Meet the founders. 🤓
Markus Stoll & Fabian Ziegler
"Stay hungry, stay foolish"
Mission: Collego is the social networking platform for interest-based employee networking and long-term employee retention in companies.
Too many people are unhappy in their jobs and teams. Many employees find it difficult to connect with teams and colleagues. With Collego we want to promote friendships among colleagues and fun at work! New employees should be integrated more quickly and contact barriers broken down.
🔝 List up to 3 of your greatest achievements to date.
🏆 Invest2Grow Award 2021 - Best Startup among 200 participants from the DACH region
As part of a startup pitch event, we were able to prevail against 200 other participants. The pitches were broadcast live and the winners were determined by vote.
💰 Working MVP version of the app with paying customers
Both various positive conversations with interested parties make it clear how much appeal the platform has, how great the need really is. Having direct paying customers who are actively using the product in such a short time is confirmation for us that we still want to go all the way with Collego.
🚀 Onboarding allygatr as an investor after almost 2 years of bootstrapping
Everything is always better in a team. True to our motto, we are looking forward to moving forward with professional help. It was important for us to find an investor who fits us exactly and shares our "spirit". It couldn't have worked out better for us with Allygatr.
Friendships with colleagues and fun at work. This is what we want to bring to companies with our software! Our vision is that employees enjoy working and are highly motivated, so that colleagues become 'collegos'. 👬👭👫
💡 The most important lesson you have learned so far?
Have a good team that will help you persevere even in difficult times, especially in the beginning. Resilience is the most important quality for founders.
A good network. Many people are willing to support without expecting anything directly in return, because they rely on people to offer them help or support when they need it.
You have to dream big to not let it get you down. The road to a successful start-up is rocky, it depends on perseverance and the vision of where you want to end up in a few years.
And last but not least: Not everything has to be perfect in the beginning. Strategic focus in start-up hustle is everything; first build the business base, then merchandising and co.😉
💪 Your biggest challenge so far in founding a startup?
Building internal IT team. Developers are in high demand. However, we are convinced that we will soon find more people who share our passion and who can identify with our values.
Knowing what you are working for and hopefully improving the lives of many at work! The talk of "owning your own baby" is amazingly true. The passion is yet another.
We have now been able to build our working day 100% the way we think it should be and what we are most comfortable with. For example, we believe in quality and not quantity, which for us starts with the hours we work per week. If you know how, you don't have to assume a 50-hour week to succeed, even as a start-up.
The idea is that our product will make life easier for companies and employees in the near future. We are convinced that we are doing something good and important for the world of work, that we can improve it.
📚 Is there any advice you can give to other founders?
Positive thinking and good mentors. Think rather too big than too small. Don't let it get you down if something doesn't go the way it should, if you just look at it from a different angle, it will open up new opportunities or learnings that you can use again.
🐊 How did you find out about allygatr?
An acquaintance had made the first contact with Ben.
✌️ If you had to choose: What is your No. 1 favorite leisure activity?
Sports! The common No.1 is probably skiing! In addition to day trips, we have already been on various overnight trips to more distant ski resorts and there is no end in sight. Maybe we love apres ski just as much as the actual skiing 😉🎿⛷️
EMPLOYEES ❤️ COLLEGO