was the idea. Well yeah, because the other issue was the cold start problem. And when you get one or two or three people coming in at a time, you know, in the early days I would sit and look at the logs. And I would watch someone would log on to the site.

And I would be like, oh my gosh. You know? And I would watch them. You know, they would like like someone and then pass on someone and then like someone, and then they leave, and it'd be like ah. I mean that's the trickle that was happening. And we were just like we've gotta get everyone on at once. Like no one's gonna stick around if there's not a lot of people on this thing. So we've gotta just like throw this hail marry. We've only got twenty five thousand left. We're gonna pivot to mobile and we're just gonna like get twenty five hundred people in here. They're gonna be like the coolest, trendiest people in DC, and they're all gonna see each other downloading the app. And so they're gonna think it's cool and they're gonna keep using it. This was in February of twenty thirteen. Where was the party? It was on a floor of an office building that was about to be built out as a new incubator that we were moving into.

touched it yet, so it was just this big empty floor and so we just used that. And I mean how did you entice twenty five hundred people to come to the party? Open bar We ha we had a liquor sponsor who just I think Tito's vodka just like shipped us a bunch of alcohol for free. We had like a DJ, we had an art exhibition, we had photo booths and a dance party. and everyone had to download the app to get in the door. Now Mind you, we we actually didn't Have

An app. Almost because we had submitted the app to the app store for approval and they were not giving approval. And we'd we submitted it like two weeks early. And it is the day before the launch party, and we still have not gotten approval for the app. So we're about to throw this like launch party. And We have no app.

Uh for people to download. I was just like I was trying to get in contact with people at Apple. I mean, who cares? Like we we're like nobody, but I'm like trying to reach out to the head of the app store and reaching out to any V C I've ever met and seeing if they have contacts there and just like begging and writing emails trying to get this thing approved. And I remember like the night before the launch party I just was like Curled up in a ball.

in the floor of our little office at this incubator. Crying. The last Two years have been for nothing. Because we're gonna launch this and we're gonna have no app.

And you know, we skirted. We had like Days of cash left. At that point. So what happened? I went to bed and I woke up.

in the morning and the app had been approved. Wow. Yeah. It was nuts. No explanation, never got an email back, never know why. But it was approved that morning.

Alright, so that night. To get into the door, you had to download the app, which meant That's twenty five hundred downloads. Yeah. Which is pretty good. How much of an impact did that?

Have. Did p did those twenty five hundred people? Presumably not all of them, but did a p percentage of them start to use it? Yeah, the next day we had like five hundred people log in to use the app. Who didn't have to you know. The

They like just came of their own volition. and use the app. And then the next day like six hundred people came. And the next day like eight hundred people came. And we are off to the races. I know this would eventually change, but initially Let's be honest. I mean

If you if you want to increase your chances of making money And there are a few places that, you know, will will do that. Sex. Maybe alcohol. Um a few others. That

You guys were kind of Let's say selling to to potential Customers, users. was like hey, this is a way to Hook up. Was that i in I mean initially part of the value proposition? Because I would think that

That would make sense. I mean that that's what people want. No. We were we were such a wholesome brand. We were friends of friends. Right. So people would equate it to like You know, a house party or a wedding.

And that was the kind of crowd and the vibe that you'd feel on Hinge. Whereas then maybe on the other ones it was a little bit more just like people nearby and random. And so it just felt a little bit more like a club. And so we sort of gain this reputation as the more wholesome, more relationship oriented

App. Right. And that was our niche. It sounds like you didn't really Change. your approach or your strategy too much. I mean you went too mobile, but

The value proposition was the same. Like this is a You know, friends of friends. relationship app. What explains I mean, is it i is it that that launch party alone that explains how you really start to acquire users.

Well I mean the details make the difference for sure. And those are pretty big details. Mobile only Simplified interface. Everyone's on it. It's very different than clunky interface. No one's on it. So yeah, I mean Those details definitely made it.

Big difference. So we started in Washington D C and then a wait list built up in New York City and then we opened up New York City and threw a launch party there and then a wait list built up in San Francisco and then you know, et cetera, et cetera. And presumably now you've got raise money. Um w was it now easier or investors now m more open to To giving you money.

Oh my well, one we had traction. Yeah. And two. We had Tinder. Tinder was exploding, and no one could invest in Tinder, because it was owned. By IC.

And so the only place that people could put their money. as a competitor tender at the time was basically us. Wow. And so we were We raised a like a few million dollars. Towards the end of twenty thirteen.

And then we raised a big round. of like fourteen or fifteen million dollars. At the end of Twenty fourteen.

