This article looks at the main changes that have occurred in the remote working and sub-contracting or outsourcing sector. It’s an important sector for small and emerging businesses to be aware of and keep up to date with the latest changes, so continue reading to find out more.
Increase in tech and blockchain options for work
Web3, crypto, and blockchain tech and software have become some of the major areas of work and employment in the current age. If you’re looking for contract work or to work from anywhere in the world, then the Web3, virtual and augmented reality, and cryptocurrencies and NFTs are those sectors that are growing fastest at the moment.
More ways to pay and reward than ever before
The manner in which employees can be paid and rewarded has changed forever. Whether they are rewarded with a unique NFT, or digital assets that hold value in the company, or are paid in crypto, employees now have access to a whole new way of being paid or rewarded for going over and above. There is a detailed explanation of the NFT sector provided by the professional platform OKX, and it is advised that those who are interested in such digital assets as payments should be as informed as possible. As a remote or contracted worker, it is important to look for additional sources and forms of income wherever you can, and being able to diversify the manner in which you are paid will go a long way to increasing the job possibilities that you are ready for.
The metaverse is making a massive change to where we can work
The metaverse is here and with the right tech, virtual and augmented reality has changed not only how we work, but also where we work. The jobs that may have required face-to-face contact have gone virtual, and as such, there will be a whole new range of jobs (and a new way of doing the jobs of old) in virtual or augmented reality. Freelancing and remote work has expanded exponentially as the metaverse becomes a reality. As headsets and the tech to implement a workable version of the metaverse becomes more real it is changing the nature of contract and remote work forever. It may be remote, but you’ll still be able to go into the office.
A better understanding of productivity in remote or outsourced work
The recent pandemic proved our ability to work from home and still be as productive as when working from the office. The tech has been proven, and as such, it is now simply about using it to produce the same quality and standards of work from anywhere in the world.
With the rise in remote and hybrid work, those entering the job market and young professionals are all now looking for ways to work remotely. It is about being able to develop a productive work-life balance, and many find that having the option to work from wherever you are (or simply from home) is one of the best ways to develop and institute a work-life balance that will serve to prolong your health, happiness, and hopefully also create some wealth.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Xoxoday.
The Global Rewards and Recognition industry stands at around USD 300Bn. Of which, Xoxoday is targeting around 1% market share. Founded by Manoj Agarwal, Sumit Khandelwal, Abhishek Kumar, and Kushal Agarwal, Xoxoday enables real-time, digital global rewards which are linked to a client’s business KPIs. These rewards increase employee engagement, improve channel performance, enhance sales performance & more.
It is interesting to note that Xoxoday is currently growing at a rate of 100% YoY in terms of revenue. No wonder, its clientele includes some of the notable companies like Infosys, HCL, SAP SuccessFactors, Siemens and more.
StartupTalky interviewed the founding team of Xoxoday to know its Success Story. In this post, you will know all about Xoxoday Growth Story, Revenue Model, Funding, How it started & more.
Xoxoday provides technology infrastructure to enable rewards & recognition for global clients. The company enables real-time, digital global rewards which are linked to a client’s business KPIs. These rewards increase employee engagement, improve channel performance, enhance sales performance and build brand loyalty/retention for their clients.
Key Use Cases:
Employee Rewards & Recognition
Sales & Channel Incentives
Consumer Rewards. The products are enabled through In-app integrations (with CRM, ERP, HRMS, Survey Portals, Gaming Portals)
According to industry estimates, the company is targeting around 1% market share in around US$ 300Bn rewards and recognition industry globally. The R&R industry is divided into:
Consumer acquisition, retention and loyalty (US$ 200 Bn) – Drive consumer demand in the sales funnel to improve ARPU, loyalty & new customer growth.
This space is seeing a lot of traction in terms of funding, M&A, and consolidation and is ripe for exponential growth in the coming future. Xoxoday is poised to take advantage of this growth by solving the key customer pain points through technology, continuous innovation, and expanding its geographical footprint through organic and inorganic growth.
“We met each other (4 founders), through common friends and family circles. We were passionate, young individuals with varied backgrounds who wanted to build a great organization” says the Xoxoday founding team.
The company has around 175 employees mostly located in Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Dublin & USA. The team is young and very stable. There are a lot of employees who are entrepreneurs before joining Xoxoday. There are a good number of people from premier colleges like IIT & IIM. The company has a very good working culture and that reflects in the low attrition rate in the company.
