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Alex Skatell

Co-founder & CEO, Topline · 1 appearance on the record.

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founderexecutive@alexskatell ↗LinkedIn ↗topline.com ↗

Alex Skatell is best known for founding the viral news website Independent Journal Review (IJR) and parent company Media Group of America. Previously the digital director for the National Republican Senatorial Committee and co-founder of IMGE, he currently serves as co-founder and CEO of Topline.

10statements → 4claims → 1claims resolved → 3.7/5average certainty → 1.7/5average debate potential → ≈4.5/5argument clarity, estimated →

1 supported 0 partly supported 0 contradicted 3 not checkable as stated how the 4 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

1 prediction · 3 assertions · 1 opinion · 2 insights · 3 disclosures · every statement was checked. The prediction and assertions are the 4 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 1 is resolved, and 3 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Alex argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Assertion Supported
Skatell: Independent Journal Review reaches 20M to 25M monthly unique visitors
“We get anywhere from 20 to twenty five million uniques on independent journal review.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 6:30 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell

How they sound: not measured why? →

We measure speaking style by listening to the audio itself, and a fair number needs at least 2,000 words from one person on tape we have measured. There is too little of Alex Skatell on measured tape to publish a rate. This says nothing about how they speak.

Everything Alex Skatell said on Top Founders that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Skatell: Media companies are abandoning custom CMS builds for WordPress
“And I think what you're starting to see is those media companies are now abandoning their own CMS, and they're moving to things like WordPress.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 8:55 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Insight
Skatell: A media company's true competitive advantage is audience distribution
“I think the competitive advantage is your audiences. How, how big are your audiences? How often can you reach them and how engaged are they? I mean, that's at the end of the day, when you, when someone went to buy a newspaper, they didn't really look at their …”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 9:24 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Insight
Skatell: Media companies must build recurring audiences over chasing viral hits
“Thinking of these distribution channels, these are, you know, this is the new printing press. It's how can you reach people online? How can you reach them on your own terms? So not just relying on a story that goes viral, but building these audiences that you …”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 4:59 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Skatell predicts major newsrooms will abandon digital ads for paid subscriptions
“It's not going to float their annual budgets from digital revenue. And they're watching print revenue erodes. They're moving to paid models. And I think you're going to see this more and more across the board.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 11:43 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Assertion Not checkable as stated
IJ Review dynamically customizes every subscriber's email based on engagement
“We actually every single individual gets a separate, their email looks different. Based on what they engaged with in the past.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 4:27 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Disclosure
Skatell: Media Group of America reached monthly profitability on $2.5M raised
“Contributed, but we're still profitable every month. And so that money is just kind of on the balance sheet to think through growth acquisitions. So we have, we've got about two points, 2.5 million we've raised.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 5:54 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Assertion Supported
Skatell: Independent Journal Review reaches 20M to 25M monthly unique visitors
“We get anywhere from 20 to twenty five million uniques on independent journal review.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 6:30 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Opinion
Skatell: Turning internal media tools into a SaaS platform is difficult
“I think it's focus is really hard in a startup. And I think right now scaling those products that we use into a SaaS platform would be tough unless it was part of a strategy that Included you know, part of a strategy that included a model that, that scales wel…”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 14:02 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Disclosure
Skatell: Employees cannot execute any tasks unless officially assigned in Asana
“We actually are, we have a policy where no task should be done that wasn't assigned in Asana.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 19:44 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Disclosure
Skatell: Independent Journal Review's newsroom staff consists of about 50 people
“And then we have our newsroom folks, which is about 50 people.”
Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 ▶ 7:01 The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell Jun 19, 2016 11m
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