And I was turning away millions. I was like I don't even know what like I can't I can't take any more, like we have to close the round. Like I don't even know what I would do with all this money, so we're gonna stop here. all of a sudden, like, there's t there's tender, there's Hinge, and there's some others, but You were very different from Tinder, because Tinder was swipe left, swipe right. Not that different.

The the apps really converged. Over time. They came similar. Yeah. You know, we are very focused on our competition and our competition release a feature and we release a feature and

Yeah, they became very, very similar. in their appearance. And we were still friends of friends. And so we had this different vibe. But Practically speaking, the apps were

very similar in how they operated. There was a um an article that came out in Vanity Fair, I think in twenty fifteen. It's called Like the dawn of apocalypse dating or something like that. Yeah the dawn of the dating apocalypse. Right. Yes. And um and it's mostly about Tinder, but there's quite a bit in there about a hinge and

There's a a paragraph in there and it it's and I'll read it to you. It says Marty who prefers hinge to tinder, he says hinge is my thing, is no slouch at quote racking up girls. He says he's slept with thirty women in the last year, and then he says, I sort of play that I could be a boyfriend kind of guy. in order to win them over, but then they start wanting me to care more and I just don't. Now Forgive me. I don't w want to sound judgmental, but like This guy just sounds horrible, right? I mean when when you

Hear that. And you saw that. And you saw what you created. Did a part of you just like I don't know. I mean yeah, you it was amazing. You built this amazing app and people were using it, but

I don't know, did did a part of you Kinda feel like This is not what I want to do. A huge part of me felt like that. That article so it was by Nancy Joe Sales. I mean, I went to go meet with Nancy Jo Sales in New York and I was like, I wanna hear your experience as you put together this article.

It was a really big Yeah, it was a pretty big gut punch. And that wasn't it. I mean, there were some other things going on in twenty fifteen where you know, our our growth was starting to slow a little bit. But I I do think more importantly it was like This just isn't the company that I wanted to build. It's

It's not it doesn't have the values that I want it to have. It doesn't have It's not having the impact that I wanted it to have. We're kind of just this copycat. app that has the same interface with like a small twist. We're just friends of friends. But it was still a a let's just say quote unquote like a meat market.

Yeah, I mean e again, it it was it had a little bit It just wasn't well designed for What we wanted it to be for, which is long term. I mean, I got the I started this because I wanted a girlfriend. I was starting this because I wanted that real connection. And it it was not

Designed for that. Yeah. And and again, like I I I have to be really careful because like I'm older than

A lot of people who use use these apps, or we're using these apps in this article and So it's like any any anything that is not familiar you you sort of see it differently, and I it's hard for me to talk about it without sounding judgmental, but like, you know, you read these stories like in that article on Vanity Fair, and it's like Just stories of young people just

talking about, yeah, I I've I've slept with eight people in the last like ten days and it's so easy because I think one quote in the article is like, Yeah, it's just a numbers game. Dating's a numbers game. If I went to a bar, I'd have to talk to a hundred different girls. I could just swipe all night from my apartment. And do better. Yeah. You know and

I thought it was a numbers game too. I I had a different objective in mind. But I I also believed when I created that version of Hinge that you know you just You just Go through enough people and then when you find The perfect one, everything's easy from there. And so that is the kind of ethos that I'd built hinge around.

Let's go back to something we talked about earlier in this in this interview about Kate this woman that you dated in college that you loved and wrote to her and almost was a seer in twenty ten and then she said no and now it's twenty fifteen. And There was a New York Times reporter who was or writer who was writing an a for the modern love. Uh she was writing an article for for the New York Times about Hinge.

Name Deborah Copagan. And uh so she meets with you. And twenty fift and you were like, you know, this young hot shot running hinge and it's raised all this money and doing really well, so she wants to do a story about About you.

And uh What happens during the interview? Yeah, so rewinding a little bit further, it was like end of twenty fourteen. And Deborah writes me this email. I didn't know she was.

She had downloaded Hinge and the very first person that came up for her, she had matched with. And started dating and fallen in love with. And she was like, I have to know how your algorithm works, like how the heck. Did I just download this app, hit a button, someone comes up and I match, and now we're dating. You know, I want to write a story about you.

So she reaches out to me and we go for this like pretty standard Founder interview about Whatever we I was talking about at the time. I could tell it was just kind of like it was an okay interview. And we're about to finish up.

Have you ever been in love? I was like, Wow Once a long time ago, but I didn't realize it until it was too late. And she's like, Well tell me the story.

And so we sat down I told her the story of Kate and me and this magical connection we'd had and the sort of twists and turns and the breakup and the drug addiction and the alcoholism and and me reaching back out and how In a way she'd sort of I realized, especially at that time, she'd inspired Hinge.