Manoj Agarwal
With 15+ years of experience in technology, product and marketing with companies like Yahoo, Flipkart & Manipal education and health, Manoj takes care of the product, marketing, customer service, and process automation at Xoxoday. An MBA IIM Kozhikode and a Computer Science BTech from PEC Chandigarh, this co-founder’s Hobbies & Interests include yoga, fitness, reading, family time.
Sumit Khandelwal
Khandelwal possesses over 14 years of experience in sales and marketing in companies like Hexaware, Wipro Consumer, Metro Cash & Carry. He is an MBA from TAPMI and an engineer from NIT Nagpur whose hobbies and interests include bike riding, reading, and running. Sumit leads finance and international sales at Xoxoday.
Abhishek Kumar
Abhishek Kumar brings in 13+ years of experience in engineering and technology and has previously worked with companies like Manhattan Associates and Nettpositive. Kumar has a BTech degree from IIT Bombay and his hobbies and interests include painting, travelling, and technology. At Xoxoday, Abhishek leads engineering and technology. Abhishek Kumar co-founded Evening Flavors and Prodintel Technologies.
Kushal Agarwal
Kushal Agarwal leads India sales for Xoxoday. Agarwal has 8+ years of experience working withBidco-Oil refineries, and has represented India in Mongol Rally and the Great Nile River Ride. Agarwal has a Btech degree in Electronics and has then opted for PGDM in Management from the Welingkar Institute of Management. Agarwal currently is the Co-founder of Xoxoday along with being co-founders of Empuls and Compass AI. His interests include travelling, car rallies, storytelling, etc.
Xoxoday is currently working with a 270+ member strong team.
The founders, Manoj and Sumit come from business families. Manoj also comes from great entrepreneur mindset companies like Yahoo & Flipkart. Both these factors gave the team a lot of initial confidence in the startup.
We also found a big gap in the market and a good business opportunity in the rewards and motivation technology business – says the team
The founders validated the idea with their existing contacts in the corporate world. Once they were confident of providing value to their customers, Xoxoday started reaching out to other companies. It acquired around 30 new clients in the first few months which was a great validation of the product-market fit.
Xoxoday – Mission and Vision
Vision
Xoxoday brings simplicity and continuity to a complex, everyday problem of human motivation.
Mission
Xoxoday’s mission is to put human motivation at the center of business growth through technology
Xoxoday – Products and USP
Xoxoday, technology products solve the following use cases in the rewards and incentives space.
Employee Rewards and Incentives
Sales and Channel Incentives
Consumer Rewards
To address the above, Xoxoday has come up with 3 products with differentiated offerings catering to each use case. These products are called: Plum, Empuls and Compass.
Plum – Transactional Reward Platform
Plum is an API-based, real-time pay-as-you-go transactional reward platform. Plum helps drive behaviours that power business results with engaging rewards including gift cards, experiences, discounts, merchandise, & more. The platform can be used to reward employees, consumers, and channel partners. Plum integrates with over 100+ platforms like HRIS (Darwinbox, Bamboo HR), CRMs (FreshDesk, Zoho), ERPs (SAP), Survey platforms (Survey Monkey, Typeform), collaboration tools (Zappier, Marketo), and more.
Xoxoday Plum logo
Empuls – Employee Engagement Platform
Empuls helps improve employee productivity, performance & retention with an easy to use engagement application. Empuls is a holistic employee engagement platform. The platform helps build and drive company culture and ethos in the organization. This helps drive employee engagement, motivation, and overall culture in the organization. A strong culture is extremely important during these times when 90% of the employees are not working from the office.
Compass is a sales and channel partner gamification software to increase sales achievement. Compass integrates with the existing ERP platform of the client and lets the user create sales campaigns. These campaigns are monitored on a real-time basis providing real-time feedback to increase sales. The platform can gamify the sales target achievement based on product lines, geographies, special sales events as per the company sales strategy.
Xoxoday – Compass
Key USPs of the solutions:
Easy to set up, use and scalable tech platform (with open APIs, integrations with 100+ apps)
Largest and most diversified reward catalog in the industry – over 120+ countries covered and over 20+ categories covered.
Over 100+ app integrations like Survey Monkey, Freshdesk, SAP, Darwinbox, Zapier, Slack, Microsoft Teams, and more.
Modern UI & UX
Idea Pivot:
Xoxoday started in 2012 but did a pivot in 2018. From 2012 to 2017, they were doing experiences and activities business in India. Similar to a Klook/Getyourguide or Viator.
“While doing this business we found that we are ahead of the market as both the supply and demand were premature in India. They still are premature. However, we were selling these experiences/activities to corporates as rewards and gifts. In 2018, we extended the rewards business into a full stack technology company covering different reward use cases for employees, channel partners, sales team, and consumers. Since 2018, we have been growing very well” the team adds.
