Getting Real, our book about a smarter, faster, easier way to build a successful web application, is now available as a free PDF (it used to cost $19).

We’ve used the Getting Real methods to develop all of our products. Here’s what other people have said about Getting Real.

Head over to the Getting Real site to get your free PDF of Getting Real. We hope you enjoy it.

We’re looking for another teammate. This time we’re looking for someone who is completely focused on improving conversion and retention. You love moving the needle, one small step at a time. This job is all about seeing untapped potential.

Conversion could be financial (get more people to start a trial or complete it – what we consider a “sale”), or outcome-based (inspire people to create more Basecamp projects by showing them creative ways to use Basecamp they never thought of before). Or something else.

Retention could be reducing cancellations, or reducing unsubscribes from our mailing list, or increasing the number of people who log into Basecamp every day. Or something else.

You should…

You should be great at figuring out which words or phrases hook people instead of letting them get away. We believe the right words at the right time can make all the difference.

You should look at a sign up form like… …and already know three ways to significantly improve conversion.

You should be great at understanding what motivates people. This requires deep insight into the decision making process. You should know why people buy, why people don’t buy, why people buy more of something they already have, and why people who bought decide not to buy any more.

You should look at a screen like… …and think to yourself – “if they rearranged this, highlighted that, or renamed this other thing, they’d increase sales by at least 25%.”

You should be great at knowing how to help people find value in something they already have. There are always more ways to use something than the ways you already use it.

You should look at a new project like… …and say “no, no, no… a better way to get someone started on a new project is like this…”

Or you should look at an email like… …and think “You’re missing a big opportunity to get more people to take action here. If we…”

Ideas and execution

This is not just a job for an idea person – it’s about ideas and execution. You’ll be expected to write the copy. You’ll be expected to implement the designs. You’ll be expected to shepherd ideas from start to finish – not just to toss them out there for other people to worry about.

You should love to propose, experiment, implement, execute, and measure. You may not be able to take everything on 100% yourself, but you try your best before you hit your limits and have to ask for help.

The challenge: Double our sales

We’d like to double sales over the next 12 months without making deep material changes to our products. We don’t believe it’s possible. Change our minds. Convert us.

Can you do it?

If this sounds like something you’re great at, we’d love to talk to you. This is a new position at 37signals, so you’ll be in charge of making it work.

You’ll be part of the best overall team in the business. From ops, to programming, to design, to support, to data, to video – we’re ready to work together to see your bright ideas through.

To apply

Send an email titled [Conversion] to [email protected] telling us why you’re the one. How you tell us is up to you.

Our office is based in Chicago, but our team is spread out all over the world. You can work from anywhere. We just require a few trips to Chicago a year when the whole company gets together.

We’ll be accepting applications until June 4.

This is a chance to do the best work of your career. We know you’re out there. Get in touch.

A year ago we put Sortfolio up for sale.

We entertained a variety of offers, met with a few potential suitors in person, and negotiated numbers. Ultimately nothing came together. Then we shelved the process so we could focus all of our efforts on designing and building the new Basecamp.

Sortfolio continued to run itself for another year, generating over $200,000 in profit for us during that time.

Our paying customer count continues to hover consistently in the 170s, each paying $99/month to be listed as a premium member.

The price

We’ve put Sortfolio on the clock: We either sell it by July 1, or we close it down. And we’ll make it easier this time so there’s no guessing: The price is $480,000, cash. No special deals, no partial payments now the rest later, no equity in your company, etc. $480,000 cash and it’s yours. Considering how much hands-off free cash flow it generates, we think that’s a very fair price. We just want it to go to a good home.

We’ve put next to no effort into it over the last year… If you put some effort in you should see significantly higher sales. With over 10,000 free accounts, there’s tons of untapped opportunity here in the existing customer base. And of course plenty more on the outside or in entirely different industries.

What you get

You get the design, the branding, the code (it’s a Rails app), the customers, and the steady cash flow. Since Sortfolio is hooked up to our centralized billing system, you’ll need to write your own code to charge customers. Also, since Sortfolio is hosted on our server cluster, no hardware is included (but you can run it on a cheap server or two – the hardware requirements are next to nothing). We’ll also be happy to announce the sale here on SvN and on our very well subscribed email newsletter.