And I guess it I mean, it makes sense for a reporter to ask the guy behind Hinge, like How's your love life? Exactly. And you were not dating anybody at the time? No Again, there was someone that I was dating on and off during that period, uh, my sort of usual pattern.

But no, not really. And so she Shuts off the tape recorder. And she says I've got to tell you the story.

And She tells me the story of how she had this like amazing romance when she was younger and really felt this person was the one. She was a war reporter or a photographer actually in Afghanistan and They were supposed to rendezvous in Paris. It's like this very romantic transcontinental story.

And He lost her number and so they didn't meet up and then they lost tra you know this is like the eighties and nineties, so they didn't really cell phones. And so they didn't connect and she ended up marrying the next person she dated and he ended up marrying the next person he dated and then twenty years later she's researching a story, comes across his name. And reaches out to him and it's like, Hey, are you the same so and so that stood me up twenty years ago? they ended up meet like coming together and they met

And I think it just lit her up in a way that she was like I'm gonna leave my marriage. 'Cause this guy that she had.

S was supposed to meet in Paris. He didn't stand her up. They just both he lost her address and and she didn't know for twenty years. Yeah. Exactly. And so she left and downloaded Hinge and then had met this guy. And if it sounds familiar to anybody, it's because it was written in a Modern Love Article by Debric.

Copacan. She wrote this. In that in this article. But but but but anyway, so she tells you this story. And she she said, Listen, don't get me wrong, I don't regret my life. I love my kids.

But You still have a chance to be with the one. Well. And I was like

Lady. Uh nice to meet you. You're a little nuts. It's been Eight years.

since I've seen Kate. At this point. She's You know, engaged to be married, as far as I know, she still lives. Um

Another continent. It's too late. And she's like You won't know until you Try. And

Early February, we were gonna be throwing a launch party in London. And so about a week before the launch party I happen to run into Kate's best friend from Wellesley. And we're chatting. And she's like, I think you should reach out to Kate.

Mm. You know, at this point, by the way, I had written Kate an email every year on her birthday after she told me no. And some of these emails would be like You know, I'm over it. I hope we can be friends.

No response. I think my my last one in like twenty th Twenty thirteen had been something like I'll come over with an engagement ring. Please. It was you know, it like range depending upon the year and how I was feeling. Wow. And

After that one, you know, she had like defriended me on Facebook and yeah, it was like pretty clear that like that had sent her Yeah, that was it. So I after that I'd I'd let it go. And I was headed over to London and I'm like, you know what? Whatever, like I'm just gonna send

One last email. And so I I composed a really short note, it just said Hey Gonna be over in London. Weird to think I'm never gonna see you again. Would love fifteen minutes just to say hi and goodbye.

And I woke up the next morning to a response. Saying. Sure. I'll see you later. No.

Saying You're a terrible stalker. I don't live in London anymore. I live in Switzerland. My fiance is not a huge fan of yours. But I'm willing to chat, so He'll be away this weekend if you want to just like hop on the phone. I said great.

And then I Went to the airport and I bought a tick to Switzerland. And I flew to Zurich. And the next morning, which is a Friday, she thought she was like in another time zone and she was like

I'm awake, like whenever you're you wanna chat, we can chat. And I said Great. Because I'm going through customs in Zurich right now.

Wow. You know, I flew over there definitely having Deborah having inspired me to do something like big But I have to admit That's It had been eight years. I had changed a lot. I mean I'd gotten sober.

And uh HBS I'd like started a company. You know, it was like a lot had happened since I'd seen her. I assumed a lot had happened for her. And You know, a pretty big piece of me thought we would. maybe see each other and then laugh this off and Yeah.

Bring some closure to the whole thing, and I could move on, she can move on. So we met. In a cafe. And Zark. And five minutes in.

I was like I Don't know. What? I am doing without this girl.

the conversation started off and we ca obviously there was a connection still there and she was like, Well obviously I'm not calling off my wedding, I'm getting married in a month. Four hundred people coming from five continents. She's getting married in a month. Yeah. Invitation sand planes booked. And She's like, Well obviously I'm not calling off the wedding, but you know, we should stay in touch.

And then, you know, halfway through the conversation it was like, Well if I were gonna call off a wedding And we sat there for like Eight hours straight. I don't even think we even got up to get a coffee. And then by the end of the

Yeah. our like eight hour chat, she was like, I think I'm gonna call off the wedding. Whoof. I mean Wow.

