The latest UKTN Podcast is out now. This week’s guest is Sho Sugihara, co-founder and CEO of Pave, a fintech company that helps people improve their credit score.
The London-headquartered company provides a free service that connects with users’ bank accounts to scan for recurring subscriptions and bills. Its app then provides alerts to encourage repayments. It also provides a paid service with additional features, which helps those with poor credit ratings rebuild their score.
Founded in 2017, Pave has grown to over half a million monthly subscription customers.
During the show, Sugihara tells UKTN Podcast host Mark McDonagh how his time working at an NGO in Brazil helped provide the inspiration and lessons to launch Pave – and how he was almost electrocuted in the shower.
The Pave founder also recalls the “number one lesson” he learned from a female entrepreneur mentor in Brazil. He also talks about signing up as a Deliveroo rider to conduct market research on people who found it difficult to access credit.
Sugihara describes this experience as “super cringeworthy” but that you “get used to it”.
There’s a big difference between market research for consumers and B2B, and Sugihara delves into the main contrasts, explaining why the community-sourced feedback popularised by the likes of Monzo “didn’t quite work” for Pave.
On the marketing front, Sugihara discusses creating a successful marketing campaign for TikTok, including a video of an employee talking about the Pave app.
“It looked like it had been shot on a Nokia – real low production quality. But it worked,” said Sugihara.
Elsewhere on the show, Sugihara shares his thoughts on the booming buy now pay later industry, and explains how it can benefit people “when used responsibly”.
You can listen to all this and more in the latest episode of the UKTN Podcast, and catch all previous episodes here.
Don’t forget to subscribe to the UKTN Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you catch your favourite podcasts.
The UKTN Podcast is sponsored by Uncapped, which provides no-equity investments from £10,000 to £5m to the founders and companies who are changing the world.
The post UKTN Podcast: Pave founder on understanding your audience appeared first on UKTN | UK Tech News.
