Postscript

Postscript's legal battles with Attentive and regulatory wins dominate comparison chatter, generally framed as a win for Postscript's credibility.

“I have major news to share. But I wanted to let this play out in court before I spoke about it here. Over 2.5 years ago @attentiveHQ sued @PostscriptIO for patent infringement over their “two tap” technology. And in the years since, they’ve spent millions of dollars on lawfare, preferring to push a weak infringement case vs competing in the market with innovation. Well a few weeks ago, a US District Court in Delaware ruled against Attentive, concluding that “[a]ll of Attentive’s claims of patent infringement (of any type) have now been resolved in Postscript’s favor” and threw out all of Attentive’s claims. Pretty good 🙂 But that's not the end of the story… In an effort to defend ourselves against their lawfare, we countersued. And last week, a jury in Delaware found Attentive liable for infringement on our Campaign Flows patent, and awarded us over $1.5M in damages. Yep–you read that right. They sued us, and ended up being the liable party + paying us damages. Now that’s justice. Maybe the biggest Uno Reverse Card I can remember. But, I still have a sour taste in my mouth. Why? Well, Attentive wasn’t exactly silent about their allegations over the last few years. They’ve left the market with the impression that Postscript infringed on their IP, which a court found to be false. But is anyone really surprised they went this route? Unfortunately, it’s extremely on brand. Ever since we exposed their bullying antics with phone number list holding, or pushed back on some of their other aggressive tactics over the years, we haven’t exactly been Attentive’s favorite. So we figured something like this might happen. The funny thing is, we aren’t against the idea of protecting your IP, especially when it’s actually innovative and the facts are strong. Postscript has a bunch of patents. But, in our opinion, their litigation was never about protecting intellectual property. And so they sued us. Without merit, as the Court has now found. In fact, Onsite Opt In replaced Two Touch popups over a year ago and has shown superior results consistently for merchants. But Attentive wanted to keep the suit going, clearly prioritizing lawfare and bullying over building better products for customers. Did they learn their lesson from the list holding controversy? Nope. Because this was always about a larger company that’s raised enormous sums of money with a historical pattern of bully tactics trying to push around a smaller, more innovative competitor. One that's become a thorn in their side, that they're afraid to compete with in the market. It’s a bummer they behave this way, because (contrary to what you might believe) we do welcome healthy competition. We want brands to win, we want the market to win, and it’s been frustrating to have to correct the record that we did not infringe on Attentive’s IP. At the same time, they’ve been banging the drum for years that they had a unique, disruptive technology that was exclusive to Attentive that could only be used by Attentive customers. That’s why we felt it was so important to defend ourselves and our customers and prove that Attentive didn’t really own what they said they did. And of course along the way, we did what we are known for, we innovated and launched something WAY more performant for list growth - Onsite Opt In. We left the outdated technology behind while Attentive continued litigating, burning resources on the past rather than innovating for the future. I truly wonder what their calculus has been–they’ve spent millions on this meritless lawsuit, all to have a court and jury declare that (1) Postscript’s two touch popups did not infringe and (2) in fact Attentive has been the one infringing on Postscript’s IP. Has this been a good use of time and money? What is the strategy over there? Why do they behave like this? Whatever the reason, we are proud to be vindicated by the court in this way. We will continue to do what we always do - innovate on behalf of our customers to make their SMS program as performant as possible. In fact, we’ve been so successful at innovation, Attentive has had to use our patented technology to keep up. We’ll continue setting the pace on behalf of Postscript customers everywhere. More to come, I’m sure. We will keep fighting the good fight. Thanks for your continued support!”— @ringmybeller on X

Brands see SMS driving strong returns via Postscript, though at least one deep-dive questioned whether the revenue math holds up under scrutiny.

“Postscript just saved sms for everyone… AGAIN”— @Seanfrank on X

New features like Onsite Opt-in Engage and common Klaviyo pairings show up frequently, alongside a caution about differing attribution settings.

“I just got back from my favorite thing that we do at @PostscriptIO . It's truly the highlight of the entire year for me. Earlier this week, we hosted our 2nd annual, Customer Advisory Board in Napa, California at Stanly Ranch. 🍷 We brought over 40 of our top customers to talk about the future of SMS and Conversational, see some of our exciting new roadmap, and to network with their peers. When you put together an amazing group of people, with an incredible venue and accommodations - magic happens. ✨ Shockingly, many companies and marketing teams DON’T invest in a customer advisory board. I’ve even heard some CFOs say “We already got these people as customers, why would we spend MORE money on them?” 🤯Crazy, I know. The truth is that listening to customers and investing in ways to get that feedback directly is the lifeblood of all good companies. The more you can ensure the voice of your customers is ringing in the ears of your employees, the better the company will be. Customers make your marketing better. They make your products better. They make your strategy better. I have never heard of a company who ever regretted investing in their customers. One of my favorite sayings is “Whoever is closest to the customer, wins.” I don’t love it just because it's a pithy little quote, I love it because it's true. If you aren’t investing in your customers now, start building the case for it immediately. You won’t regret it. Thank you to all our customers who took the time out of their busy schedules to join us. It truly means the world to us. 🙏 Finally, cheers to our amazing best in class event organization led by the amazing Angel Kinard. Special shout out to Vanessa Smith, Ren Reed, