SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders
Ukrainian Volunteer Group Uses This App to Raise $200k/mo, Now Available to Western Customers
28 Sep 2023
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Guys, Tamara launched an app called Kila app, which is helping a very large democratic volunteer group in Ukraine raise hundreds of thousands of dollars per month to support the cause in Ukraine. She says, wow, if this is working so well in Ukraine, I want to take this prototype and create a version to sell to Western nonprofits or nonprofits in Ukraine.
europe and so she's looking to take this to market at 350 dollars per month with her three co-founders we will see what happens next so far fueled by a fifty thousand dollar loan from a friend and a fifty thousand dollar investment uh and a ten thousand dollar grant as well Hey folks, my guest today is Tamara Tajinska.
She's building an app called Kila, which is, and she's doing this because she was a communication strategist and manager from Kiev, Ukraine. In the past decade, she's been working on various projects from healthcare and politics to education and culture, both in the private and public sector. Kila is a supporters motivation management app. So take your volunteers, take your supporters.
How do you engage them? That's what she's working on. Tamara, you ready to take us to the top? Okay, great. Maybe tell us a story right now of a company that's using you to manage their volunteers, their supporters.
Actually, the story of Kela app began before full Russian invasion in Ukraine. And before that, it was just standalone solution for one Ukrainian liberal movement. And it was like a prototype. And just before the invasion, we decided to turn this standalone solution into SaaS solution for every democratic community in the world.
uh unfortunately or the wars paused a bit our work but we just you know pull ourselves together and continue to work and i'm happy to announce that we are going to launch the us and european market very soon and what it is about it is about the revolutionary way to communicate uh leaders and supporters should communicate differently and the main point is
to share the power with supporters, to see them not only like, you know, like your employees, but as your co-decision makers, as your shareholders and so on. So this is the main.
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Chapter 2: What is the Kila app and how does it support Ukrainian volunteer organizations?
How do you define traction today?
Actually, the prototype was used for three years, so it has some results. We saw how much the number of volunteers and supporters increased. For instance, for that organization, it was six times increasing from 2,000 to 12,000 users of the app. And the donation increased. The donation increased and just like from $18,000 to $40,000 per month. So we saw how it worked.
And after that, we got some grants for developing. And after that... How much?
Chapter 3: How did Tamara transition Kila from a prototype to a marketable product?
It was 10,000 euros. And after that, we raised some friends and family investment. It was about $100,000. So it allowed us to develop the solution. And now we are trying to... Because due to the martial law in Ukraine, the political activities in Ukraine stopped. So we cannot just sell it fully in Ukrainian market because it's forbidden to the rally are forbidden and so on.
So we have to focus on the market outside of Ukraine.
Understood. When you raise the $100,000, what percent of the company did you sell?
Uh, it, uh, it was, it was not like, uh, some of them it's like my, my, um, like my friend, we, we have, we have some specific like, um, agreements on it. It was not like for sharing some, some, some, uh, what's tomorrow.
What's the incentive. How did you get this cat? Your friend doesn't give you money for free. Do they?
Uh, it's no, he wants, it's, it's, it is a little, it's as a loan.
Oh, okay.
Yeah. It will be, uh, like, uh, it's, it's, it's alone. We will.
So you still own, you still own a hundred percent of the company then?
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