I mean it's it's I have so many So many feelings and thoughts about it because Obviously this was meant to be. The two of you were but like

Wow, I mean that's That's a lot, right? I mean Shit. Both of you guys were making a huge decision to that was going to be really hurtful and painful to somebody. But clearly this person she was gonna marry was not

To right. match for her. But still like She was a month away from getting married and And I'm assuming that

When she decided to call off the the the wedding, she also kind of implicitly decided that she was gonna move to the To New York? To be with you. That's right.

Yeah, I move from A big chalet in the Alps to uh my three hundred square foot studio apartment. in Manhattan. So

Uh, and this'll lead us back to the discussion about Hinge, which is that You know, here I am thinking like, Oh my God, like I got the person the one. The one I've been dreaming about all like all this time. I you know, and then I flew to London and we did the launch party and then I flew back to the States and then she met me back in the States. And she moved in.

And it was amazing. For like Two months. And then you know, we're two people living together in a three hundred square foot apartment and we're like Figuring each other out.

And it's not perfect. All the stuff that I wanted to Run from the 'Cause I did. I mean there's a piece in me, like two or three months in, uh, that was like

Ooh, like Should I have done that? Uh that yeah, but there was like But I she'd like she'd given up a whole life, she'd come back and so I'm like, Yeah, I'm gonna stick it out. And we just worked it out together one step at a time and I realized That

It's not a volume game. Love isn't about Trying to go through enough people until you find your perfect puzzle piece and then everything's smooth sailing. Love is about.

The way you approach it. It's about vulnerability, it's about connection. You don't find The what? You create the one.

That completely overhauled my approach. to how I thought dating app should work. But but this is the thing, like again, like now

the thing that you had built. Was Let's say a lots of people were using it in ways that didn't lead to that. It was it was more like A hook up factory, and again. Please, anybody listening, I am not judging you. I am not being judgmental. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. That's perfectly fine if that's what you're looking for, but

Justin, that's not what you wanted to build. You didn't want to build a hookup app. That's right. But you were kind of pushed into that direction just because of the forces of of

you know, the economy and of what of what people wanted and of what investors wanted you to do and What you thought. Was gonna work. It was a lot of pressure. running that company at that time.

And we are really trying to keep up. With the competition. And the natural thing to do is to like be obsessed with your competition and look at what they're releasing and then they'd release a feature and be like, Oh, we have to have that feature And our users be like, Why don't you have this feature? And so then we would wanna like copy what they were doing. And we were always a step behind'cause we were Not as well funded and not as experienced.

So I mean not only was it not a limited values, it just wasn't. Kind of. succeed like it was just not that different or interesting of a product. And So yeah, t on both fronts.

I was frustrated. And I and I remember It was around Thanksgiving that year, it was around twenty fifteen. I was headed home for for Thanksgiving. I was about to fly back home to Kentucky. And I had lunch. Right before I left with Katie Han to Azar.

Chief Brand Officer. And she and I sat down. And I was just like Kitty like I just want it.

tear this whole thing down, start over. Like I I'm just like done. And She looked at me and she was just like What's stopping you? And I pause and I and I was like

Nothing. Is stopping me. What is stopping me? when we come back in just a moment.

How the effort to relaunch the app Would lead to a dramatic R and users. and how an 11th hour investment from a one-time competitor

would help revive the brand. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This? And PR. Hey, welcome back to how I built this. I'm Guy Raz. So it's the fall of 2015, and inspired by his rekindled relationship with Kate,

Justin decides once again to completely rebuild Hinge. We're gonna rip down this whole thing. Bigger deal now. We're not four people anymore, we're thirty. Mm. And we don't have twenty five thousand in the bank, we've got like ten million.

And I called up my COO, Sam. Talk to Katie. You know, I got them rallied around this idea that What we built. Is not gonna succeed, and we have to

We'll rip it down. Start over from scratch. And by the way, there's a market opportunity, so now it had been What, three or four years since the dating apps had launched.

when they w came out are now like twenty six, twenty seven, twenty eight. And they're looking for something more serious. So Let's start over. And let's build.

the app that's gonna be accessible to young people and have a cool brand. But is really designed. Two get people into relationships and off the app. Yeah, and by the way, is a great word of mouth. Like if people always ask, how did you meet? And if we're the best at getting people who are in relationships, we're the best at that.

And people will tell their friends. And as long as there are single people in the world, we'll do great. Right. And Like we're not thinking about competitors anymore. Don't wanna talk about it. I don't want anyone to have those apps on their phone for competitor research.

That was the biggest decision we made and we said we're gonna actually measure whether people are going out on great dates or not. We're still the only app that asks. Whether you went on a date and whether it was good. And that is our North Star metric period.

