Postmatic Plugin Review

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Today I’m reviewing the Postmatic plugin, a new way to deliver posts & comments to your inbox.

The plugin was created by Jason Lemieux & Dylan Kuhn to beautifully marry WordPress and Email together. I had the chance to talk to Jason about the dedication he and his team have committed to their ambitious product. After talking with him for about an hour, it was clear that this is just the beginning. 

On the outside, Postmatic looks like a way to wrangle comments in your inbox — but I think it’s poised to become something much more.

Engagement, something we’re all looking to increase, is the name of the game. At least for me and at least for this current iteration of the product.

Postmatic Video Review

In this video, I walkthrough using the Postmatic plugin from an options overview and what it’s like to interact with comments in your inbox.

If you’re looking for support or an in-depth installation procedure, see their support documentation.

Attention to detail

Before we begin, wether you use this plugin or not, I wanted to call attention to the attention to detail that went into building this product.

If you’re anything like me, you might try about 20 new plugins per month. I rarely come across “startup” plugins that feel as refined as Postmatic does. From their admin screens to their press page, everything was done with a reason behind it.

By the end of this writeup, if you’re still on the fence about using their plugin or service, this type of care proves they are in it for the long haul and should be part of your consideration.

Kudos to the team.

All your commenting into the inboxdirect-reply

Commenting management via e-mail.

Do you need it? The short answer is, it depends.

It depends on the amount of commenting volume you receive now and how big of an itch that is for you to scratch. If you’re someone like Tommy McFarlin, a daily tech blogger, then it’s quite possibly heaven sent.

No more logging into the dashboard to approve/disapprove comments. Heck, you don’t even have to go to your website to reply to the comment. Simply reply to the e-mail the comment was delivered in and you’re done.

But is it worth the price tag of $9 a month per website?

Engagement and Personalization

I need more than just commenting to sell me, I need a higher level of engagement, and that’s where I think Postmatic will really shine.

In fact, I’d venture to say that this commenting thing, is really just the tip of the iceberg. When you start to see some of the initial features for customizing your e-mails via headers and footers — I think the opportunities start to fill themselves in.

If you’re building a brand online (and who isn’t nowadays?) every touch with your customer/reader is important. And while solving this commenting issue allows your reader a frictionless interaction with your site, it does allow you to custom tailor that experience to drive them back.

Areas of engagement

  • Comment summaries
  • Subscribing to the entire blog
  • Subscribing to the comments of a post
  • Providing unique headers
  • Providing native custom widget areas

And while solving this commenting issue allows your reader a frictionless interaction with your site, it does allow you to custom tailor that experience to drive them back.

Usecase examples

Custom headers

Postmatic allows you to upload a header image for each email you send to a reader. You could very well change this header image to include a special product promotion happening that month or the date to an upcoming event.

The idea is, you can be creative and play with the look and feel of your e-mails. I’m sure we’ll see this mature along the way.

Native widgets

In the video above, I used my product Conductor Plugin, to insert the 3 most recent blog posts from my blog. I could have very well used Conductor to pull in other custom pieces of content or even my WooCommerce products.

What we’re seeing here are the first steps to custom tailoring emails using native WordPress content. I dig it.

Wrapping up

I think the Postmatic team is really on to something here.

I can’t say I’m 100% sold on the commenting management functionality, but I am sold on what the future holds. Online businesses eventually hit a phase where increasing engagement to their website becomes exponentially more difficult. Using a plugin like Postmatic, is one way to see the numbers and brand recognition go up-n-to-the-right.

If you’re a business or a consultant looking to help increase traffic to your websites — this could be the ticket to get you there.

Give Postmatic a try! Leave a comment below and experience it for yourself! 


Comments

12 responses to “Postmatic Plugin Review”

  1. Matt! You nailed it! Thanks so much for the awesome review and especially the video.

    I’m convinced you aren’t sold on the commenting management yet because you just installed us. Give it a few posts and then we’ll see 🙂

    All my best,
    Jason

  2. Hey there Matt,

    Nice overview, mate, and completely agree, you can tell the Postmatic guys are serious about what they’re hoping to achieve.

