MailTank 3 is here!

We are proud to roll out Mailtank 3 this month.

A lot of hard work has gone into this release and as always we are continually making tweaks and minor fixes based on your feedback.

The most notable features to announce are: abolished storage limits, rules for processing messages and notifications, and chained templates.

Many of the other improvements are based upon customer requests and feedback as well as solutions to problems we faced in our work as well.

Here is a list of the major changes in this update:

Unlimited storage

Businesses of all sizes need to know their inbox will never be full. MailTank 3 removes the previous storage limitation of 1 Gigabyte, so now you can keep all of your business email in one place: MailTank.

Basic Rules

Processing messages with rules can greatly improve management of large volumes of email. The rules editor can be found in your MailTank’s Control Panel. Rules are very easy to use, handling basic processing tasks such as tagging messages, changing the message status, and even sending simple notifications. The rules are triggered when a string of text is matched by either the subject or the sender of an incoming message.

Chained Templates (templates with follow-up)

To improve on the power of templates, we have added the ability to create templates with a follow-up. This let you ‘chain’ a template to another template, that will automatically be sent a predetermined number of days after the first template is used on a reply.

Chained Templates help you reach out and touch customers after a technical support issue, or perhaps to request they fill-out a post sales survey. The possibilities are yours to explore.

At present, you can only chain two templates together.

Improved user interface

We have spent some time simplifying the design and adding more features without simply crowding the page with more stuff to look at. In a number of cases fewer ‘clicks’ are required to perform tasks. This system wide improvement includes updates to the mobile interface and the new iPhone interface as well.

Message contact filters

These filters help discover contact information in the body of an email. Specifically it is designed to work with emails generated by web forms, commonly used for sales and contact forms on web sites which obscure customer contact information. Now, with the click of a link, MailTank will retrieve contact information embedded in form based email so creating contacts is easier than ever.

Broadcasts

Broadcasts are used to send a message to a small group of contacts. You can select a tagged group of contacts and send an email to that group. While not aimed at marketing campaigns, Broadcasts are for talking to a small group of contacts, currently a maximum of 25.

Template sorting

Templates are now sorted alphabetically, instead of by number of times used. This change was done to make the template menu easier to use.

Templates are now global

Template are no longer linked to a team. Like contacts, they are accessible everywhere within the MailTank.

Tags, tags, tags.

As long as a contact is linked to a message, when tagging a message inside the message viewer, the contact will also be tagged with the same tags as the message.

Message and Contact tags are now combined so your contacts are automatically grouped and accessible from multiple directions.

You can also tag groups of messages in the Queue, using the same interface you are used to with Rapid Reply. Select the messages you want and tag them all at once to save time.

Adding tags to a message or a contact is now done using ‘clicks.’ Once a tag has been added to the set of universal tags clicking the desired tag automatically inserts tags into the tag fields.

Revamped message viewer

The message viewer and message threads have been refined to make messages easier to read, and lay the groundwork for some upcoming improvements.

Icons!

We have added icons to help organize information and communicate functionality.

Keeping tabs of messages

There are two features to help you keep tabs on the traffic in your MailTank – Queue Reports and RSS Feeds.

Queue Reports are messages sent every 3 hours that indicate the number of Pending messages in your MailTank queue.

While we had RSS feeds for message hidden away in version 2 of MailTank, they are now a full fledged feature. You can get an RSS feed of the all pending messages in your MailTank queue, messages in your archive, and the replies that have been sent.

Sent messages are really replies

In previous incarnations of MailTank we used the term Sent to describe messages, which seems to be a mistake we made. When you respond to an email in MailTank, you are creating a ‘reply’, that ‘reply’ is then sent to the customer. It seems subtle, but it caused confusion in the past.

In MailTank 3, we have added a Replies tab to help clarify what type of message you are looking at, and to show where to go when you need to find a reply from your business to a customer.

Reporting improvements

Statistical reporting for teams and users have been improved. You can now click on the reporting numbers to view the list of actual messages and replies.

We have also changed the way stats work, so reports are now focused on messages completed and replies sent. For an overview of pending work, use the Queue Manager permission in your Control Panel to see all work pending. You can also enable the Queue Reporting or take advantage of the RSS feed for the Queue.

That should cover the list of improvements in MailTank 3. There is a lot here so please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions at all.