How are you guys gonna make money? How are you You know, I mean presumably charging a a a a fee to join, or monthly fee, a a per dating fee, like how how did how did it work? Well, that was one of the massive mistakes we made when we relaunched. So

We had this thesis that the serious dating websites are all what are called hard paywall businesses, meaning that In order to engage pretty much at all. you have to pay a monthly fee. But it's usually pretty expensive. It's like thirty nine ninety nine or forty nine ninety nine.

About. You're talking about the the the big sites like like eHarmony and match dot com and stuff like that. Yes, that's right. So we were like we're gonna create a hard pay law. app.

But it's gonna have a millennial size price. of nine ninety nine. A Mati. And that gave you like basically unlimited. No, just access to the platform. Gotcha. I mean, you couldn't even like we're just like we're the intention platform. If you're not willing to pay ten bucks a month then like

Yeah, go on go somewhere else. Right. And the other apps, by the way, were free, right? And the other apps are free. Yeah. But we had we were very idealistic and we're like, people will pay, like that'll be the model. That Was

A totally wrong. Thesis. So people were not willing to pay. And then we had to like give people free trials and then we had to and then by the t it was like it was such a mess. Because the the market f the market for dating apps is like sort of like Podcasts. Like people are used to free dating apps. all of a sudden you're coming out and saying you've got pay for it.

People like No, I'll just go on This other dating app. Yeah. And even more important than on podcasts, like There's network effects, so if there's not a lot of people on it. then people don't find it valuable to be you know, loses its value anyway.

And you figured this out because it was like crickets, like no one was Yeah, we got like Yeah, a few hundred thousand people to to sign up, but then no one really would h like when they hit the paywall, everyone was just kinda bouncing. So So we started giving away free trials like oh if you've had a hinge account before, you can have the first three months free. We thought like if we could just get the engine going, then like the new people would come in and pay. Because before that it was free, totally free, before you you kind of relaunched it.

Before that it was totally free. Yeah, we'd never made money. Up until that point. But now you needed to make money. You had real m investors and real money behind you. Yes, that's right. So what did you

How'd you salvage it? I mean, given that you this sounds like it was kind of a disastrous relaunch in that sense, even if the th other features were great. What did you do? Yeah, that was it was

pretty rough relaunch'cause we yeah. Yeah, and that whole period of time was tough, by the way. I mean Wait. I felt like Moses leading people around the desert, like we didn't know where like we were testing things and you know, we just like didn't know Is like the best thing, is the only thing to have the swipe feature? Is that the only way that a that a app can work? Is this like

What are we gonna do that's gonna be really any different, that's gonna be better than that? And we did figure that out. by the way, and we did come up with a very different way for people to interact that had very significant ramifications on how people behave on on the dating app. What

Tell me tell more about that. Well, one of the biggest changes that we made is we we did get rid of the swipe feature. And We had people fell out.

longer profiles. Still relatively simple, but you had to add six photos, and you had to add Three props. Which are responses to short questions that are designed to help you get into better conversation. But

More importantly, Is when you like someone on hinge. First of all, you like something about them. You have to choose something, like one of their prompts or one of their photos, and you can comment on it. And you send that like. And that seems subtle and maybe not that big a deal, but it has a pretty dramatic effect on people's behavior.

They are way more selective and way more thoughtful because when you're not just throwing people to the left and to the right, you actually have to think about what you wanna like about them, what you wanna say. It just makes people way more thoughtful and selective. And when you're way more thoughtful and select about who you like, our data is way better. About learning your tastes.

And If someone liked you, we would just notify you and tell you that someone so liked you and they liked this thing about you, so that there wasn't a strategy of just liking people to see if they liked you back. A lot of people will use the the swipe feature and they'll just like, like, like and they'll just see who matches with them. And then they kinda figure it out from there, which creates A lot of engagement. But it's a lot of noise and it frustrates people because a lot of those matches don't go anywhere. And so when you can actually like distill it down and it's not as engaging, it's not as noisy.

But It's a lot more substantive, there's a lot more signal there for people to latch on to. That was a very fundamental change that we made. So you you sort of offer up a Free version.

Right, like a freemium model, which a lot of these And basically Users can go back to using it for free, but if they wanna Want more features they gotta

There's like a a tiered. System. How does it work? Yeah, so now You pay

For certain upgraded features like advanced preferences or Unlimited. Likes. And I I have to assume it's a tough business, right? I mean

there are lots and lots of options, right? And and so a big part of of differentiating yourself is through the branding, like what you represent and now you guys were kind of really focused on being the relationship app, like, okay, Tinder's to the hookup app and Bumbles, you know women initiate but we're the relationship app. Is that fair to say? Yeah, that was actually I think our original tagline, but yes, it was very much branding around.

