Looking for a spot to grab dinner and drinks tonight in Denver, but not sure if you should trust that 4 or 5-star Google or Yelp review?
A new app, billed as a combination between Instagram and TripAdvisor, drawing recommendations from travel pros, influencers and locals, launched in Denver today.
Rayka is a social recommendation platform that highlights the best places to eat, drink and see in your city - using visual recommendations, not numbered reviews. In addition to Denver, the company announced the launch of its app in Charleston and San Diego.
Rayka was founded by Sal Lavallo, one of the youngest Americans to visit every country in the world, and his co-founders Landon Sanford, Mikayla Furlan and Denver-based Drew Koszulinski.
Since launching the beta in January, Rayka has garnered over 35,000 recommendations and added over 500 influencers or experts to the platform.
Koszulinski said the company was very purposeful in reaching out to and adding influencers to the app in an effort to build out the library of recommendations.
In addition to finding specific recommendations, users can follow these influencers and travel pros or explore different groups, like “Denver’s Most Instagrammable Places” or “San Diego’s Features on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives.”
The company has searched for a balance between the social media scrolling aspect and the search functionality to provide value to its users.
“We learned early on that without these peer-to-peer interactions and without browsing somebody’s profile, that these recommendations were a little less meaningful,” Koszulinski said of the importance of social media.
Koszulinski said Rayka is built for two users, the browser, someone just killing time, and the hunter, someone looking for a specific recommendation.
The company's primary source of revenue at this point is targeted advertising, though Koszulinski said they'll weigh partnership opportunities going forward.
As the company grows, they’ll look to strategically expand into other mid-sized U.S. cities before making a larger national push later this year. Koszulinski said the app’s primary need at this stage is to further grow its users.
“The more users we have, the more people we have producing content, the more powerful the platform gets,” he said.
