How much does it cost to make a website full of other people’s lists? $3.5 million, if you are Top10.com.
That’s how much the startup has raised from Accel along with Founder Collective, Bill Gross’ Idealab, Forward Venture Partners and Spotify executive Shakil Khan.
Top10.com doesn’t even make lists itself. The site aims to “harness the power of lists to curate the world’s opinions” – but it is its users who populate lists like Top 10 TV Detectives, Top 10 Action Movies and Top 10 Reasons To Be Single.
It’s hard to see where the business is here. But the site is starting to make noises about how personal recommendations are greater influencers of product purchases than retailers themselves. So the idea seems to be to catch affiliate income from products that relate to list items.
“We want to enable people to buy the products they’re discovering in user-friendly ways,” a spokesperson tells paidContent. “We have a big road-map to build up the data sources and platforms to make Top10 a super-useful consumer tool.
“We’re starting with the concept of creating and crowd-sourcing lists, but lots more input sources will be coming down the line. We believe that by creating a fun, easy-to-use platform for recommending and debating things, we’ll be able to make a very powerful resource for people to find new things based on real people’s opinions.”