If you're looking to get off dating apps. This is the place for you. Let's talk about this this tagline that you guys eventually settled on. 'Cause it's it is It's hinge.

Designed to be deleted. Which I love. Yeah. Your Tag line now is hey. Download us, but really we want you to d to delete us.'Cause if you succeed on Hinge, you won't need us anymore. That's exactly right.

And I mean, that's how a dating app should be. And by the way, designed to be deleted. has two dimensions to it. Yeah, one dimension is

We are the experts in getting you into a relationship. We get this better than anyone. We research it. We spend all our time looking at how users behave and how do we get them on better dates, and that our whole company's organized around that. But there's also an element. Uh digital wellness to it as well.

Which is that we don't want you spending all day on our app. Like we don't want you stuck playing a game on hinge. And and this really grew out of my experience with addiction and and I Yeah, I don't use

social media. I don't I don't use Instagram. I don't really have an Instagram account or a Facebook account. I don't spend any time on it. Because it's Yeah, I didn't Escape drug and alcohol addiction just become a slave to my phone.

But Do do you think I mean given you know, given the the fact that you relaunched a few times and your tagline is, you know, we want to be deleted. Do you really think that Hinge is no longer the place or a place for someone who just wants a casual hook up? Like how were you able to now

change the behavior of people who went on the app if in twenty fifteen in Vanity Fair some guy was saying, Yeah, I love Hinge, it's I've slept with thirty to forty people in the last five months. Like how do you change That person's behavior. with the relaunch. It's just Two

Difficult. If you're looking for a hookup. It just requires too much effort. You asked about the You know, how do you aren't you gonna still have people like that person in the Vanity Fair article using your app? And

What we find is that when you have to answer all these prompts and have to send, you know, like a piece of content and Like if all you're looking for is a hook up, like this is way too much effort. t to do that. And so That's I think the difference. You know, we lose

more than twenty percent of our users during the signup process. On on other those other apps you hit one button and you're in and you're swiping and you're going. So if you again if you were like talking to a Silicon Valley social media investor, they'd be like, oh my God, you can't lose twenty five percent of your twenty percent of your sign-ups. Like, are you crazy? And for us it's a feature, not a buck, you know? It's like yeah, it you have to Finding relationship is hard. If you're not willing to put in the effort to fill out This Profile and answer some prompts and

Then You know you're probably not The you it's not the right service for you. Like we just want people who want meaningful relationships. Full stop period.

Like we just want to get amazing at that. Okay, so w when you did Go ahead and And do the relaunch. of Hinge in in twenty sixteen had

How did it get like how was it received? Well I mean. It was not a breakout success. Like when we did the relaunch in twenty thirteen. We got off to a rocky start. But

The numbers started to look really interesting and really promising. And so You know, my first instinct was obviously to like keep this thing going and go raise money. So I was back out in the fundraising game. Flying.

All over the country, talking to every VC, and now I could get in the door. of anywhere, right? I mean any V C firm would at least take my meeting. Yeah. No one will give me money. So I mean it was I mean I was begging. I mean I

Well I was offering valuations that would are in Embarrassingly low. Even your existing investors were were getting coal feet. My existing investors were willing to rally. To put together a few million dollars.

But A few million dollars is not. going to get us to where we need it to go. So I really wanted to raise a bigger round. And and I I tease that. You know, I said, you know, are we existing investors will put like three or four, but I need five to ten more at least.

Yeah. And I just I mean, I went everywhere trying to make this deal happen. I talked to everyone. I mean, it's amazing because you had already had a record of success. You'd launch this thing, you defy the

even putting this out into the world. You had achieved Quite a bit of success. With it.

You you know, millions of people had used it. And then And still You had a hard time raising more money. Well We made a decision when we decided to do the reboot.

That we were just gonna Not touch. The existing app. You know, this is a big debate. Like do we keep the app like on the rails and keep adding updates and kinda just keep it going? Or do we just let it go completely and divert all of our focus to this new thing. And we decided to do the latter. And so meanwhile the app had started to

go down and then the user numbers were going down and'cause we just weren't putting any effort into it at all. Where were you putting the effort in? into developing the new hinge. I gotcha. And while you were developing that, you weren't even updating the app at all? No. So it sat there stale for almost a year. Right. And I had this like one investor that was really holding out for

And I really thought we were gonna get across the line. And I remember the partner at the V C firm called me and She was like, you know We just can't get our heads around. We've never seen a company

That was cool. And then went away. And then was able to come Back. And wow. We just

Can't do it. And I was like Timberlands? You're totally right. K Swiss. Uh yeah. Yeah, exactly. It's just like fashion brands are not the same as acts. And I said fair point. Uh but our numbers were actually starting to look really interesting and if you had the right eye for it.

you knew that there was something here with the new version of Hinge. Yeah. You know, on the old version of Hinge, the biggest thing just to give you a sense, you had to send a thousand Likes. In order to get to a date. And on the new version of Hinge it was fifty. So a thousand to fifty. Twenty times more effective at getting people out on a date.

