Welcome to the latest episode of ExtraMile by HiTechNectar! Join us and explore the insightful discussion with industry experts as they share the current trends in tech, marketing tips, and insider knowledge.
In this exciting interview, we will talk with Michael Olsen, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Mailbird, to learn about his journey in revolutionizing the way we manage emails. Mailbird is an award-winning email client for Windows and MacOS that brings together different ways to communicate in one easy-to-use platform.
Michael discusses how he came up with the business idea, faced the challenges of remote work, and launched Mailbird for Mac in October 2024. He also shares the innovative features that make Mailbird stand out.
Accompany us as we unveil the future of email, understand how AI can improve user experience, and get helpful advice for those wanting to start their own businesses.
Hello Michael, greetings for the day!
Q1. Can you tell us about your journey in starting your business? What inspired you to create it?
Ans. The inspiration for Mailbird came to us more than 12 years ago. My friend and business partner Michael Bodekaer was using Sparrow at the time, an email client for OS X, later acquired by Google. We talked about it and realized there was no similar alternative for Windows. So we decided to build one: a clean, efficient, and user-friendly email management app.
I’ve been a software engineer my entire adult life, and I’d been creating tech products for years. Taking on a new project and building a business felt tremendously exciting.
It wasn’t easy, though. I’m based in Denmark, and most of the core team back then was in Bali. We had to find a way to work together efficiently, despite being thousands of miles apart. Remote work wasn’t as common as it is today, and there weren’t as many communication and task management tools available. But we soon found our rhythm and style, even though we never had a physical office.
I’m still in Denmark, and some of my colleagues are still in Bali. In the meantime, our team has grown to 30 people from all around the world. I’m very content with the culture we created.
Also, Mailbird took off pretty quickly. We had minimal outside investments – for the most part, it was bootstrapped. Now, Mailbird for Windows has More than four million users worldwide, and we just launched our Mac application. Over the years, thousands of people asked us to build it. We’re elated that it’s finally live!
Q2. PCWorld named Mailbird “the best email client for Windows. What do you think helped you achieve this, and how does it inspire your team?
Ans. It felt incredibly rewarding to hear that. It’s a testament to our team’s hard work and our genuine desire and effort to make a great product.
What I think helped us is that Mailbird solves a real pain point and offers an easy and fun user experience. People are often overwhelmed by email. Having to juggle between several accounts can be exhausting. Mailbird alleviates this pressure by allowing you to bring all your inboxes into one single platform and manage them from there.
What’s more, you can connect your favorite social media and task management apps. Mailbird integrates with Facebook, X, LinkedIn, Asana, Slack, Google Workspace, and many others. It’s evolved into a digital workspace that makes work and communication more efficient.
Q3. What new features can users look forward to in your latest release,‘Mailbird 3.0’, and how will these updates improve the user experience?
Ans. Mailbird 3.0 is our latest Windows version and comes with the very best features we have to offer. There are the core features that we’ve been adding to over the years: unified inbox, send later, snooze, customizable themes and email signatures, advanced search.
On top of that, we’re adding a new suite of features, some of them suggested by our customers:
- AI replies. Based on previous replies, Mailbird’s AI tool can suggest a contextual answer. AI replies save time and improve email management flow.
- Inbox categories. We surveyed our users and found out they enjoy Gmail’s categories. So we’re planning to add inbox categories to replicate the web-based email experience. It will sort emails in your primary inbox and promotions inbox. Right now you can have a similar experience with filters and rules.
- Advanced Email Signatures. Mailbird already provides email signatures, but the advanced feature will be even better.
Our newest product, Mailbird for Mac, has just launched, and it comes with several of the features our Windows users love. Unified inbox, email tracking, third-party app integrations, advanced search capabilities, folders, and email signatures are a part of the Mailbird experience across platforms.
Q4. What special feature makes your email app different from others?
Ans. The feature our users seem to love the most is the unified inbox. The reason it’s so popular is because it solves the biggest pain point related to email. By unifying your accounts, you don’t have to jump from one inbox to another. Instead, you can have one central hub for all your emails and stay on top of your communication.
If we’re talking about our approach to the Mailbird app as a whole, I think it’s our obsession with customer experience that has earned us so many loyal users. It’s my passion to perfect every little detail and make sure things are flowing smoothly. Over time, people have come to recognize that, and word-of-mouth has been instrumental to our endurance and wide adoption.
Q5. What steps do you take to keep a positive and productive work environment?
Ans. As a fully remote team, we knew we had to put in extra effort to keep the team engaged and productive. First, communication is vital: we’re open, prompt, and transparent. Our open-door policy has encouraged everyone to express their ideas and opinions.
Also, we have one-on-one conversations with our team members where we discuss any potential roadblocks and goals they’d like to accomplish. Having a sense of purpose and growth matters a lot to them.
The fact that our employees can set their own schedule also keeps our work environment positive and productive. There are some core hours where we all agreed to be available, but other than that, everyone can design their day around their best working hours.
Q6. How do you collect and use feedback from users in your development process? Can you share an example of a big change that came from user suggestions?
