Copenhagen startup Klusterr is an entirely new kind of social platform that allows users to rate workplaces, bosses, co-workers and work environments. It started out as an idea for a site to gather references for jobs and keep them in one place but as co-founder Richard Blackham tells us in an interview, they pivoted to the workplace ratings model.
Klusterr allows employees to share information and ratings about their workplace across Facebook,Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. This type of broad social sharing forces a new kind of transparency.
While this startup is similar to California startup Worker’s Count, Klusterr seems to be focusing on a broader more social picture. Employees can provide reviews, ratings and information about their employers and workplaces either by name or anonymously.
Check out our interview with Blackham after the break
What is Klusterr?
klusterr is the social rating platform for the workplace. klusterr empowers you to rate and recommend your workplaces, and share them across your networks. It delivers seamless integration across the networks you choose, including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+. Fully optimized for mobile devices with Facebook secure one-click login, klusterr brings transparency and forces accountability at the workplace…in a social way. klusterr is for everyone, always and everywhere.
We are four founders. A family of three expat Brits in Copenhagen… and a Dane.
Richard Blackham, a veteran of three startups in Copenhagen and 20 years of identity and access management experience. In 2005 became bitten by the cloud and the possibilities that mobile were going to be offering. Currently immersed in Ruby on Rails to add to basic php skills. Educational background in History of Art and Design.
Rupert Blackham (son) and veteran of two startups in Copenhagen as UI/UX expert. University of the Arts (London) degree in Digital Media Production. Skilled in HTML and CSS and now dabbling with Ruby on Rails.
Robin Blackham (son) and on his first startup after working for BBDO (the advertising agency). Educational background in marketing. René Reinholdt is the code mule in the team. Deep php skills and a genius with front end dev and SEO. Brilliant freehand illustrator.
Where are you based?
We are based in Copenhagen, Denmark. Copenhagen has one of Europe’s liveliest startup scenes. Its been the home of recent startups like Skype (Microsoft) and Podio (Citrix).
In January 2012 I found myself suddenly unemployed after two and half years as the Founder/CEO of another startup. I looked around at the IT contracting market and they were all asking for references as I had been out of the freelancing loop for a few years. I wasn’t prepared and suddenly the lights went on in my head again. Surely I wasn’t the only person who had a problem with pulling his references together at a moments notice! So the core of a job reference web application for mobile started to form and after a few days brain-storming we announced the plan. Within two weeks we had gathered three hundred people who registered with us to test the feature set and the feedback pointed us further towards a workplace rating platform than a reference gathering app. This is where we’re settled today and is what we are taking to market as we speak.
We solve the problem that everyone in the workforce everywhere has, whether it be the formal or informal market, and that is getting the message of either satisfaction or dissatisfaction across to employers. We empower employees to speak up, either by name or anonymously. We believe this will drive employers to be more transparent and accountable. We think this will play a small part in helping businesses and their employees collaborate better. Happier workplaces create happier and more productive employees.
What’s your secret sauce?
Always a good question and one that usually has a long-winded technical answer. Google has algorithms, Skype has P2P. klusterr has basic human nature working for it. We leverage the basic human need to be heard when times are bad, and to be praised when times are good. Everyone everywhere has something to say about the company they work for and putting this power into the hands of the users (their mobiles) gives them the chance to ‘Speak Up’ whenever they have a moment…in an airport, after work on a bus, last thing at night before turning out the light. klusterr secret sauce is social rather than technical. Our focus on the Facebook login assists their need for being heard amongst their peers. klusterr is driven by some interesting behavioral needs of everyone. Its just a matter of identifying them and retaining users by
What’s one lesson you’ve learned in the startup process?
Listen to the users. Listen to the users and listen to the users. We haven’t written a line of code without iterating and testing. I owe a lot to the advice of of Steve Blank, Alex Osterwalder, Eric Ries and Ash Maurya.
What’s next for Klusterr
Klusterr will close the circle on building the complete workplace rating platform. We will come back and complete the employee reference features. With the growth in numbers come the very obvious monetization opportunities. Our user community could easily become the largest searchable database of active workers. Our user community has free access ad infinitum to register and score their employers all around the globe in their native languages. This is generating some extremely interesting statistics for all types of stakeholders such as analysts, businesses, recruiters, news agencies. We think this will become increasingly interesting for businesses to adapt as part of their corporate social responsibility programs. We believe that addressing the global audience is more meaningful than just a US-centric or European-centric approach. After all, our users are the (almost 1 billion) Facebook users who are increasingly devoting more time to web access via mobile. And our geo-location integration is showing some very interesting mapping of users and their careers. And then there are some compelling opportunities for gamifying the app. Its a cliché but it works. We want it to be fun and we want people to come in and join the fun.
Linkage:
Check out Klusterr on their website klusterr.com
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