Interested?

If you’re interested at $480,000, please email me direct at jason@37signals… Thanks.

This is going to be a big one. Now you can post messages, to-do lists, files, and text documents to the all new Basecamp just by sending an email.

First, some background

In Basecamp Classic, you can post a new message by sending an email directly to Basecamp. This feature is especially useful if you’re on the road and want to post a message to the project from your phone. Just fire up your email app, address the email to Basecamp, and it’s immediately posted as a message to the project.

Initially, the all new Basecamp didn’t launch with this feature. Like everything else in the new Basecamp, we wanted to approach it fresh, take our time to think it through, explore a variety of ideas, and make it even better than before.

Better than before

In Classic you could only post a message via email. You couldn’t make a to-do list, start a text document (called Writeboards in Classic), or upload a file via email.

But in the all new Basecamp, you can do all these things and more. Plus, it’s easier, clearer, and more powerful than before.

Here’s how it works

At the bottom right corner of every project you’ll see a link that says “Email content to this project”.

When you click that link, you’ll see a sheet pop up that looks like this:

You’ll see five icons at the top of the page. Each icon describes a different email-in feature. Starting discussions, making to-do lists, creating documents, uploading files, and forwarding emails. Clicking any one of those icons shows you the simple steps to follow for each feature.

Below the steps we show an example of an email and how that content will look when it’s posted to Basecamp.

When Basecamp receives your email and posts your content to the project, it immediately sends you an email receipt letting you know it worked.

For most content types, the email also includes a link to let you notify others on the project letting them know that you just added something to the project. If you click that link you’ll see:

Since we expect a lot of people to email in from their mobile phones, we made a mobile optimized version of the notifications screen too:

And a bonus feature

In addition to allowing you to start discussions, make to-do lists, create text documents, and upload files via email, we also allow you to forward in any existing email to Basecamp. This is especially useful if there was a conversation going on outside of Basecamp. Just forward that email thread into Basecamp and it’s stored along with everything else on the project. Easy peasy.

Forwarded emails get collected into a “Forwarded emails” section at the bottom of the project.

And if the email was an HTML email, we show the full HTML email, too:

So many uses

There are so many interesting ways to use this new email-in feature in Basecamp.

One of the things I’ve loved about it so far is that I can sketch an idea on the whiteboard/chalkboard in a meeting room in our office, take a picture of it with my iPhone, and email it directly to a Basecamp project. It’s such a great way to get the physical results of a brainstorm, meeting, or sketch session right into Basecamp. And now that it’s in Basecamp, I can erase the whiteboard and not worry about ever losing that idea.

Email-in is also a great little “poor-man’s API”. You can have your apps send emails direct into Basecamp whenever you make a sale, get survey results from a customer, or who knows what. The opportunities are endless. We’re eager to see what sorts of things people come up with.

Thanks again

We’re thrilled with the feature and we think you’ll feel the same way. Thanks again for using Basecamp!

We just launched a brand new feature in the all new Basecamp that is handy in a bunch of different ways. Now you can move to-do lists, discussions, text documents, files, and calendar items between projects or into a brand new project.

Moving items between projects is especially useful in a few specific cases (and probably many we’ve never thought of). For one, people put things in the wrong place from time to time. Now it’s no big deal – just move it to where it should be.

And then there are other times when you want to break a bigger project into a couple smaller projects. Now you can take a list or a message or anything from one project and start an entirely new project from that item. It’s great.

Here’s a video showing you how it works. We think you’re going to love it.

Thanks for using Basecamp! Wait, you aren’t using Basecamp? What are you waiting for?.

It’s always satisfying to announce the release of one of the top Basecamp feature requests. Today is one of those days. We’re glad to announce that to-dos with due dates now show up on the all new Basecamp calendar.

Prior to this update, only events that were directly added to the calendar showed up on the calendar. But as of today, any to-dos with due dates also show up on the calendar. And just like events, you can drag and drop to reschedule a to-do. Very handy.

Now you have a much better view of everything that’s due in a project. To-dos, events, meetings, project phases, etc. – now you can see them all at the same time on a single calendar.

We’re really happy with how it turned out. We hope you love it.

Here’s a quick video showing you how it works.