Ans. We collect user feedback all the time, and we do it through all available channels: from beta testers, customer support tickets, social media, surveys, and app usage patterns. This information has always been valuable to us as it’s helped us shape Mailbird into the app it is today.
Being aware of what our customers and users need and want – and how those needs and preferences change over time – lets us build relevant features.
User feedback makes its way into almost all Mailbird departments: product development, engineering, and even marketing. That way, we can plan projects in advance and focus on those that allow us to stay nimble and continue to grow.
Q7. What challenges have you faced till date? How do you encourage creativity and new ideas within your team?
Ans. We’ve had three major challenges.
- Dealing with competitors with way bigger budgets. We can’t outperform them in terms of spending, as we’re a self-funded company. Some of our competitors are worth billions of dollars, yet our website gets up to 10 times more traffic. We go the extra mile in every area of our expertise, like SEO.
- Opening up new acquisition channels. After a while, every channel gets oversaturated. You need to come up with crazy and/or smart ideas to overcome that challenge while making the unit economics work.
- How to best serve our users while integrating the changes happening in the email market, without alienating them with a one-for-all solution. It requires us to clearly define what problem we’re trying to solve – and how we want to solve it. We won’t be jumping the gun on every little move our competitors make just to make sure we offer something similar. An example would be not adding every new feature out there if it doesn’t fit with our vision of an easy-to-use email client.
As for how we encourage creativity and new ideas, our culture is such that everyone feels free and encouraged to express their suggestions. We have regular meetings where we talk about our features and updates, and at the end, we spend 10-15 minutes sharing new ideas.
Some of these ideas stem from customer interactions or things happening in the market or the world. Others come from the creative minds in our team.
Mailbird’s Head of Growth, Alexis Dolle, loves to experiment and test different approaches. Whether it’s products, SEO, marketing, or sales tactics, the team knows they can always go to Alexis and present him with a new idea. I’m equally interested in what our colleagues bring to the table – it’s how we’ve grown as a company and as a team.
Q8. How are you using artificial intelligence to improve email management, and what benefits do you think it brings to users?
Ans. We use artificial intelligence to save our users time and energy. For instance, our upcoming email authoring feature will allow you to reply to an email in seconds. When you manage several inboxes and you’re trying to be responsive, every minute counts. You can go through your messages faster and move on to other tasks. The ChatGPT integration is one of our most popular features.
Another feature that’s coming soon is Inbox categories, which partly uses AI to sort emails and segment them into groups that make sense to you. Later, we’re planning to add a dedicated spam filter using AI to determine whether an email belongs in your inbox or your spam folder.
Q9. Can you explain how you decide which productivity tools to add to your app? What do you consider when making those choices?
Ans. Most of the tools Mailbird integrates with were suggested by our customers and users. We pay close attention to what they say. If a certain app comes up a lot in reviews or customer support conversations, we add it to our list of priorities.
For instance, with ChatGPT seeing record-breaking adoption as soon as it came out, we put that integration at the top of the list. Our community has also asked us to bring their calendars into their Mailbird accounts, so we did that. Same with Grammarly, social media apps like Facebook, X, and LinkedIn, and even WhatsApp.
Q10. What advice would you give to young people or new entrepreneurs who want to start their own businesses?
Ans. The first thing I’d say is: don’t overthink it.
Things can be really messy in the early stage, but try to find excitement in that chaos. The best approach to improving your product is user feedback, so don’t be afraid to launch, even if you don’t feel “Ready.” You’ll get helpful feedback and insights – that brings you clarity on your next move.
Also, measure your efforts from day one. Keeping an eye on what works and what doesn’t saves you time and energy. You can focus on what matters most to your customers and offer them the best product and experience.
Finally, take the time to celebrate every achievement. That gives you strength to overcome any obstacles and enthusiasm to move forward.
Q11. What trends do you think will shape the future of email, and how do you plan to stay ahead of them?
Ans. AI will continue to disrupt nearly all industries, and it’s already transforming email technology. We integrate AI into Mailbird, too, and so do many other email companies.
The future of email is all about creating friction-free, meaningful, and safe experiences for people. Some of the trends we’ll see more of include:
- Deeper personalization. As AI evolves, expect emails to go beyond the typical personalization we’re all familiar with. Think hyper-relevant content that feels made specifically for each recipient. This will play a huge role in boosting engagement and building long-lasting relationships with our audiences.
- Heightened security. Cyber threats are prevalent and many consumers fall prey to phishing scams. Just this year, large email service providers like Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft enforced email authentication to verify sender identity. Both companies and individuals have to stay vigilant.
- Preserving what makes us human. The future of email won’t revolve around piling on new features but creating a seamless experience that works for you. We don’t want email to make you a superhuman but instead, be your superhero so you can preserve what makes you human. AI will sort your emails, identify what’s urgent and what’s not, weed out spam, separate cold emails, and even suggest responses that match your style. With AI handling the details, you get to focus on the human moments – the little things that are unique to you.
Explore Our Other Insightful Interviews:
Exploring AI-Driven Marketing Strategies: A Conversation with Sheila Morin, CMO of Coveo
