The YoDJ app started out with a simple idea: help people at an event request music from the DJ, while helping DJ’s monetize some of their services. Bootstrapped since 2017 and incorporated in 2019 the two-founder startup landed a $2,500 grant from Facebook late in 2020 – and some of that money helped the founders test out their Beta in January.
“That’s what really helped us be able to throw an event because we have all these ideas and all this potential, but you know, actually getting some money to push the idea forward… Facebook came through,” YoDJ CEO Zaid Hameed told the 4thEst8. ”The Jabari Bonfire event was really like a big step for us, to be able to have more of a public presence with the application – not just testing it behind the scenes, but actually putting our faces out there.”
The event was held at the Northwest Coffee Roasting Company in St. Louis on January 17. About 40 people attended in person, but there were many more participating – through the app – via the live-stream. Hameed says the incorporation of streaming audiences, notably on Twitch, is something that directly came out of the Covid 19 lock down that prevented their planned launch in the spring of 2020.
“We were able to adapt to the pandemic and really learn about the ecosystem in Twitch, where you have DJ’s live-streaming for the audience so that we can now approach it from the digital and in-person side,” he said. “This led us to really being able to see it as a way to monetize without having to be in the presence of our main users.”
CTO Jamal Simmonds (aka: DJ JaJa) DJ’d the event along with DJ Albizness. Like any time a Beta gets in front of real users, the CTO came home with a valuable ‘to do’ list.
DJ Albizness and Jamal “DJ Jaja” Simmonds
“As a DJ, you have a feed of requests coming in… And in our feed, it could get a little overcrowded, a little hard to manage. So we were able to, within a week, talk to our developer and get some new changes in,” Simmonds said. “The other thing that we realized was maybe all DJ’s don’t have access to a streaming service like Tidal.”
After Jabari Bonfire the two saw that they’re going to have to educate some DJ’s about more than just their app, but how their app works with other DJ tools.
The company is headquartered in St. Louis, has two full time employees and one part time.
