Ask HN: Rate my startup SoftwareSuggest (www.softwaresuggest.com)

Started this about 18 months ago. It was born from realizing the people were always asking myself and my business partner for suggestions on software. Example: "What should I use for virus software, picture editing, open zip files".

The original idea was to make a community driven review site of categorized web apps, mobile apps and software. We were sick of hearing people getting lost and misled on download.com and other software directories that are covered with advertising and 'sponsored links'. We also recognized that the app store and android marketplace were limited in search and suffered from ratings bias. The five star rating system wasn't as measurable as a count of 'likes' or votes.

We created an application directory of about 700 apps and associated each app with a verb/noun combination. We also attempted to categorize the 'tasks' that could be accomplished with each item.

This is what you'll find when you 'Browse Software'

Later we came up with an idea of 'Solutions' or an itinerary of goals around a central theme "e.g. Protect My Computer: Backup my files and documents | Keep spam out of my inbox | Keep viruses out of my computer". We were able to 'remix' our application directory into a playlist based on how each app was categorized.

The technology and the concepts behind it are pretty neat. It was built on appengine, and incorporates facebook, twitter feeds. The application categorization system is unique as well.

We lost steam along the way. We met with several local business incubators who expressed some interest and gave some great feedback on the struggles to monetize. At the end of the day, I think we were hoping for a quick hit, awesome idea. We then realized that this would turn into a long slog to build a community, gain visitors, and take a few years after launch to even determine if it would be profitable. We were naive when we started. At least we know now some of what we don't know. We realize now that the 'slog' is much more typical of building a business.

One of our major struggles was identifying our core user. At first we had hoped to appeal to the mass market to solve their problems. We quickly realized that the majority of people (we polled at least) aren't particularly interested in finding software/apps. They typically learn from word of mouth and aren't researchers like myself and my business partner. I speculate that the 'researcher' would be more of a technical user and so our target should be more technical 'super users'.

We kicked around the following ways to monetize: 1. Advertising 2. Affiliate fees 3. Concierge service (e.g. pay $10 to have someone remotely solve your problem) 4. Ask questions for a fee

Anyhow, the site has been sitting dormant for four months as we decide what to do with it. Does it have potential or just another idea that was poorly executed?