There’s no shortage of tools for running massive email marketing campaigns. But if all you need is a way to send personalized messages to a handful of people at a time, a full-fledged email marketing solution is always going to be overkill.
So when Chicago serial entrepreneur Ajay Goel found himself in need of a tool for sending small email campaigns from his Gmail account, he was surprised to discover that no one had created anything of the sort.
“This was shortly after Gmail had released its own API, so I seized the opportunity to build what I wanted for myself,” said Goel. “I wrote the code for a simple mass email system that worked within Gmail and shared it with friends and colleagues. To my surprise, people really liked it.”
What started as a side project to meet a personal pain point turned into GMass — an email marketing startup with more than 100,000 users and over $1 million in annual revenue. That revenue comes in the form of $7 to $20 monthly subscription fees from users who send more than a certain number of emails per month using the service.
Although Google is more open than many companies about allowing third-party developers to work on its platform, said Goel, thriving in the Gmail ecosystem still requires something of a hacker mentality.
“The biggest challenge for us has been figuring out how to hack the Gmail interface,” said Goel. “Gmail’s API only lets you mess with the back end of the service. Part of the magic of what GMass does is that our code manipulates the Gmail interface to add new buttons.”
Technically speaking, that’s not a Google-sanctioned way of using the API. But companies like Boomerang, which lets users schedule emails to be sent at a later time, have relied on that approach for years without issues.
Well, almost without issues.
“There’s a small community of software developers who have gotten together to write some common libraries for this,” said Goel. “But Gmail’s code changes on a weekly basis, so anyone who tries to manipulate the interface has to keep up with that. It’s not like there’s a blog post or announcement. We notice because our software breaks.”
Google has yet to crack down on companies like Boomerang and GMass for circumventing the API’s intended use. Goel said he believes Google recognizes that the configurability companies like his offer are ultimately a boon for its customers.
“I’m sure they’re aware of what we’re doing, and they haven’t changed the Gmail code enough to break all of our apps permanently,” he said. “Ultimately, we make Gmail a better product, and a more attractive email platform.”
So until further notice, Goel will keep looking for new and inventive ways to hack your inbox — in a good way.
