How rapid? Mint grew quickly enough to sell to Intuit for $170 million after three years in business. And when Mint eventually revealed its product-a tool that helped users budget their finances by gathering different accounts and balances in one place-the viral nature of the blog was key to the company’s rapid growth. “This created a welcome audience when their product eventually launched, and MintLife went on to become the number one personal finance blog on the web.”Įven in the early years, articles like “ Home Budget: Affordable and Cheap Dates” and “ How-To Guide: Paying for College” were perfect for that welcome audience. “They decided in the early days to invest heavily in building out MintLife … independent of the eventual product,” Rekhi writes on his blog. Since this demographic spent so much of their time online, Mint launched MintLife, a personal finance blog that would act as a significant money management resource for these young consumers, even though the company didn’t have a finished product people could buy. According to serial entrepreneur Sachin Rekhi, one of Mint’s earliest goals was to get the attention of their prospective customers: young professionals. They had to start from scratch.īut from the get-go, Mint had a target audience in mind and a plan for reaching that audience.

But for Mint, a digital personal finance service founded in 2006, there was no head start.

The following is an excerpt from Contently’s latest e-book, “ On the Money: How 5 Finance Brands Build Loyal Audiences by Investing in High-Quality Content.” To get the free e-book, fill out the download form at the bottom of this article.įor established financial institutions and capstone banks, building an audience can be a little easier if customers are already familiar with your brand and name.

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