    I’ve been on-board with them since February, though some of the beta iterations and the refinements they’ve been making, and each update makes me smile, because it’s clear they’re listening to not only the beta users, but their audience as well. If that doesn’t show a team that cares about the user experience, I don’t know what does. 😉

    As for engagement, I’ve probably doubled (and in some cases tripled) the amount of comments and deeper conversations on my blog since installing. It takes a little leap of faith to comment via email, but once you get your head around it, it quickly becomes second nature.

    Look forward to seeing where Postmatic goes (and great idea on the dynamic header option!).

    1. Jason Avatar
      Jason

      Awe. Thanks everyone!

      Matt, the conductor implementation that you have configured seems to be misfiring in the footer of the emails.

      I’d recommend disabling it temporarily. I will be working explicitly on conductor support over the next few days and will push out an update as soon as it is solid.

  3. Jason Avatar
    Jason

    Hey again Matt.

    I just watched the full video. I’m glad to see you love our native widgets system. I’m going to work on increasing Conductor compatibility so it will really shine.

    One tip you might not have thought of: You can use a conditional widgets plugin (there are some in our directory) to display different widgets on different posts, depending on their category… or time of day… or number of comments.. or whatever. Things get really interesting there as well.

    Thanks again, Jason

  4. Jenn Grainger Avatar
    Jenn Grainger

    Hi Matt great to see you only promote “the good stuff”

    I follow dannybrown.com and he uses Postmatic. I do comment on some of his posts and I’ve really enjoyed the way you can comment direct from your email on the go via your phone. The difference is you feel part of a community. The engagement far out performs other commenting methods even social media because it’s more direct and personal. I’m launching a blog later this year and will absolutely use Postmatic. If engagement and learning about your audience is important to who ever reads this I’d defiantly give it a go. I have no affiliated relationship. This is just a review from being on the receiving end of a Postmatic user on a blog I love. Cheers Jenn

    1. Hey there Jenn,

      Great to see you, miss, hope all is well your neck of the woods. I had to comment when I saw your reference (and thank you!) because myself and dannybrown.com couldn’t be further apart (which you’ll see when visiting his site), hehe. 🙂

      1. Jenn Grainger Avatar
        Jenn Grainger

        My pleasure Danny. “The more the more” is a concept I like. One of the ways I’ve been able to increase my knowledge, is to only follow people I trust to influence me. There is so much crap out there in cyberspace. I trust Matt and you, so maybe different in topic but the equal in quality. Nicely linked by Postmatic offering. All is well here. Cheers J 

        —Sent from Boxer | http://getboxer.com

      2. Jenn Grainger Avatar
        Jenn Grainger

        You know what’s funny I had not seen your comment to Matt. So let’s see how people enjoy the experience.  Not sure where Matt is right now, but its nice to show how commenting in real time across the world creates a conversation rather than a “one way street” of comments, See ya later Danny on your blog… J 

        —Sent from Boxer | http://getboxer.com

        My pleasure Danny. “The more the more” is a concept I like. One of the ways I’ve been able to increase my knowledge, is to only follow people I trust to influence me. There is so much crap out there in cyberspace. I trust Matt and you, so maybe different in topic but the equal in quality. Nicely linked by Postmatic offering. All is well here. Cheers J 

        —Sent from Boxer | http://getboxer.com

  5. Jenn Grainger Avatar
    Jenn Grainger

    Oops missed checking the participate in comments box…

  6. I’m just leaving a comment here because (a) you mentioned me in the post as ‘Tommy’ which is my dad’s name and he’s not a daily blogger, bro and (b) because if you’re not sold on getting your comments via email, I’d like to add +1 to your inbox.

    Bye.

    1. Jason Avatar
      Jason

      Bahahahaah that’s fantastic. I was wondering if you were going to let him get away with calling you Tommy.

      1. Wait – it’s not Tommy MacFarland? Well now who the heck did I sign up for all that Euro spam?

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