XOXO – means Hugs and Kisses in chats. So basically, Xoxoday means love and happiness every day.
At Xoxoday, the team deeply understands the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and engagement drivers of people, be it an employee, sales, channel partner, gig worker, or consumer. It brings simplicity and continuity to a complex, everyday problem of human motivation. It brings love and happiness in the lives of employees, sales and channel partners of its clients every day.
“Make every day rewarding,” says the tagline of Xoxoday.
Xoxoday Logo
The logo is bright orange showing energy and happiness and the connotation with “day”, just like the colour of sunrise.
Xoxoday – Business Model and Revenue Model
The revenue model is pay-as-you-go SaaS. It is similar to pricing models of payment companies like Stripe and communication companies like Twilio. Xoxoday’s Revenue model has 2 components: Commission on transactional reward revenue and Platform software fees.
Xoxoday – Startup Launch and User Acquisition
Initially, the team reached out to their contacts in the corporate world. “We requested them to give our services a try. Once we were confident of providing value to our customers, we started reaching out to other companies” says the team.
The initial set of customers was acquired through common connections, customer referrals, and organic marketing initiatives. These customers then helped Xoxoday with more referrals. Xoxoday’s product quality has been a big winner. It has built the product with quality UI/UX, modern outlook and built for the users with extensive primary research.
“We keep listening to our customers and improve the products every month” Xoxoday team added.
Xoxoday’s customer success team also has been doing very well by working with clients as partners and helping them succeed in their business metrics through its products. These two things have helped Xoxoday the best!
“Getting the right marketing mix has been a challenge. How can you build the right lead generation mechanism without shelling out a lot of marketing dollars. We experimented with various marketing tactics and hacks to overcome it.”
Xoxoday – Funding and Investors
Xoxoday raised total funding of USD 4,20,000 prior to pivoting in 2018. The startup recently was funded by Giift And Apis Partners LLP on February 23, 2022, when it was successful in raising $30 mn.
Xoxoday’s funding details are as follows:
Date
Stage
Amount
Investors
February 23, 2022
Private Equity Round
$30 mn
Giift And Apis Partners LLP
June 5, 2021
Seed Round
–
–
August 2016
Seed Round (For experience business)
$300K
Mahindra Holidays
July 2013
Angel Round
$120K
Kshatriya Ventures
Xoxoday is almost EBITDA zero and only spent for growth.
Xoxoday – Acquisitions
Xoxoday has acquired 4 companies to date. Here’s taking a look at its acquisitions:
Companies Acquired
Date of Acquisition
Amount
FamousEnuf
January 7, 2019
–
BookMyInterest
June 13, 2016
–
Actizone
January 27, 2016
–
Yipeedo
October 15, 2015
–
Xoxoday – Marketing Strategies
Xoxoday has done a lot of marketing hacks across its journey.Partnerships marketing has worked very well for the brand. The company has done various marketing campaigns with its integration partners which have been a win-win for both parties. High-quality content along with SEO has been another strategy that worked very well for Xoxoday.
Shreesha Ramdas has been the advisor/mentor of Xoxoday. He is an entrepreneurial executive with a track record of launching and growing products in competitive markets.
Xoxoday – Competitors
Tango card, Tillo, Blackhawk Network, Wegift, Workstride, Sendoso, Bonusly, Perkbox are some of the competitors of Xoxoday.
G2 crowd best rewards software in 2020 APAC region
DigitalHR award
Oracle top 50 startups in 2018
Ranked #20th in Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Award 2020 in India
Xoxoday Ranked #20th in Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Award 2020 in India
Key Players in Gamification Industry
Key Players Landscape in Channel Incentives space by Forrester
Case study published by Harvard Business Review HBR
Top 15 employee recognition platform 2021
Xoxoday – Future Plans
International Expansion – Increase presence in US, Europe and SEA markets
Product Innovation – See product roadmap below.
Xoxoday Product Roadmap
Xoxoday – FAQs
What is Xoxoday?
Xoxoday is a Bengaluru-based full-stack embedded solution company that helps businesses automate rewards, benefits, incentives and payouts and get the most out of them with modern, cutting-edge infrastructure and technology.
When is Xoxoday founded?
Xoxoday was founded on April 2, 2012.
What are the subsidiaries of Xoxoday?
The Xoxoday subsidiaries include Plum, empuls, and Compass.
What is the Xoxoday revenue?
The Bengaluru-based Saas startup was founded back in 2012 and has already crossed the 100 crore mark between the fiscal years 2018 and 2019.
