Plug & Play’s CEO Corner: George Ruan, Honey

Plug and Play brings together retailers and start-ups who offer specific technology and expertise that can relieve merchants’ pain points. Customer Disruption highlights one of those start-ups in each issue with a brief Q&A. This issue, the spotlight is on George Ruan, CEO of Honey.



What does Honey do?

Honey makes a browser extension that automatically finds and applies coupon codes when users are shopping online. We are our users' last interaction before they click the buy button and can influence the purchase decision. We are now on more than one million browsers and growing rapidly.



How do retailers leverage your solution?

Retailers can make personalized offers to Honey users at a critical stage in the purchase funnel to increase the likelihood of triggering a purchase. Shopping cart abandonment is a major problem for retailers and a lot of it is due to consumers going off to search for a coupon. Honey keeps the consumer on the retailer's website and because Honey is the final touch point of our users before either buying or abandoning their cart, offers at this stage will provide a significant lift in conversion rate.



What is your background as CEO and/or what lead to the development of the company?

I am a serial entrepreneur with several exits. I started my first successful ecommerce company while I was in college. Honey was started to solve a pain point for anyone who has shopped online and has had to tediously search for and test coupon codes. It turns out this is an even bigger pain point for retailers. When consumers have a bad experience, they are less likely to buy. We want to fix the user experience of digital coupons and improve how the entire system works.