Insight
Zeffy's zero-fee model prevents incumbent copying due to their high-margin addiction
“Other fundraising platforms are structured with higher cost and sales motion. They have a higher margin on each non-profit, so they do more money on the fundraising, but it's also, I think, An addiction because now they are structured with higher costs, more s…”
Insight
Raising unneeded capital distracts founders and risks adding misaligned board members
“It's actually a very conservative strategy because you'll take this money that you don't need, so you're preventing a risk that you don't know is necessary. But you do two things. First, as a founder and funding team, you spend a lot of time raising money and …”
Disclosure
Zeffy exclusively hires inexperienced fresh graduates to maximize their learning curves
“For junior, we like them to be just out of university. So the more junior is the role, the less experience we want because we want to Get them at a role where they will learn as much as they will bring. So maybe it's not really clear how I'm saying this, but i…”
Insight
François de Kerret: Zeffy's tip-based model thrives in North America's tipping culture
“And we thought, okay, but if it works in Europe, where people leave maybe one euro for a 200 euros meal here in Quebec and in America, it will work for sure. And it's exactly what nonprofits are asking for, a free platform.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zeffy acquired 30,000 non-profits by scaling Google Ads to $500,000 monthly
“And those three years, well, a lot of things happened that if I'm summarizing, we just scaled Google Ads from 5000 dollars a month to half a million a month, and it just brought traction and 30,000 non-profits.”
What-if
François de Kerret believes Zeffy could have reached profitability after one round
“Probably I wish we could probably even have done it after one round if we were more serious in this focus.”
Insight
Pre-seed founders should seek advice from Seed founders, not Series D veterans
“When you're pre-seed, just spending time with seed or series A founder to understand how they build their motions. And I will spend more time with them and less time with, I don't know, series D advisors, outstanding advisors who don't really know this.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zeffy hit $40,000 monthly revenue processing $2M in donations by July 2021
“And then I remember in July, 20, 21. So now it's like three years into Zephi. We do approximately two million donation amounts, something like this. And our revenue, I think is in I think it's in the 30, 40,000 dollar a month.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zeffy hit profitability eight months post-seed by negotiating Stripe volume discounts
“First thing in our plan, when we raised the seed, the idea was to become profitable after eight months, but actually we didn't think we would make it. And we made it because of the margin that increased radically when we had volume and we didn't know we would …”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
François de Kerret says Zeffy grows 200 percent annually without capital constraints
“So we are doing 200% yearly growth and money is not limiting us.”
Disclosure
Zeffy co-founders vowed to raise $50,000 by Christmas 2018 or quit
“And we said, let's make sure we raise 50 K before Christmas for non-profits or we stop.”
Disclosure
Zeffy funded its first sales hire with a $15,000 advisor loan
“We had an advisor Was really excited by this vision and this model. And he'd said, okay, let me lend you 15,000 dollars. You recruit her and she will pay, pay it back. Not her, but us as a company when the sales scale And so we recruited her as the sales”
