Show HN: Siftery Trending Products

Interesting thoughts! We're definitely trying to strike a balance between reliability and short-term popularity. One of the ways we're trying to solve is by every day pushing up "wildcard" products that are getting traction.

Another of our bets is that since a user can only recommend a product once, over time the more obvious products should find it relatively more difficult to get new recommendations and newer products will surface.

This effect might become more noticeable with some filters (e.g. recommendations only from YC companies).

We're looking into ways to improve the ranking, so thanks for sharing that teej. We actually started with a normalized and more complex algo that was more along the lines of what you suggest, but the resulting feed had mostly random products and was not very helpful for more casual users. It also made it difficult to understand why a product was ranked. I think you're right that as it stands, we can do more to surface younger products. So far, we're doing it manually with "wildcards".

I mentioned in another comment that one of our bets is that since a user can only recommend a product once, over time the more obvious products should find it relatively more difficult to get new recommendations and newer products will surface.

e.g., if we did a filter of recommendations by YC companies (or more extreme - YC founders), then something like Slack would be popular the first month, but then have few remaining votes. Thoughts?

Yeah, most reviews in top software review sites may be incentivized (e.g. with an Amazon gift card). Siftery's approach is to be as data driven as we can, while focusing on verified business users and what products they use and recommend at their workplace.

I agree.

> It feels like the reviews can be bought.

I assume Siftery's business model depends on getting paid by software companies when a prospective buyer makes a purchase after visiting Siftery. Maybe it's more advertising-based though? (Siftery folks, please correct me if I'm wrong).

Like all affiliate marketing, there's a fundamental tension between maintaining customer trust by actually making good, honest recommendations and maximizing profits by directing consumers to products whose makers are willing to pay more. A lot of affiliate marketers start out very consumer-focused in order to build a strong brand that consumers trust. They later find it very hard to resist the temptation to maximize revenue by making bad but profitable recommendations later on. Of course that will catch up with them eventually, but they can exploit the inertia of a trustworthy brand for a while.

All of that said, hopefully Siftery will be able to provide good, consumer-focused information. There is real pain point around learning about this kind of software.

With PH there are some similarities (both are product feeds after all), but substantial differences in the feed mechanics and results. Siftery's ranking is based on recommendations coming from verified business users and the products listed all have business use cases. Products also have a persistent identity (i.e. a new one is not created each time a product is created).

Ultimately, the are different products at the top of each feed, as would be expected from their different use cases and different (if to some degree overlapping) audiences.

We think Siftery Trending is a place where b2b products can go after launching and "graduating" from a community like Product Hunt. One way we're thinking about it is that Product Hunt is to high school what Siftery Trending is to college. There's a time and place for both!

That's my take, but additional thoughts/feedback appreciated.