How Justin McLeod Made Millions From Dating

YAHOO FINANCE - Mar 4 - McLeod is the CEO and founder of Hinge, which launched in 2012, after the then-college business student found himself single, and wanting to meet a new partner. "The idea originated back in 2011 when I tried to reach out to my college girlfriend and get her back, and she said no," said McLeod. "I looked at the options at the time, and nothing really appealed to me." In 2012, he launched Hinge for the first time - which he admits didn't garner a lot of traction. Hinge finished its first year with just a few thousand users and $32K in bank, leading him to make some changes. "What became really clear to me was that people were missing something that was accessible to people my age, but also something that was more serious," he said. He rebooted Hinge and started from scratch. He let go of half the team, threw out the code base and threw out the user-base. Hinge is now $7 per month, and requires users to go through a lengthy vetting process at signup to ensure they're matched with the best possible partner. The app generated $5.2M in worldwide revenue in 2018, and was downloaded 5.5M times globally according to Sensor Tower.