StartUs Presents: baningo

Image: baningo Launch Party

Describe baningo in 50 words or less.

baningo is a new web-service for bank customers which will radically change the inefficient, expensive and old-fashioned approach of banking.

We offer a simple and consistent personalized search, filter and recommendation system to easily find appropriate bank advisers and good offers – even for complex issues.

Why did you decide to pursue your own dreams rather than someone else’s?

When I was a child, my uncle had his own business. I spent a lot of time with him and saw him managing his business. He was responsible for everything and decided what is best for his company. At this time I learned a lot about running a business, negotiating with customers and leading staff. When I started working as an employee, I realized really fast that this has nothing to do with the things I saw spending time with my uncle. So I decided to set up my own business at some point! This was 15 years ago and the only thing I regret is that it took me so long to start.

7 years from now: How did your startup change the world?

Our vision is that every bank customer should get the best bank advice possible. Therefore it is often necessary to talk to more than one advisor to get a second or even third opinion. Imagine you want to finance a real estate. This is a really big decision and most people do it only once in their life-time. So you should better make sure, to make it right! baningo makes it really easy to find the right fit advisors and talk to them. In 7 years people will find their advisors on baningo.com without saying. In other countries as well.

In what ways do you measure your success and how do you make sure you don’t lose track?

Measuring success is one of the most important things to do. But first of all it starts with defining measures. As we are kind of a “double-sided” platform we need bank advisor profiles and customers, requesting bank solutions. So these are our main three measures. At the moment we are running a project together with WU Wien for setting up different ways to track the customers’ journey on our website.

Describe your typical working day from coming to the office to leaving it.

That is really hard to say. I think there is no typical working day and that is one of the best things in being self-employed. Every day brings new challenges. In general being self-employed and running a startup is like a roller coaster. It is up’s and down’s all the time. Sometimes even on the same day.

On a normal day I start working at home, checking Slack and mails, the traffic on our page and do all my social media stuff. After this I’m heading to the office or I have other appointments somewhere. Normally I am in the office between 9 an 10am. Really often I don’t have lunch before 14:00 pm. Usually I’m not going home before 7pm. And most of the time after dinner, I work again a bit at home.

Already pivoted? Did customers use the service like you imagined it in the beginning?

We just went online 6 weeks ago, so no – we have not pivoted so far.

Bootstrapped or financed: What fuels your startup now and what will in the future?

We just closed our first finance round with an investor. But our financial situation was really relaxed as we have already had some good sales and all co-founders also put money in baningo. These circumstances strengthened our position in the negotiations with the investor. In the future we probably will look for another round to finance the expansion to other European countries.

With ferocious competition and a booming trend to build new companies: How do you make sure you don’t get lost in the shuffle?

We try to be very fast in everything we do and of course, try to avoid mistakes as good as possible. We are lucky, as there is no direct competitor doing exactly the same thing as we do. Additionally, fintech is booming at the moment and users as well as banks are open to try out new, innovative services as baningo. baningo provides a clear value to banks (we bring them new leads) and customers (we help them find the right fit bank advisors). In my opinion customer value is the key to success.

What do you look for in team members?

Oh, a lot of course 🙂 They should be enthusiastic about what we are doing and strongly identify themselves with baningo. For me it is very important that a team member is reliable. If someone promises to deliver on time, we must be able to rely on that. Also important in this context is open communication. If you are not able to finish a task, just tell us. Another important thing is an absolute “get-things-done” attitude. I know this is common said, but it is really important. Good ideas are great, but they are nothing without execution. Last thing: I really like people who go out of their comfort zone. Great things never came from comfort zones.

Why would a talent join your team?

Because we are a fast growing startup in an interesting and really big market. Almost everyone is a bank customer, but almost nobody likes dealing with his or her financial problems. We work exactly on this topic. Make banking easier, faster, and just cooler. We provide solutions for complex financial problems.

What was your most memorable moment so far?

There were so many milestones within the last 10 months that this is hard to say. Getting the idea, decide to focus on exactly that and nothing else, finding a CTO, getting the name and logo, finding the first team members, getting our own office, getting business cards, sending out the first newsletter, finding the first paying customers, founding the company, getting online, seeing the first users coming on the page and liking our product, getting funding by an investor, seeing your picture the first time in a newspaper… these are all memorable moments and there is no need to rank them 🙂

What advice would you give fellow founders for their startup?

Prepare yourself by reading the right books and blogs. Go to events to get together with startup people and grow your network. Maybe do an internship in a startup for a couple of months to learn how to get started with your own company. But the most important thing is: be brave and start! Many people are just talking all the time about startups, their ideas and dreams, but they never start their own project. That’s the most important thing in my opinion, you really have to turn thoughts into actions.