Got a tough decision? Plug it into
The Reckoner and see your peers' opinions. "One of the great things the internet has told us over the last four years is that you can ask it for advice and get actual good information back," says Dan Koch, founder of ReckonLabs, which created The Reckoner. "Giving practical answers to individuals has worked well for Q&A sites, but has not yet worked well for polls. Internet polling is still back in 1998."
The Reckoner seeks to bring the internet poll into the present, with a new kind of content curation and a heaping helping of humor. Launched at the end of November, the site took off immediately. In its first month, reports Koch, The Reckoner welcomed 11,000 unique users and 81,000 page views. One of the more popular questions currently in rotation asks:
TICKLING: ADORABLE DISPLAY OF AFFECTION OR A LEGAL FORM OF TORTURE?
The Reckoner, says Koch, will make money via two primary revenue streams: "The first is advertising. The second part is feedback. Knowing what customers are thinking is valuable."
Koch envisions a company posting two possible ads on The Reckoner to elicit feedback, for example. He trusts that an occasional sponsored question will not ruffle feathers. "In America, so much of our culture is based on shopping and our relationship with our brands." For its part, The Reckoner offers advertisers unique access to an affluent, educated young adult demographic. "The Reckoner has to achieve a certain scale to make it worthwhile," says Koch.
Coming from Accenture, where he was a consultant on the road most of the time, Koch returned to his hometown of Philadelphia to create a business where he grew up. "One thing I've learned is that Philly has a great tech scene, much better than I ever thought," says Koch, who is a member of Indy Hall and participant in Philly Tech Meetup.
The future of The Reckoner rests on solid visitor numbers, with 10,000 and 50,000 unique visitors the two benchmarks. "The timeline is the key thing," says Koch, who has set July 2012 as the deadline to decide if the website is self sustaining, with an interim analysis scheduled for this March, at which point Koch will make a decision about pursuing outside investment.
Source: Dan Koch, The Reckoner
Writer: Sue Spolan