In South East England a ninja has come up with a compelling idea. Programmer Daniel Clarke’s company TrafficCake offers online businesses the opportunity to monitor whether or not the traffic generated to their site via banner ads or pop-ups, for example, is legitimate revenue generating traffic.
At 22, Clarke has a history in technology that dates back to his days as a 13-year-old. That’s when he began creating apps and other various projects. One such project was a creating a website that served as a gaming community. Since then he’s worked on several others based in the technology field, and most recently he was a team member of Shockedfish.
Ready, Steady, Go!
TrafficCake being his point of focus now, Clarke and his business partner find the startup taking up much of their time as any meaningful project should. Working from his flat in England, he prefers taking things one day at a time and slowly building TrafficCake instead of going to an office job.
Privately funded, Clarke prefers that the growth of his startup works organically by addressing “tiny costs” as the present themselves.
Workdays, which according to Clarke have a starting time of 1 AM, typically begin with a cup of coffee or a glass of diet cola. Then, it’s checking emails to keep things full steam ahead.
Attitude
“I’d really question people when they go and get an office (job) straight out the door. Is it really required for a lot of people? Sure it may seem like the best bet in terms of outwards appearance, but that counts for nothing once you’ve spent out,” says Clarke.
This is the spirit from which Clarke attacks the challenges of TrafficCake. He’s not interested in success as judged by anyone else but himself. It’s a focus instead that comes from his desire to create a tool to help companies save money.
When the time comes, he says, he sees hiring passionate programmers as the next step in his company’s growth.
Character
He doesn’t own a mobile phone but does own an iPad. This also allows him use of Google Apps which in combination with the iPad “enables us to really share work processes and status no matter whose house we’re at.”
He’s not exactly proud of being an iPad owner and working with iOS but Clarke shamelessly is a dog person. After being attacked by a cat at the age of 11, he swiftly decided that dogs were a much more suitable companion.
What would he do if he had time to take one year off and was handed $500,000?
“Eating a lot and perhaps taking a trip to the States – beyond that I’m content in my small little village flat. With the time, I’d work on ensuring TrafficCake gets as good as it can and then work on random concepts involving Robot AI… no really.”
Purpose
Clarke is on a mission. He’s aware that professionals who have been buying traffic for years have suspected fraudulent traffic.
“We’re giving those professionals and even amateur traffic buyers the chance to be certain about what they are paying for.”
Thorough testing, programming, and research have allowed Clarke and his associate to build a robust application that determines this legitimacy of traffic.
It’s just him, diet cola, and some ninja stars.
For a limited time, KillerStartups readers can get a week of TrafficCake free with the coupon code ‘killerstartupsrocks’.
Thanks, Daniel!
