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1. How did you start your online business?
The idea for BigMailBox actually came from one of our executives who was setting up web-based email for one particular site. During setup we realized we could provide many domains with a web-based email solution. We looked ahead and were able to anticipate what the next year's trends would be, and BigMailBox was created. We were the first company to offer co-branded web-based email for webmasters and a few other companies followed. What makes BigMailBox number one is our commitment to maintaining one of the best customer service departments on the Internet.
2. How does your business help webmasters?
BigMailBox empowers individuals and businesses of any size to offer free Web-based email at their Web sites to enhance brand loyalty and optimize repeat traffic. When a user signs-up for an email account at their domain, the user will keep coming back to the site in order to check their email account. BigMailBox also provides its affiliates with an email signature. The email signature is sent on every email that is sent by the webmaster, as well as every email that their users send out. This is free word-of-mouth advertising for the webmaster's site, free email system, or current promotions. The webmaster also has the ability to send an email to all of their user accounts. This feature can be used to promote products and services within their site and/or the webmaster's other web sites. We also provide the webmaster with a percentage of the banner advertising that appears in the web-based email system. Webmasters can use this banner space to promote their other sites, or certain sponsored ads.
3. How did you go about promoting your web site?
BigMailBox went "door-to-door" looking for great web sites that would benefit from our services and sent the webmaster a personalized solicitation and responded quickly to any questions webmasters had. BigMailBox has not spent any money on advertising. We instead decided to concentrate on using our resources to hire our highly qualified staff. It is people that drives this business. At BigMailBox we feel that customer service is a top priority and strive to have the best Customer Service Department on the Internet. We receive numerous phone calls from webmasters stating that they heard about our service from a current BigMailBox affiliate and the reason they want to use our mail system is because of our excellent reputation in system reliability and customer relations. BigMailBox has, and continues link trading. If you have a tool that is helpful to webmasters, in exchange for putting our logo on your site, we will place your logo in our webmaster Tips & Resources section.
4. When did you start your business?
We started programming in 1998 then named and launched the service as BigMailBox in January of 1999 for beta testing. We hired a full marketing staff that summer and remained in beta testing until November of 1999 at which time our beta testing was completed.
5. How has your business grown?
Once beta testing was completed and we started to market ourselves, the applications started rolling in. We built-up a reputation for superior customer service by word of mouth and our applications have risen to hundreds per day. BigMailBox grew much faster than we had originally anticipated. Like many other Internet companies that grow quickly, we reached maximum server capacity by December of 1999 and the system slowed down considerably. BigMailBox was determined to expand our resources as quickly as possible and did so by purchasing an EMC2 system as well as an additional Sun Oracle box near the end of January, 2000. Because of our excellent Customer Service Department we were able to answer every phone call that came in and respond to every email from our clients within 24 hours. This was able to ease the concerns of our affiliates through our, thankfully brief, "growing pains".
We'll be introducing our subdomain services soon and are prepared for the expected increase. We have also received attention from the media. There is an article about BigMailBox in the most recent copy of PC World Magazine. We also had articles written about our company by ZDNet and InternetNews.com. Copies of these articles can be found at our web site under the category "Press". These articles have had a great impact on the growth of our company and we now provide co-branded web-based email solutions for thousands of domains.
6. Do you have any tips for webmasters?
Customer service, customer service, customer service. If you have a marketable product, but do not provide great customer service, you will not have the competitive edge. Be sure to have the workforce to keep up with your clients' demands and they will remain loyal customers that recommend your services to other webmasters. For example, if you give BigMailBox a call between the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. PST and a live person does not answer the phone, we will give you the first month of our "Special Delivery" Program for free.
We recently received an email stating:
"Greetings, I wanted to pass along my sincerest appreciation to your [staff] who have been tirelessly helping me in a tech support situation. They have been providing me with the most outstanding support I have ever encountered with an Internet service, especially one that offers free services. I had prompt contact when reporting the problem, and they have been diligently working towards resolving the problem. Unfortunately my ISP admin is a bit grouchy and unhelpful so I think I am stuck. But, I wanted to let you know you have an excellent support staff who has gone above and beyond the call of duty expected. Please accept my deepest appreciation and I thank you for such an invaluable service.
Sincerely,
[private]"
We love getting these emails, it reminds us that our hard work is very much appreciated. We're certain that this BigMailBox affiliate will inform and recommend our services to other webmasters, thus increasing our userbase.
7. Do you have any other comments?
BigMailBox now offers two levels of service, "Totally Free" ad supported, or our new "Special Delivery" program. The new Special Delivery program gives the webmaster complete control over the advertising inside the web-based system in exchange for a monthly fee that is set according to the number of active users. We have now started accepting applications from subdomains as well, so if you are the webmaster of a subdomain, visit http://www.BigMailBox.com and sign-up!
Coming soon look for a new service option: POPmail Service with no banners available to large sites only. A setup fee and monthly minimums apply.
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