Earlier this year, we introduced a change to the way Organizer labels emails in Gmail accounts. Instead of using a single “OtherInbox” label, Gmail Organizer now uses new OIB labels that help categorize emails as they are organized.

Based on the feedback we received, the majority of our users liked these new labels. However, some missed the ability to select a single label or folder in Gmail to view all organized emails at once.

We listened and have added a new “OIB” label for all organized emails. Because Gmail allows multiple labels, every organized email now has its category label and the OIB label. The benefit is you can now see your organized emails by category or all at once.

Nested labels

When you combine this “OIB” label with Gmail’s Nested Labels (a Gmail lab), the result is nested labels right inside of Gmail that can be collapsed and expanded. This is a great way to keep your labels nice and neat. We recommend that you give it a try. Just follow these instructions to turn it on:

• In Gmail, go to Settings, then Labs (or click the green flask icon next to Settings)
• Find the lab Nested Labels and click Enable
• Scroll to the top or bottom of the list and click Save Changes

As we continue to enhance Organizer, we are also investing in new ways to integrate with the top email platforms and environments, making it as easy as possible for users to enjoy the benefits of a clean Inbox.

Today we are happy to announce our release of Organizer for Google Apps! Get it here.

Working closely with the Google Apps marketplace team we have developed a
version of Organizer that can be installed by any Google Apps domain
administrator for all their users with a single push of a button.

Individual users in that domain can then activate Organizer with a
single click from within the Google Universal Navigation menu or from
their “more” tab within Google Apps.

Once activated, Organizer goes to work, labeling commercial emails and
archiving the messages in easy-to-access folders while leaving
prioritized emails from real people in the primary Inbox.  A daily
digest ensures that users see a full inventory of the emails that were
received and then filed – ensuring nothing is lost.

If you are a Google Apps domain administrator why not give it a try, and help all your users get the benefits of a clutter free, organized Inbox.

Last year when we developed Automatic Organizer, our Yahoo! Mail application, we used Browser-Based Authentication (BBAuth) to connect OtherInbox to Yahoo! Mail accounts. BBAuth allowed Yahoo! Mail users to authorize OtherInbox to connect to their email accounts without needing to give up their Yahoo! passwords.

This was great! It allowed us to connect to Yahoo! Mail accounts and still provide our users the safety and protection of never giving out their Yahoo! passwords. In addition, our users could disconnect from OtherInbox from their Yahoo! Mail settings if they desired.

However, using BBAuth to access Yahoo! Mail accounts proved to have a couple limitations:

• If the user changed his or her Yahoo! password, the OtherInbox connection was broken.
• We had to create an OtherInbox account for each user. This meant each user had another username and password to keep track of.

Two things happened after our application was created that allowed us to improve the user experience immensely. Last September, Yahoo! announced support for the OpenID OAuth Hybrid Protocol. This powerful protocol allows Yahoo! users to sign in to external sites and allow for two-way data sharing all in one step. This potentially meant our users would no longer need an OtherInbox login.

Second, earlier this year Yahoo! introduced an OAuth API for Yahoo! Mail for all Yahoo! Mail accounts. Now, we could take advantage of the Hybrid Protocol to offer our Yahoo! Mail Organizer users a greatly enhanced experience.

The advantages?

• A user changing his or her Yahoo! password no longer breaks the OtherInbox connection
• Users can sign in to OtherInbox with their Yahoo! username and password

For our users, this meant no longer needing to remember another username and password. Because of the Hybrid Protocol, the signup process (and setting up OAuth and OpenID) is completed in just one step.

We also experienced some positive changes. When we used BBAuth, we received many inquiries from our users about how to access their OtherInbox account. We had to create an OtherInbox account for every new user with a unique username and password.

Despite our best efforts, many users would still be confused. Some would try their Yahoo! credentials to sign in to OtherInbox and subsequently get locked out. We would receive 100-200 inquiries like this every month.

After taking advantage of the Hybrid Protocol, these inquiries have dropped to effectively zero. We have also seen some evidence that our deactivation rate has dropped, especially amongst new users who have had Organizer installed for less than 30 days.

Overall, we believe switching to OAuth and OpenID allows us to provide our users a far superior experience and provides us with a product that will have higher conversion and retention rates.

Previously on this blog, Joshua Baer asked our Gmail Organizer users for their feedback. Organized messages are currently labeled with just one OtherInbox label. Josh suggested an alternative: multiple OIB labels like those in our Yahoo! Mail Organizer product. We wanted to know which you thought was better.

