Show HN: A clean directory of awesome startups

Most of the directory or listing services are worthless from a browser's point of view. Your startup(or any listed business) gets lost somewhere buried under categories and sub-categories. So, while these directories do offer a link or two, they really do not provide any value or a good user-experience to a casual browser who simply wants to check out cool startups, quickly find out a bit about them and explore further if interested.

I created StartupOnTop to address this very issue and offer a directory that presents startups in a clean, clutter-free manner. It offers a top-down view (startups first, categories later) and also shows a "quick - view" for users to quickly learn about a startup.

Most importantly, I intend to vigorously maintain it - I would like to keep it ad-free and spam-free. That means, the site is not meant for ‘every’ startup and will try to prevent the site from generic dilution. After a free first month, charging a basic maintainance fee.

It is interesting to see whether users interested in new startups want a directory (links organized in a category-based model) or a blog (where new, fresh information is served periodically on an ongoing basis as it becomes available). I assumed the later when I created http://www.DailyWebApps.com ; I use WordPress which has built-in support for a category taxonomy so I kind of get the best of both worlds.

If you're interested it would be nice to collaborate in this area. Thanks for the useful resource.

Vladd, that sounds great. I can be reached at startupontop@gmail.com or paul@startupontop.com

I don't get it. First, I can't imagine anyone would pay $10/month to be on the list (except for forgetting to cancel their trial). The fact that anyone can submit contradicts that it is a list of "awesome startups". The site itself is marginal (no SEO, one line descriptions, hidden information, no content, no freshness, etc). And it's oddly slow. Yuck.

I go to the 'travel' category see the Hipmunk logo, but I can't click on it?

Hi Markkat, thanks for the heads up. There was a small jquery bug. It should be fixed now.

Fixed on the homepage but I'm still seeing it on category pages.

This is like startuplist too.. but paid? I don't know why I would pay for this compared to anything else. Also, the site design leaves a ton to be desired.

Haha happily filled all the form until I saw the 9.99 per month hehe. Thats steep, given that its free to be on sites like Angel.co or Crunchbase.

Good idea, I hate the fact that directories force everyone into sections, What about a Games start up?

Do you run a games startup? I would be happy to feature it.

I was really hoping this was a CrunchBase replacement.

$10 for a link to my startup (http://bizen.com)? No thanks!

9.99 per month ?!?! Good joke

Why is it paid? What value are you providing for startups to apply for a paid listing?

You don't even have a pagerank as of yet so why do you charge?

First build up value then charge

Vow! $10/month to just get a link from a pr0 directory?

I signed up since it's on the homepage of Hacker News and perhaps getting a peak in traffic for some days. I can always cancel before getting charged.

I agree, $10/month is way too much for a service without traction.

what is the average traffic for being on the homepage of hacker news?

That totally depends on the content, I have found. We've had a couple of links and it brings a couple of hundred hits. However, we've also have had a few that brought a couple of thousands, with little difference in the rank/time.

That was my thinking. Try it for the first month, and see what comes. It looks nice, at least. :)

Hi infocaptor,

I am offering a free 30 day listing, if you want to test it out. Like any site, we are just starting out - so obviously we don't have a pagerank etc. But hopefully, with support from customers like you, the ranks will come in near future.

Regarding fees, to be bluntly honest - it just takes too much of my time to be doing it for free (even the most subtle of tasks end up taking a good chunk of your day). Moreover, I do not want to offer any advertisement, nor do I want to clutter the site with any and every submissions. So, the only way towards any revenue is a small fee.

Thanks for understanding (and your support :)

I am not saying provide it for free. Because marketing a free and paid app requires the same amount of effort.

Here are my thoughts when I tried marketing MockupTiger to all the websites. It summarizes the exact thoughts https://plus.google.com/u/0/103713120145925411926/posts/G5nW...

But, for $10/month you are not providing any value yet.

First build value and then charge. Start free but with the intention that one day you will charge.

Thanks. I appreciate the feedback.