San Francisco, CA
Social TV check-in startup GetGlue has lured away Evan Krauss from its post as EVP of sales at Shazam to become its new president, the company announced today.
GetGlue allows users to check in to whatever TV show or movie they’re currently watching, providing stickers (aka badges) for those that watch during a premiere or opening weekend. It’s still got a decently large following of over 4 million registered users, according to the company. (No idea how many of those are active monthly users though, but considering the number of competitors in the social TV space, GetGlue is definitely one of the largest players.)
Normally we don’t cover hiring announcements, but in this case its newsworthy. GetGlue is coming off of a failed merger with social TV startup Viggle, which fell apart back in January. The deal between those two companies made sense because GetGlue had a great relationship with many entertainment companies and really didn’t have a clear game plan for how to monetize its popularity. Also, lots of other social TV services had also started consolidating or pivoting, such as Dijit’s purchase of Miso and more recently Fanhattan’s dip into hardware with its Fan TV set-top box.
That said, GetGlue’s hiring of Krauss was a smart move because it should help the company figure out how to increase monitization through promotions and second screen advertising sales. Krauss has a long history of working in digital media that spans two decades, including positions at Yahoo, AOL, Excite, JumpTap, and Looksmart. His most recent position at Shazam was focused on helping that company grab a piece of the TV industry’s advertising budget, as VentureBeat previously reported.
“Evan is a very experienced leader, thinker and a passionate contributor to the second screen & social tv revolution,” said GetGlue founder and CEO Alex Iskold in a statement. “Evan pioneered innovative products, native advertising models and created companies we admire. We are fortunate to have him on board defining and scaling GetGlue’s business.”
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