Hm. So uh I mean, uh I I think finally in two thousand eighteen, um You guys. Uh did?

Get an investment, pr a pretty big one, um, which was a a majority stake in the company from Match Group. Which is match dot com owns Tinder. So former competitors and then in twenty nineteen they um fully acquired Henry. Yeah. There are lots of reasons to to get acquired. I mean, obviously you've worked on this for many years and

it's a chance to kinda get a payout and to And not to worry about having to raise money every year or every every few months and and it takes and and now you've got a bunch of resources behind you. Are all those reasons why agreed to the acquisition. You know, funny enough, the way that the relationship with Match Group started is I tried to poach

their head of business development to come run finance it hidden I mean that's the level of audacity that I had. We had like three months of money in the in the bank and I'm trying to like steal their head of finance to come like run finance it Uh Henge. And he very quickly turned the conversation around and was like, Have you thought about, you know, maybe we can partner with you. Yeah. And

That started a conversation. And so The more time I spent around that team, the more I realize that the combination I think of our different perspective. on the hint side with their Wisdom.

Фінанчо Бак. It was gonna be a really good success. And then there's a reason I think, you know, you see that the the startups that have really taken off and grown in the dating space were all Started. In house.

Yeah. They were all I mean, Tinder was started within I see. Right? And and Match was owned by IAC and They had huge resources and marketing dollars and It's not surprising that they

They exploded in growth. That's right. And so it it sounds like the calculation you made was These guys have a lot of resource. Like It's like Procter Gamble. It's like you have a product and and Proctor and Gamble comes and says Look, we want to acquire you and we have this all this research money and marketing dollars and

could be a really attractive idea to go and and Work for them. And scary at the same time. Right. I mean for us like t

you know, Tinder was the enemy and so like, you know, it was like it was kind of a lot to get your head around that. And At this point I had friends who'd sold their companies and had agreements and It like Almost never works out. Yeah.

Yeah, the the the company goes sideways or the company goes up but then they the relationship doesn't work with the founder and they leave And so I was really conscious of that, obviously. So it was scary. But ultimately

I just thought. I wanted to do what's best for Hinge, the company. And I think this is it. W what did that allow you to do once you were acquired by match? Did that I mean and and then you sort of became more comfortable with this idea that

you could still run the the company the way you wanted it. Does it take some of the stress out of Of Hinge knowing that you know, the money is there, you're not you don't have to worry about firing people or Going on begging for money.

Does it Kind of. Destress you a little bit? Well, you're trading some stresses for new stresses. Right.

It's like a new relationship, you know. Yeah. Uh it's it's just like with Kate and me and you like hop into you know, you're now living together. And you figure each other out. And just like that relationship, I was really, really committed to making this one work and they were committed to making it work too. And we and we figured each other out and we have A pretty incredible relationship today.

That was twenty nineteen. And I think the the relationship with match really enabled you guys to to grow and to scale more. And then comes twenty twenty. Which

I imagine it's beginning of the pandemic. You must have thought. Oof we're in. Big trouble.

Nobody's gonna be going out on dates. Is that initially did you see a a steep decline in users? Yeah, it's been really volatile. Yeah, we planned in twenty nineteen our growth was really incredible.

And We planned a very big twenty twenty. You know, we're gonna grow the team, we're gonna like double the size of the team, we're gonna do all this stuff. And

the pandemic had ended, I think, initially, you know, everything went into lockdown. It was cold outside. And so we definitely saw Some shakiness in the business to say the least. But then as things started to stabilize and it started to warm up outside. It actually like completely turned the other direction.

Yeah. Because now people can't meet at house parties and Weddings and bars and yoga classes and gyms and all the other places that theoretically they would have met. Now we're the only game in town. Yeah. And I also think this period of time has been

People have been Rethinking their dating lives and rethinking their lives in general. And I think people have become more thoughtful and more serious during this time about their intent and what they're looking for. And so

Then when it started to warm up and and the numbers stabilized, then it was a huge boon to the business. W were there things that you guys features that you introduced During the pandemic that made it easier, like that you know made it easier for people to connect.

