Box It for Now or Later

I’m not big on hype, so the title of this post should mean something to you. Ryan Kuder, an online and off friend, pointed me to SimplyBox a few days ago, and I’ve been in love in with the application ever since. This is probably the first site/product I’ve blogged about in recent memory that actually makes my life easier.

SimplyBox is a service that lets you capture, share, and organize anything online. Think of it as a cross between social bookmarking (a la delicious) and social screen capture (à la Skitch). The beauty of SimplyBox is the browser plug-in that lets you capture and store everything while you stumble across the web.

This is a problem-solving app for me because I’m a tab-aholic—I hate closing out tabs—I’m constantly researching various sites for blog posts, so I end up with way too many windows and way too many tabs. Yes, I could bookmark each site, but that process has never worked for me because it’s too distracting. With SimplyBox, I click “Box and Save,” create a box around content (images, text, etc) I want to remember, and then drag that saved screen grab to one of the boxes I’ve already created.

Once I return to view my boxed content, I can change the view of each individual box to either free form (drag and drop functionality), list view, or grid view depending on my preferences. I can also select previously saved content to either return to the source, share and comment on the individual items with friends or co-workers, print it, or save it to my computer.

Even though I’m quickly falling for SimplyBox, Skitch will still be the standby app I use for screen graps, simply because I can resize images on the fly. Once SimplyBox adds new functionality, and they will, I see this becoming the only thing I use for managing my manic web navigation craziness. Seriously it’s definitely worth a look.

According to the CEO

I’m such a huge fan of the product that I asked CEO Mario Cavagnari to answer a few questions via email. Here’s what he had to say.

Q. Where did the idea come from? What was the inspiration?

A. Around 05/06 we were thinking of starting a web paper that would have a very international flavor and the content would come from knowledgeable experts throughout the world, not from journalists. In early 07 we thought of a feature that would be cool for our readers – a “coffee table”, a place where the reader would be able to put the parts of our content that he/she liked. That’s when we had the “aha moment”: let’s give people a “coffee table” or a BOX where they can keep and share content from any site. I’ve always liked SimplyRed, so the name was set. From the get go we wanted the solution to be visual and easy. We felt, and feel, that is the only way to engage the masses.

Q. Is there an easy way to resize images?

A. Good observation. It is part of our road map and it should be done by the end of Feb.09.

Q. Who do you see as SimplyBox’s primary direct competitor?

A. Clipmarks. They were actually bought by Forbes in late 07. We think our user experience is much cleaner and easier. (Jenn says, “I completely agree.”)

Q. Are there any additional features you plan to roll out in the near future?

A. By early 09 we will release an iPhone version that will allow the user to capture, organize, and share from the iPhone (Jenn says, “I want this right now”). We are also working on a lot of enhancements for Sharing, particularly with the notion of Public Boxes (boxes that can be shared with non-SimplyBox users). We will also be integrating with Facebook and Twitter. Search, Open APIs, and more …

Q. Do you have any metrics you can share? Total registered members?

A. One of the metrics we were particularly interested in keeping an eye on was related to stickyness. About 1/3 of the users that sign up become regular frequent users. We have been live for approx 2 months, and out of every 100 people that visit the site 15 people sign up. Which is good news. But we need to continue to make noise and expose the solution to more people. The current conversion rates are not bad at all, but we do want to improve them. That is why part of our commercial game plan is to bring our user experience to sites that have large user bases – basically making them better. We are actually in the design/building phase of a licensing deal with a very large international portal.

Q. How many people do you have your team?

A. Four full time, and two contractors.

Q. Is SimplyBox funded?

A. Yes, by an angel. Luckly we raised money before the crisis. We are actually in a good funding position.

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