Popl
Setting the Scene
In the whirlwind of networking events and business dinners, you cross paths with hundreds of professionals.
However, keeping track of these connections proves challenging.
The majority of business cards you receive end up misplaced.
Many of your LinkedIn follow-up messages go unanswered.
This week’s company provides a contact sharing and management platform for individuals and teams to track leads.
In a Sentence
Popl is a digital business card solution for individuals and teams to manage their networks and leads.
Individuals: With QR codes or NFC tap technology, users can exchange contact cards that auto-generate in the phone's contact app.
Teams: Catering to both enterprises and small teams, Popl provides a streamlined solution for tracking and managing employee contacts and ensuring customer leads are cataloged.
Bulleted Version:
- Think of Popl as the Apple Pay for networking; a simple tap transfers contact info into a team’s centralized CRM, with connections tracked much like those on a credit card statement. 🤑
The Basics
- Headquarters: Los Angeles, CA 🌴
- Employee Count: 31
- Investors:
Goat Capital, Urban Innovation Fund, Cathexis Ventures, Y Combinator, Ralph Gootee
- Funding amount: $2.5M Seed
- Business model: Premium subscription for individuals, B2B enterprise software for teams
- Early traction: $10M ARR 🤯, 3.5k teams as customers including Disney and Google, 1M+ professionals using Popl, 2k downloads daily
Due Diligence
WHAT WE LIKE
📈 Market positioning: Popl is well-positioned in the growing customer relationship management market, where CRM adoption is becoming the business standard.
⬆️ Traction: With a notable ARR of $10M, a remarkable 100% retention rate among enterprise clients, and 90% of customers being inbound, Popl's early traction demonstrates both PMF and scalability.
This is further underscored by top-tier customers including Disney, Google, and multiple NBA teams.
🙏 Unifying contact management: Only 10% of leads and 12% of paper business cards find their way into company contact lists.
Popl ensures that all connections are not only seamless but also integrated into company databases.
POTENTIAL RISKS
🔁 Employee turnover: While Popl Teams facilitates the acquisition of multiple users simultaneously, customer retention at the individual level may pose a challenge if a user leaves their current employer.
💻 Virtual shift: In today’s increasingly digital environment, where many events and professional interactions occur virtually, Popl's primary focus on in-person contact sharing may limit its applicability.
📊 Market competition: The digital business card and contact management market has several emerging players offering complementary solutions.
Popl needs to continuously innovate and differentiate its offerings to maintain a competitive edge.
Founder Profile
Jason Alvarez-Cohen, Co-Founder & CEO: Forbes 30 Under 30, previously a software engineer at Boeing, Ticketmaster and UCLA.
Nick Eischens, Co-Founder & COO: Forbes 30 Under 30, UCLA grad with experience in supply chain management and global distribution.
Comps
HiHello: Backed by K9, TenOneTen, August Capital, Foundry, and Lux Capital.
Blinq: Backed by Blackbird and Square Peg.
Linq: Backed by Alabama Futures Fund, Abstract, Mucker Capital, and Bill Smith.
Mobilo: Backed by TMT and DeepWork Capital.
dot: Backed by Techstars, WeWork Creator Fund, SBI Investment, and others.
Why Popl
By focusing on team and enterprise-oriented solutions, Popl has managed to position itself to outgrow other digital business card offerings. 🤝