One of the tools that I spend a decent amount of time utilizing is a service called Boomerang for Gmail. The service is a nice add-on to your Gmail inbox and while they have been rolling out some nice upgrades over time, the main function is to have emails come back into your inbox whenever you’d like.
I’ve had this service featured on the Gadarian Digital Resources Page for a while now, but one thing I just noticed is that the folks at Boomerang for Gmail seem to be trying to garner some viral magic as they are currently running a fun rewards program – if you use any of the links to Boomerang from this page and are new to Boomerang I understand we both get a spin on their “wheel of prizes.” Some really nice prizes, but I’m pretty sure the biggest winners would be getting some time to talk with them about email this and email that. And even without the prizes, if you are using Gmail in any kind of business sense, installing Boomerang should help a great deal with your email productivity.
This is a great way to follow up on things, and to keep on track. I like that it allows you to have emails “Boomerang” back if they have not yet been responded to, or if you’d prefer you can elect to have them show up at the top of your inbox even if they have already been responded to.
A nice new feature they’ve included is the ability to track if emails have been opened yet. With outlook this was pretty easy to accomplish, but in Gmail for whatever reason it is not a standard offering. Not that I need to track every open, but on occasion it nice. And yes, they offer up the recipient of your emails the option to not notify you…
Another nice feature that I never use, but probably should is with Boomerang I can schedule emails to be sent later.
Here is a video they’ve put together…
They operate on a “freemium model” but I will say that the free version is extremely robust. The paid version is currently set up in 2 tiers, with a lower cost version for Gmail proper users and a higher priced version for Google Apps for Business users. I currently use the free version and I’ve been very happy, but the paid versions seem to offer up a mobile app that I am certainly curious about….
It’s interesting that the “inbox” space seems to be heating up right now, which overall is a really good thing for all email users. My observation with regard to Boomerang is that while it feels early for this group, the service right now is really great but I suspect they’ll continue to roll out some wonderful upgrades over time and that this is a company that will provide a nice complement to your inbox and will continue to make the entire inbox experience incrementally better as they continue to evolve and grow as a company.
So go ahead and have some fun with this one. If you are not yet a user and you install I suspect that much like myself a while back you’ll be wondering what took you so long. Of course if you do plug it in, or are a longtime Boomerang user, feel free to share your thoughts below.