Yoller: the super Social app for realworld friendships

Organising meet ups with friends has never been easier, thanks to the ingenuity and slick user experience of Yoller, the free app that cleverly cuts out the faff. It’s a simple new way to get your friends together doing something fun, as a central hub to communicate from, with your friends nudged to vote on clear options proposed: what, where, when and who’s coming. Yoller is available on iOS, Android and the web, and has been named App of the Day in 140 countries by Apple and one of the best apps for quality time with friends by Google.

Yoller is great for arranging food, sports and of course nightlife. The app gives you one place to pull together all the essential info, then lets your friends make suggestions so you can agree the details together. Yoller replaces Doodle polls and off-topic Whatsapp groups – hooray, organising stag or hen do activities or weekends away is easier than ever.

The brainchild of this social-tech innovation is Louise Doherty, herself a super-social organiser, seeking to cut down on endless group chat, polling tools, email chains and sometimes spreadsheet involved in getting groups together. Yoller wants to make, “seeing your friends, as easy as ordering an Uber”. Doherty is a marketer by background, leading digital engagement projects for big brands, before turning tech entrepreneur herself. As a frequent group event organiser, she faced a myriad of pain points that needed to be tackled head-on. 

The simplicity of Yoller is very impressive. Moving parts are well structured, each dealt with in sequence, with a deep understanding of how to lead the group in these circumstances. “I find it the most fascinating problem in the world,” says Doherty, who believed a big part of Yoller’s success is understanding the psychology of group dynamics. It is important to pin people down; getting social events confirmed in the diary is now a breeze. Decisions are made collectively, through a rapid evolutionary process of multiple choice. Unresponsive friends get auto-nudged. Pushy friends can’t over influence the group. There’s a democratic quality to it, that works fluently.

Yoller raised seed capital from the startup accelerator Techstars,  grants, crowdfunding, angel syndicates, and Corporate Venturing, with VC funding as the next likely step for the company.

As an avid fan of simplifying complex processes, it’s no wonder, Yoller’s founder picked SeedLegals to simplify the company’s investment process. Yoller has 530 Crowdcube investors: “We would really struggle to manage our investor base without SeedLegals. I can now email them all personalised legal documents in one go, and it will all be executed digitally.”

Founders have a clear to-do list on SeedLegals: a framework for getting funding plans over the line. The founders build a term sheet sequentially on the platform, with clear data on how other startups have done deals previously, and why each term should be considered. Execution culminates in digital signatures of a new investor agreement, before the platform administrates the Company Secretarial work; distributing new share certificates, articles, founder/investor agreements, SH01 forms and SEIS compliance documentation to Companies House and HMRC. The Cap Table is live on the cloud, automatically synchronising with any agreed deals. All of this saves startups time, and hassle. With it being digital, Doherty notes,“the other benefits are that it is far cheaper, and there’s less chance of mistakes being made. You can in fact uncover mistakes you never knew you had!”

“It helps you to create the documents you want – instead of getting an off the shelf one. You can choose what is right for your business and customize it for your own needs, but you can’t make any massive errors because it is largely multiple choice. It’s really empowering to be in control of your legal documents and to learn in the process.”

Having the flexibility to organise different kinds of investment deals, for different types of investors, has been very important for Yoller:

“The reality is you’re on a journey; fundraising is so much about the narrative. The SeedLegals platform allow you to tell the right story at the right time with the right legal documents for different types of investors.”

Startups are like Yoller are showing how founders can be in control of fundraising at every stage , instead of binging on large fundraising rounds every 18 months. Large rounds consume bandwidth and increase risk on cash flow. You can now agree to a funding plan with investors online, whenever you are ready. It is interesting to see how both SeedLegals and Yoller offer users hyper-efficient tools and frameworks to get deals done digitally… With the help of new technology, we can cut out all the faff.