Special Guest: Zach Schleien
In this episode we interview Zach Schleien a digital marketer, mental health advocate, and creator.
Zach pursued his Masters in Information Management from Syracuse University. He has started several companies including BeginU a platform for college students to find projects and work opportunities to develop their skills, Top Romp an online dating blog that reviewed hacks and apps for the modern dater, and LIFT Protein Muffins.
Starting LIFT was where he first dipped his toe into crowdfunding, raising over $5,000 in 30 days on Kickstarter. That Summer he worked for bitly as a Data Analyst. While in School, he co-authored the book, Hacking The Internship Process, which became #2 bestseller for internships on Amazon. One year later he sold his first company, Top Romp. Following graduation, he secured a job in IT with Johnson & Johnson. After his friend’s passing with mental illness, Zach dedicated himself to helping people with mental illness. He launched a $9,500 project on CaringCrowd (a crowdfunding platform for non-profits) with the funds going to the National Alliance on Mental Illness – NAMI New Jersey. He attained his goal within 2 1/2 weeks. The proceeds went to the NAMI Basics program, which supported 360 parents with children who have a mental illness. Zach wanted to do more, so he teamed up with his best friend David and launched the mental health Slack community, 18percent.org. With mental health awareness month coming up, he launched another project with the goal to raise $30,000 on CaringCrowd to support 600 families where at least one member of their family had a mental illness. The funds would go to NAMI El Dorado. He attained this mark within 3 weeks. Zach’s passion for helping people, combined with his love for entrepreneurship has helped him grow these companies and non-profits, allowing them to hit their crowdfunding goals.
In this episode we discuss his new dating app Filter Off. The app emphasizes getting to know the person, not the profile. Daters have 60 seconds to connect with their speed date through live video.
Filter Off: https://getfilteroff.com
Zach can be reached through his website at: https://zachschleien.com/
Please feel free to comment below and let us know what you think.
Geoff & Kira