The Rating Game | Seattle Business Magazine

This story is featured in the October issue of Seattle Business Magazine. Subscribe here to access the print edition.

Sung Rhee was unemployed and unsure of his future after selling his venture-funded software infrastructure company ViAir in 2003.

The Internet was still in its infancy and Rhee was looking for a way to build a business on it.

“Remember, that was before Facebook, social media, and the iPhone,” he says. “But I was pretty sure I didn’t want to get a normal job.”

He wasn’t worried. He had options. Prior to that, he worked for Microsoft Corp. for nine years. worked where he led teams creating Outlook Express and MSN Mobile.

He began creating “hundreds of websites” in various industries, primarily as a form of research. He eventually landed on higher education after discovering a lack of trustworthy information. The result was the SR Education Group, a site that connected students with for-profit colleges and universities. Eventually, however, Rhee found that students were not getting the information they needed to make good decisions.

He switched and the SR Education Group became Optimal, a student resource to compare tuition fees, ratings and alumni salaries. It remains a lead generation service for colleges seeking students, but from a student perspective. The product of the 30-employee company in Kirkland resembles the annual rankings compiled by US News & World Report, although Rhee says that Optimal is “results-oriented” rather than “prestige-oriented”.

Here is his interview with Seattle Business Magazine.

I would say I’m a reluctant entrepreneur. What I tell people is that I am a reluctant CEO. If I could have my Druther I would just tinker and solve problems.

We saw many advertisements and malicious promises made to students. Because of this, we decided to become less of a lead generation company aimed at the educational institution and more into a publisher aimed at end users.

We started collecting reviews from students and became the yelp of for-profit institutions. That was just super insightful and eye-opening. A few institutions threatened to fire us as customers.

When we first published the Salary Ranking report, the most common comment I got from people was, “Wow. If I had had this information when choosing a course of study, I might have made a different decision about what to study or where to go. ”I get that so often.

We want to encourage schools to serve their students better. That’s the whole purpose. That is why we publish reviews, salary and related results.

Students come to our site and fill out a form. If they are interested in a specific school we will forward this information to the school and that is a potential student. So we’re still a lead generation business model.

What surprises me the most? Our main rankings are dominated by well-known schools. But there are also schools that people don’t really know about that are really good, like Santa Clara. There are colleges that are much more career-oriented in terms of their curriculum and will allow you to have a strong career after college.

The other thing that surprised us quite a bit is that there are for-profit schools and specialty programs that do really well, like the University of Phoenix. They’ve been beaten up in the past for their marketing tactics, but there are a handful of programs at for-profit institutions that are pretty good at helping students after graduation.

When I was 18 and preparing for college, I would have looked at all of these things.

It’s important to go through all of this data, especially in today’s economy. Your salary will depend more on your major than on the school you attended. If you’re a film production major, good luck no matter where you’ve gone.

If you take 10 people with you, you will find 10 different decision criteria for deciding which college to go to. We acknowledge that. Instead of being a guide, we try to provide insights into information in many different ways.

By the time you’re 20 or 21 years old, your brain isn’t even fully developed. It’s okay to be free from all of this. However, I want to warn that when you find yourself in a financial situation where you need to take out a loan and borrow, it is a limitation for many Americans. Perhaps that is not the sole driver of the decision making, but just make sure you have at least a say in your final decision.

The impact and legacy I would like to see is that we become a point of contact for people to make decisions about college.

I like going to Vegas and playing and hanging out with friends. Too often for my wife and children. Probably five or six times a year before the pandemic.

I like craps. I used to play poker but it got really boring because you have to grind for a long time. But shit! I love the energy of the table. There’s nothing like getting a hot streak with a roller and the whole crowd. Every now and then you can hear a loud roar and it’s usually the craps table because someone hit a great number.

I play basketball. Because of my height, I end up doing the ball handling tasks. The best part of my game would be to set it up as a point guard. I usually get most of the assists in one game, but my outside shot is terrible.

I collect Gundam figures. I’m from korea. When I was growing up, Japanese robot characters were super, super popular with little boys my age. When my son graduated from high school, we went to Japan and visited a Gundam museum. It was very nostalgic and brought back all these memories.

https://www.seattlebusinessmag.com/seattle-business-profiles/rating-game
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