5 ms·

Sendwithus (YC W14) Announces $2.3M to Humanize Transactional Email

51 points by alexophile 12y ago

mrmch 12y ago
Cofounder of Sendwithus -- I just wanted to give an additional shout out to some of the amazing angel investors included in this round. Full details on AngelList (https://angel.co/sendwithus https://angel.co/sendwithus). I think it shows how funding in the valley has changed when a company founded and based in a tiny Canadian city (Victoria, BC) can grow like this.
- gwintrob 12y ago
  Congrats, Matt and team! They're building something that's seriously valuable for any SaaS business. If you send transactional emails, check out this guide: https://www.sendwithus.com/resources/guide/ https://www.sendwithus.com/resources/guide/
- pedrosorren1 12y ago
  Congrats to SWU. You guys rock and are the example that there is still a lot of innovation to happen in the world of email.
Animats 12y ago
By "humanize transactional email", they mean "make spam more effective". We're going to need filters for transactional emails that filter out the spam part.
- FooBarWidget 12y ago
  What? Transactional emails are by definition not bulk emails. They're sent in response to an event, like when you've requested a password reset or when the system warns that the CPU is on fire.
  - mrmch 12y ago
    Exactly this; transactional or product based emails are baked into every web service or mobile app you use today. People depend on them for information they want, but the content shouldn't be owned by a developer. That's our goal :)
  - Iftheshoefits 12y ago
    E-mail doesn't have to be bulk to have spam in it. Not that I agree that the implication the parent post makes will be widespread, but I can certainly see some companies using such e-mails as an intrusive (spammy) marketing opportunity.
    - Animats 12y ago
      They already do. Blocking images in emails usually helps. Blocking third-party content is essential. Some of the usual suspects, such as "constantcontact", should just be blocked.
    - markdown 12y ago
      We're sad because we haven't heard from you in 12hrs. Did we do something wrong? Do you not love us? Log in now to show your love for our amazeballs saas app that was handcrafted with love and powered by coffee.
- noelwelsh 12y ago
  Nope.
ldec 12y ago
Absolutely a fantastic tool - well done, and thankyou for existing! Very happy I can depend on you sticking around.
bedane 12y ago
You mean I'll have to read through marketing BS when I need an important piece of data in an email I just received? Wow, can't wait.
- bvanvugt 12y ago
  Email Marketing is changing. It's no longer about spamming customers with "marketing BS" whenever possible. It's about sending the right content at the right time and delighting your customers. Email (especially transactional email) should be an extension of your product, owned by creative and ambitious product teams - that's what Sendwithus enables.
doublerebel 12y ago
This is exactly what I've been looking for but couldn't find! Fantastic. Sendgrid strips HTML tags in their Template Engine but doesn't document it -- I debugged their WYSIWYG editor and gave them the source of the problem, but they asked me to send a video. After 4 rounds with support I had nearly given up on finding a good service that mashes developers with the marketing and design departments. Three tips: 1. Please optimize your SEO! Searching for transactional email, transactional email service, transactional email comparison, I don't and didn't see you in results. (Guess I should have asked Hootsuite :) 2. I signed up from my mobile so I wouldn't forget -- your dash seems to work great except the gravatar/account is fixed position. 3. I tried to sign back in to confirm #2, but the log in link is nonexistent on mobile. Congrats on the funding round from a fellow BC startup! Hope to see you around :)
- mrmch 12y ago
  Hello fellow BC startup! I've brought your tips up with the team, thanks for your feedback! We use Jinja templates behind the scene, which doesn't autoescape by default -- so you're free to inject HTML through a variable. You can manually escape template variables with {{ my_var|e }}.
- sethammons 12y ago
  I'm a dev at SendGrid. I pointed out your comment to my product owner. He would love to chat with you to see what we can do to improve. Hit up my email in my profile, and I'll get you two in touch.

51 points by alexophile 12y ago

mrmch 12y ago

Cofounder of Sendwithus -- I just wanted to give an additional shout out to some of the amazing angel investors included in this round. Full details on AngelList (https://angel.co/sendwithus https://angel.co/sendwithus). I think it shows how funding in the valley has changed when a company founded and based in a tiny Canadian city (Victoria, BC) can grow like this.

gwintrob 12y ago
Congrats, Matt and team! They're building something that's seriously valuable for any SaaS business. If you send transactional emails, check out this guide: https://www.sendwithus.com/resources/guide/ https://www.sendwithus.com/resources/guide/
pedrosorren1 12y ago
Congrats to SWU. You guys rock and are the example that there is still a lot of innovation to happen in the world of email.

Animats 12y ago

By "humanize transactional email", they mean "make spam more effective". We're going to need filters for transactional emails that filter out the spam part.

FooBarWidget 12y ago
What? Transactional emails are by definition not bulk emails. They're sent in response to an event, like when you've requested a password reset or when the system warns that the CPU is on fire.
- mrmch 12y ago
  Exactly this; transactional or product based emails are baked into every web service or mobile app you use today. People depend on them for information they want, but the content shouldn't be owned by a developer. That's our goal :)
- Iftheshoefits 12y ago
  E-mail doesn't have to be bulk to have spam in it. Not that I agree that the implication the parent post makes will be widespread, but I can certainly see some companies using such e-mails as an intrusive (spammy) marketing opportunity.
  - Animats 12y ago
    They already do. Blocking images in emails usually helps. Blocking third-party content is essential. Some of the usual suspects, such as "constantcontact", should just be blocked.
  - markdown 12y ago
    We're sad because we haven't heard from you in 12hrs. Did we do something wrong? Do you not love us? Log in now to show your love for our amazeballs saas app that was handcrafted with love and powered by coffee.
noelwelsh 12y ago
Nope.

ldec 12y ago

Absolutely a fantastic tool - well done, and thankyou for existing! Very happy I can depend on you sticking around.

bedane 12y ago

You mean I'll have to read through marketing BS when I need an important piece of data in an email I just received? Wow, can't wait.

bvanvugt 12y ago
Email Marketing is changing. It's no longer about spamming customers with "marketing BS" whenever possible. It's about sending the right content at the right time and delighting your customers. Email (especially transactional email) should be an extension of your product, owned by creative and ambitious product teams - that's what Sendwithus enables.

doublerebel 12y ago

This is exactly what I've been looking for but couldn't find! Fantastic. Sendgrid strips HTML tags in their Template Engine but doesn't document it -- I debugged their WYSIWYG editor and gave them the source of the problem, but they asked me to send a video. After 4 rounds with support I had nearly given up on finding a good service that mashes developers with the marketing and design departments. Three tips: 1. Please optimize your SEO! Searching for transactional email, transactional email service, transactional email comparison, I don't and didn't see you in results. (Guess I should have asked Hootsuite :) 2. I signed up from my mobile so I wouldn't forget -- your dash seems to work great except the gravatar/account is fixed position. 3. I tried to sign back in to confirm #2, but the log in link is nonexistent on mobile. Congrats on the funding round from a fellow BC startup! Hope to see you around :)

mrmch 12y ago
Hello fellow BC startup! I've brought your tips up with the team, thanks for your feedback! We use Jinja templates behind the scene, which doesn't autoescape by default -- so you're free to inject HTML through a variable. You can manually escape template variables with {{ my_var|e }}.
sethammons 12y ago
I'm a dev at SendGrid. I pointed out your comment to my product owner. He would love to chat with you to see what we can do to improve. Hit up my email in my profile, and I'll get you two in touch.