Virtually. The biggest shift that we saw. Was a shift. to people willing to try video dates. Because people

wanted to like spend a little bit more time getting to know you and decide whether it's really worth You know, risking getting COVID to meet up. And so video dating, like more than half of our users now have gone on a video date. And so that was something that. Seemed like a pretty clear Yeah, and also just less risky, right? You're just on a video call with somebody and

If it's weird or you're just not connecting, then yeah, that's it. You didn't you didn't have to leave your room. That's right. And that's why I think you know, when we talk to our p our users who have tried it most of them say that they want to continue to do it. even after the pandemic because

It just makes a ton of sense. I mean, it really is like Doing a quick fifteen minute screen before you go spend an entire evening and spend money and energy to go meet up with someone, I think will actually make this a much, much better experience if that becomes part of it. Yeah.

Um, th this may be a hard question for you to answer, but I'll ask anyway. Um, you're still pretty young, you're in your thirties. I think your mid to to late thirties and um You started this app which is a pretty big deal. It's a major dating app and now

Fully acquired by match. And you work for a match. I'm you're an employee. Um, so you're the CEO, but But presumably, you know.

Like any employee if you're not. if if they wanted to find a new one, they could, and if you want to move on, you could, and probably eventually you will. um and maybe start something new. Can you is that what you imagine doing? Like are do you do you feel like You've got another business in you? I don't know.

The answer to that question. And Believe it or not, I actually don't think about it that much. I have so much on my plate at hinge right now. I think the opportunity is so great. I'm actually very happy

And You know, I worked so hard. To build. This culture. And this company.

And this service and this brand, I mean it is so difficult. I am so invested. I mean, this is still my baby. And so Doing that over again sounds now that I know how hard it is. You know, when I started Hinge, I just thought, like, oh yeah, this is a two billion dollar company. This should take about a couple of years. We'll sell it. And you know, like if I had any idea how like many tears I would shed and how many nights I just like I

I don't know if I would have started it. And so it's hard. To imagine that again. And I think everyone finds their sweet spot. And I think some people are really good at the beginning and the starting and the ideation and pulling the resources together and getting something off the ground. And then some people are good at the scaling and some people are good at the operating. And

I've really enjoyed each part of the journey and I enjoy the challenge of the constant shift. And so I'm still very much on that. trajectory. Like I love this challenge of scaling from fifty to one hundred and fifty employees remotely while still trying to innovate and grow internationally. I mean that's that's a lot of Intrigue for me.

And Yeah. I don't need more. When you think about Justin what do you think about your story and

Everything that's happened and All the ups and downs and where you've come to. Um how how much Do do tribute to you know, your your hard work and your skill and

Due tribute to luck. I feel pretty lucky. I mean if you go through my story As and and going through it today has really reminded me of that. There are so many serendipitous twists and turns that had they not happened.

It's hard to imagine I would be Here. I would be somewhere, maybe. Yeah, there are a lot of really lucky things that happened to me. There are a lot of like really tough things that happened along the way. I mean having the company fail multiple times, like drug addiction, alcoholism, like there's all these like really tough things. And

When I look back, I think the hardest things, losing the girl, drug and alcohol addiction, the company failing. You ended up being my biggest blessings. If those things hadn't happened, I certainly wouldn't be here today either. And if there is skill involved. I think it's how we roll.

with the bad things that happen. You know, do we resist it and fight it and judge it and get resentful about it. Or Do we Lean into it.

learn from it and like keep showing up the next day. Uh. But that's it. I feel. Unbelievably.

Lucky. I choose to feel lucky. That's Justin McCloud, he's the founder and CEO of Hinge, which today has an estimated six million monthly users. And he and Kate are actually married, they had a baby, a boy named Oliver. And if you think their story sounds like a movie, it Kinda is, it became the inspiration for an episode of the Amazon Prime series Modern Love.

Which Justin found out was being filmed. Literally on the last day of production. And so I call Kate and I'm like So Never gonna believe this. But someone's filming

A show about our lives. Like Down the street. And So Kate and I like hop in the car. and we we like go to the location and we get out. There's like a hundred and fifty people there and they're filming

the two thousand thirteen hinge launch party. And Dev Patel is up on stage. And they put Kate and me in as extras. See hanging out with like Devin. Catherine Keener now. Well, we have I have like a photo with them from from the

But Dev doesn't call me that often. Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. Please make sure to click the follow button on whichever podcast app you're listening to so you don't miss a new episode of the show and it's absolutely free. If you want to contact our team, our email address is hibt at id.wondery.com. This episode was produced by JC Howard with music composed by Ramteen Erablui. It was edited by Neva Grant with research help from Dereth Gales. Our production staff also includes Casey Herman.

Hero Wakeem, Sam Paulson, Alex Chung, Carrie Thompson, Elaine Coates, John Isabella. Chris Masini and Carla Esteves. I'm Guy Raz and you've been listening. to how I built this.

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