Based on your feedback from the blog, on our support site, and via emails from our users, the answer was clear. We will be introducing multiple OIB labels for Gmail Organizer on Monday, May 17. We think our Gmail Organizer users will enjoy having their messages categorized with these new labels as much as our Yahoo! Mail Organizer users do.

Too many labels? You can hide them!

With the new OIB labels, the list of labels in Gmail may become a bit lengthy. You can control this by going to Settings, then Labels, to choose which labels you want to see when Gmail loads. Clicking hide next to any label will hide it from the default view. This is a great way to highlight your most important labels so they stand out when you open Gmail.

Nested labels

You may have noticed a different naming scheme for OIB labels. Instead of OIB Shopping, like one of the folders in Yahoo! Mail Organizer, the Gmail version has a slash — OIB/Shopping. Why did we do this? So OIB labels will nest over IMAP.

If you read your Gmail messages over IMAP, OIB labels will group together under a parent folder named OIB. Depending on your email client, you may be able to collapse and expand this folder. This helps keep the folder list in your client organized and tidy.

Don't use IMAP? There is a Gmail Labs feature to show nested folders in the web version of Gmail as well! Just follow these instructions to turn it on:

• In Gmail, go to Settings, then Labs (or click the green flask icon next to Settings)
• Find the lab Nested Labels and click Enable
• Scroll to the top or bottom of the list and click Save Changes
• Go to Settings, then Labels
• Find the blank for creating a new label and create one called OIB

The result is nested labels that can be collapsed and expanded right inside of Gmail!

We really hope our Gmail Organizer users love using these new labels as much as our Yahoo! Mail Organizer users do. Combining OIB labels with some of the advanced features in Gmail make for a great way to keep your Inbox organized, automatically! To connect OtherInbox to your Gmail account, sign up with your Gmail account today!

Since we launched Organizer for Yahoo! Mail a year ago, the application has undergone several makeovers. It got the job done, but as with most applications in their first generation, it was definitely in need of some polish.

Below is what Organizer for Yahoo! Mail looked like when we launched the application just one year ago. Senders were listed in alphabetical order and not by folder. The sender's name could not be changed. Even the folders a sender was organized into could not be changed.

We've come a long way from these humble beginnings. There have been at least three complete redesigns of the application in the past year.

Our most recent redesign gives Organizer a fresh new look. As a Yahoo! Mail application, we wanted to reinforce how Organizer works with Yahoo! Mail. For example, you may notice the folder icons and the font for the folder names match how Yahoo! Mail presents folders. 

New features we've introduced in the past twelve months have also influenced the design. Grouping senders by folder allow you to drag-and-drop a sender from one folder to another. Since the most common action a user is likely to take is turning off the organizing of a sender, we've made this Folders page the first thing you see when you open the application.

What do you think of the current design? How can we make it better and easier to use?

It's even easier to invite your friends!

We love that so many of our users want to share Organizer with their friends and family. To make this even easier, we've added a new Invitations page right inside the application. Just click the Invitations tab to get started.

Click "Suggest people" and we will make some suggestions based on your sent messages. Or, just enter in the email addresses of your friends and family in the designated spaces. Review the message and click "Send invitations" and we will send your message with a link directly to the signup page. You can even track the status of your invitations in the column on the right. 

Along with much of the internet community, we were highly anticipating Google's new social sharing tool, Google Buzz. Because Buzz is highly integrated into Gmail, we began to think about how OtherInbox should work with Buzz updates.

Currently, pointing OtherInbox at your Gmail account means automatically labeling and archiving all of your messages that aren't from real people (newsletters, coupons, receipts, confirmations, and alerts). This includes notifications from various social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

When we started using Buzz, we noticed there are a few actions that result in a lot more email. For example if anyone replies or likes one of your updates, you get a notification in your Inbox. In addition, if you reply or like someone else's update, future replies also result in another email. More Buzz activity leads to even more notification emails!

Pretty soon, our Gmail Inbox became overwhelmed with Buzz notifications. As one of our developers said, it is going to be difficult to maintain "Buzz Zero" as it grows.

The question is "How would you like OtherInbox to handle these new notifications?"

We could easily add the labeling and archiving of Buzz notifications that reach your Inbox, just like all the other messages we organize. This way, you could get a Digest that lists all of your Buzz notifications from the previous day. But is that what you want?

Now is your chance to tell us what would work for you. Please leave your comments and ideas below so we can better shape OtherInbox for Gmail.

When we connect OtherInbox to a Gmail account, we automatically find messages that aren't from real people and organize them inside of your Gmail account by labeling them OtherInbox and removing them from the Inbox by Archiving them. We synchronize the messages with your OtherInbox account and send you a daily digest so you don't miss anything important.