Singlebrook talks with Daniel Vallejo, CEO & Co-founder of The Mutual, about how The Mutual’s Perks platform is helping to close the “Green Gap”. We discuss some of the challenges faced by a new startup, including finding the courage to leave a great job to become an entrepreneur. According to Vallejo, “the other side is a lot more fun.”

Singlebrook: Please give an overview of what your organization does.

DPV: The Mutual is a social enterprise that rewards people with Perks from great brands for donating to environmental charities. The idea came from a study by OgilvyEarth (where I used to work) which found that while 82% of Americans have good green intentions, only 16% follow through on them. This group of Americans, described as the “Green Gap”, represents 66% of the U.S. population, or 156 million Americans who are 18 or older. This intent represents potential energy that could be converted into positive environmental action. The gap between intent and action exists because currently being green is not easy or aligned with our self interersts. The Mutual makes creating an impact financially rewarding and near effortless. It’s our way of converting that unfulfilled intent into positive environmental action.

We have been called a “Groupon for Good”, but we prefer to think of ourselves as a rewards-based subscription for good (like AAA, AARP). The Mutual’s Perks platform is a simple enabler for social responsibility that could be a disrupter to the daily deal, corporate discount, and rewards-based action models. We’ve redesigned the traditional coupon and applied it to a model akin to a balanced ecosystem in which each of the participants (individual members, partner businesses, and cause partners/non-profits) gives to and takes benefits from one another.

Singlebrook: How does The Mutual’s “Perks” web platform work?

DPV: To our individual members, we offer membership into a consumer-based Perks website. Membership is as little as $10 per month, 80% of which goes to the environmental non-profit of the member’s choosing. Unlike daily deal sites, our members get unlimited access to Perks, which include both traditional discounts as well as experiential rewards (like priority reservations and early access to tickets) that don’t affect the business partner’s bottom line. The Mutual’s platform empowers members by giving them real time data on the impact they are creating.

To our business partners, we provide access to a universe of consumers more inclined to shop with them because of the Perks they are providing. We offer freedom from daily deals. We don’t enforce outrageous discounts and require a fee or revenue split on top of that. We enable our businesses to design their own Perks to help hit their unique businesses goals. Their participation in The Mutual attracts new individual members, which in turn sends more money to our charities. We provide reports to all partner businesses on the types of causes their customers support. This knowledge empowers partner businesses to realize the economic upside in sustainability.

To our cause partners, we foster ongoing micro-donations from a segment of individual donors that might not otherwise donate. We provide our cause partners with additional connectivity with new and dormant donors. We aim to democratize the ability to do good, so it is within reach for businesses and individuals at all income levels. We may not be the final or only solution but we are creating a wide-scale impact now.

Singlebrook: What have been a few of the biggest challenges you’ve faced in launching and growing this venture? How did you handle them?

DPV: One of the first challenges was finding the courage to quit a great job and jump into the unknown. It’s scary to leave what you know, but if you believe enough in an idea and you have a decent gauge from others that it’s something people will like, the other side is a lot more fun. Once you have a concrete idea and can see the path forward, just go for it.

An important and challenging step was finding a great CTO and partner. It’s hard enough to find top tech talent when you’re competing against Google and Facebook; try to do it in NYC, where there are even fewer developers, and it gets really tricky. I went to every tech meetup I possibly could. Developers hear lots of good ideas, but if you show them the makings of a product they can run with, it’s an easier sell.

Acquiring users or customers is the biggest challenge for any business. It’s important to have your core marketing strategy perfected. Beyond that, we’ve handled this challenge by being creative and not being afraid of exploring complementary channels and partnerships.

Singlebrook: What are some of the technology tools that have been most useful to you and your organization?

DPV: Being a young startup with limited resources, cloud hosting solutions have saved hours of work building infrastructure, saved a lot of money over buying dedicated hardware and allowed us to scale quickly. On the mobile side, we are currently looking at phone gap solutions so we can make our product available on multiple platforms and only maintain a single codebase.

Social media has been fantastic in helping get the word out at no cost. Social media is good for generating awareness higher up the funnel, but it’s not a great conversion tool. For example, Facebook and Pinterest have helped us in getting lots of followers and “likes”, but not in converting users. Certain apps are better for conversion. Foursquare has enabled us to push Perk notifications to users when they are near a partner outfit. We’re also using Foursquare to create local, in-person challenges, where our members visit a certain set of partners and unlock special one-day Perks. We’re using this to gamify the UX.

Singlebrook: In what ways do you collaborate with other organizations?

At our core, we are a community; we work with people, businesses and non-profits. If we do not have the participation of one of these parts, the system doesn’t work. If we have the participation of many, we create more value for our stakeholders and a whole lot of good for the planet. So collaboration is a core tenet of our model.

Advice we received early on about creating alternate channels to grow our user base and develop complementary products has been some of the most useful we’ve received. This advice encouraged us to go out and look for synergistic organizations to partner with. For example, we are partnering with 2nd Nature, a mobile app that recognizes individuals who share and discover new environmentally friendly and socially responsible products and lifestyle choices. Going forward, individuals can join The Mutual via 2nd Nature and receive access to our network of Perks by maintaining a certain score. This model is helping people uncover easy and gamified ways to improve their own EcoSocial choices and influence the choices of others.

The Mutual has also partnered with Launcht, a crowdfunding platform for social projects. Because Launcht donors have already chosen to support socially conscious projects, The Mutual offers Launcht members a free month of membership and a reduced membership rate.

Singlebrook: What advice do you have for aspiring social entrepreneurs?

DPV: Share your idea with people--don’t feel like everyone will try and steal your idea. Feedback at the idea stage is invaluable. It enables you to make improvements before you build anything. Don’t try and create the final, perfect product for launch, it doesn’t exist. Push out light products, get feedback and iterate. Listen to user feedback, but trust your own ideas. Network like crazy--people in our space love to help! If you don’t love what you’re doing, don’t bother. Finally, don’t ever forget the social part. We are here to do good. 

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