What Gmail did to Email

I have completely shifted from asking people their email ids to asking 'are you on Gmail?' And I think its happening with a lot of people around me.

Look at what Gmail has done to Email. Suddenly almost everybody who uses Email has a Gmail account. Yahoo & Hotmail & Rediffmail, Sify & Indiatimes have been around for years and years. It is my observation that:

1. People generally had multiple email accounts. 2 - 3 usually
2. People more often than not, used primarily only one
3. And as time progressed, they stuck to this email id for more & more stuff
4. This was either a Yahoo or Hotmail or Rediffmail or Sify or sometimes Indiatimes as well, based on preference of user
5. Most important reason for user to stick to this id was - it became popular and known. Like a phone number. One doesn't change phone number so often. Its a point to reach you. And its been circulated to all people and organizations that matter to you.

And suddenly came Gmail. Ofcourse, the tag of Google came alongwith it.

So when people were so resistant to change and at the same time were fairly happy with free services of Yahoo, Hotmail, Sify, Rediff, Indiatimes, etc........suddenly decided to shift.

And I also remember that people had to struggle with Gmail. It was based on a system totally unknown to them. People were aghast to learn you just cannot create folders on Gmail. Okay if you can search, but still.......people who were used to it found it very weird to adapt.

Then there was the funda of attaching all threads to a subject line not an absolute Reverse Chronological Order!

Once a User Experience Designer even called me up (this was a distress call).....she wanted to write a mail on a newly opened Gmail account but could not figure out the Compose link.

Then there were other smaller issues such as, you can't make out the attachment size until you open up the email, etc.

YET, NONE OF THIS MATTERED. AND GMAIL IS A BIG, BIG HIT. Inspite of a Very Late Mover! And inspite not resorting to advertising. Whereas we can see ads of Yahoo Mail, Rediffmail & Zapak Mail all around on TV, hoardings and what not.

So why did this happen? I don't know for sure but maybe the following things clicked:

1. Gmail grew through networking. You couldn't just land on Gmail Homepage & sign up (until now). You had to be invited by a friend. It started by 2 invites per user then 5 then 50. By creating scarcity, it created demand. And we know referrals work.

People invited each other......told them its 'cool....' I sent an invite to myself so that I could refer it to another 5 friends. And thats how it grew.

2. Gmail offered Search. No one else did. You had to hunt page by page, mail by mail. Not on Gmail though! And now everyone has a search within your mails.....thanks to Gmail. But none of them are as fast.

3. Gmail offered BIG storage space. And they put a formula that it will keep growing perpetually. You could stare at the figures moving every second. Gave a sense of growth!

However, I would like to add here - almost everyone followed suit in giving bigger space. But for some reason no one else could carry it off like Gmail.

4. Gmail was from Google. And THAT made the single largest difference. Because Google has a snob value. Its cool to be with Google. Coz they are big, growing, full of new, innovative ideas, young, think different. Subconsciously, its cool to be associated with Google!

After all, who thought of beginning an error message with "Oops!"

(You can compare on similar lines - What GTalk did to Yahoo Messenger)