Hoopla celebrates your sales wins, grabs new funding

Hoopla, a gamification startup for salespeople, has raised $2.8 million in its first round of funding.

The company grabs data from Salesforce to reward salespeople for meeting their goals and making sales. Leaderboards show the top salespeople in your organization, and Hoopla has a smart TV app to show leaderboards on office televisions. Employees are encouraged to compete for top spots and boost their sales stats.

Safeguard Scientifics led the $2.8 million first institutional round for Hoopla, with participation from Illuminate Ventures and Salesforce. The press release is below.

HOOPLA CLOSES $2.8 MILLION SERIES A FINANCING, ADDS MORE THAN 25 NEW CUSTOMERS

Proceeds enable Hoopla to further develop its gamified performance platform and bolster marketing efforts to meet growing customer demand for data and game mechanics

WEST CHESTER, Pa.—June 20, 2012—Hoopla Software, Inc., the leading provider of performance improvement solutions for employees in sales, call centers, and support organizations, announced today the closing of its $2.8 million Series A financing round, which was led by Safeguard Scientifics (NYSE: SFE) with participation from Illuminate Ventures and salesforce.com. Proceeds from this financing are being used to further build out Hoopla Software’s gamified performance platform and to expand marketing initiatives.

Gamification techniques now leverage the rapid adoption of the social enterprise by promoting healthy competition in the workplace. Hoopla helps organizations steer the actions and behaviors of their employees through friendly competition, recognition, and game mechanics. As a result, Hoopla has attracted more than 25 new customers to its platform over the past two months, including Box, Marketo, and Zillow. Hoopla serves a wide variety of industries, including technology, manufacturing, and financial services.

“Recognition, competition, and measurement have always been at the heart of motivating employees to support business goals,” said Michael Smalls, founder and CEO at Hoopla. “Hoopla’s platform offers novel opportunities to motivate individuals and teams, ultimately boosting revenue and impacting the bottom line. This Series A financing supports our effort to meet customer demand for data, game mechanics, and communication tools that drive sales and other business performance results.”

Hoopla has a performance optimization system designed to cultivate a high-performance culture. Leveraging Salesforce integration, Hoopla works with each customer’s unique custom objects and fields to create competition and challenges, track and measure actions, and broadcast success through Salesforce Chatter or on HooplaTV.