Like Chart.ly, I might’ve come up with the idea, concept and inner-workings of Investimonials, but I certainly did not have the time to add all the products and deal with all the brands and customers (TIMalert subscribers and other subscribers to my new subscription plans take up more than enough of each 24-hour period), that’s where Gregg Morton comes in:
Out of nearly two dozen interns in 2009, Gregg proved he was head and shoulders better than the rest and so I gave him a decent chunk of Investimonials LLC and hired him to run Investimonials.com. Hey may be young, but he is wise beyond his years and ore importantly, he’s one of the hardest workers I’ve ever met, and my standards are ridiculously high…
Learn from him and contact him at gregg@Investimonials.com if you have ANY site questions, comments or suggestions…we’re only a few weeks old, but we have a ton of upcoming features planned to help make finance more transparent & beneficial to readers like you!
1. What’s your background?
I will start with the basics. I was born in Powder Springs, GA, which is just right outside of Atlanta, and grew up in Northern Kentucky in a very small city called Union. I attended Larry A Ryle High School where I played on the Varsity golf team for four years and played in the one man position. I am not playing anywhere close to as well as I was playing in high school. School then, and work now, did and does not provide me with any time to practice. I would say I am still playing to a 6 or 7 handicap.
While in high school, my best friend, Giovanni DeVia, and I wanted to make some cash. We did not, however, want to flip burgers at our local fast food places. So we sat down and discussed ways to make money on our own terms. I was a computer nerd, mainly hardware, and Giovanni was a great salesman, so we decided to start up a small computer business called MoVita Technologies. MoVita was a custom computer, network design, and digital surveillance firm that serviced retail and commercial clients. We owned and operated MoVita for 3 years and had to break it up once we graduated because we were going to different schools.
I attended college at the University of Kentucky and graduated this past December with both a BBA in finance and a BSBE in economics with a minor in international business in 3.5 years. While at UK, I worked for Western and Southern Financial Group as a Licensed Representative in the financial services industry, co-managed an equity portfolio of $300,000 for the Tennessee Valley Authority, and was very active in my fraternity Delta Sigma Phi: Theta Mu chapter.
Upon graduation, I took a job in New York City as a junior analyst at Citigroup in their Global Capital Markets division. In addition to my work at Citigroup, I serve as Director of Brand Management for Investimonials.com. If you ever need anything or have suggestions in regards to Investimonials.com, please send them my way! I will be more than willing to help you out and we take suggestions seriously since we are in the early stages. I have recently been given the great privilege of serving on the financial advisory board for Daleela’s recently launched charity, Care for Kenya. Please visit her site at careforkenya.org and get involved with a great cause! On top of everything, I am trying to further my education in capital markets and investment management by pursuing the CFA designation. I am studying for the CFA Level I exam and will be taking it in June.
2. Explain what Investimonials is.
Investimonials is THE place for users to find and write reviews on anything related to finance. Our current site features roughly 3,800 products and 3,000 reviews to help users find the best products out there. Our mission with Investimonials is to really expose those products that are providing value to the consumer, and those that are just simply scams. We are out to become the standard in product ratings for the financial industry and with the help of our users we can achieve more transparency in the industry!
3. What problem does Investimonials help solve?
Investimonials help consumers wed out the vast number of products out there that charge hundreds, thousands, and even tens-of-thousands of dollars that literally provide zero value to consumers. I knew prior to starting Investimonials that these scams existed, but I had no idea the magnitude or depth. I personally compiled the database for Investimonials, which required me to visit 3300 different products websites and the things that are out there are shocking. We aim to help users help themselves by providing a central location for users to help each other find the best and worst products out there. When firms see that they have terrible ratings on our site it will provide them with incentive to improve upon their product, which helps the industry out as a whole.
4. Any upcoming features?
We have some exciting new features in the pipeline that will be ready for launch in the coming weeks. Here are a couple coming very soon: As a user, you will be able to subscribe to product feeds to stay updated on what others are saying about a particular product. This will display in your account page, very similar to an RSS feed, to consolidate the products that you care about in to one page No more digging around the site to find what you are looking for. We also will be introducing a ‘portfolio’ feature allowing users to build a portfolio of products that the user subscribes to or uses to help others understand what products work well with each other. This will allow for further customization of a users account page making it that much more useful to all users. We look forward to rolling out these new features as our newest addition, the commentators section, has gotten a great response so far. Please visit Investimonials this minute and post reviews about your favorite and least favorite commentators!
5. Name 3 things nobody knows about you
Wow, this is a tough one. I guess one thing to start out with would be that I play the cello, a very strange instrument choice, I know. And yes, the stringed instrument that is between the viola and bass. It was something that I picked up in middle school, but, no, I was not a ‘band geek.’ I still play from time to time, however I am nowhere near as good as I was back in middle school.
A second ‘no one else knows about me’ answer would be that I was a skater back in my elementary and middle school days. I used to skate vert, half-pipes and the like. I had a pair of K2 ‘Backyard Bob’s’ for any of you skaters out there. Could I still drop in to a half-pipe today? Probably not, but I would be willing to give it a shot.
The third, and final thing, that no one else knows about me would have to be that following my inline skating career, my friends and I started a Razor scooter team, became sponsored, and were an authorized dealer of Razor scooters when they first came out. Not sure if any of you remember the first time that these things hit the market, but everyone had to have one. There were three of us on the team and we we sold to the kids in the neighborhood and at school. I would say that the best part about that deal was the free scooters and Razor apparel we received. Decent business due to the perks, but as with any fad, it faded quickly.
Posted in Interviews, Investimonials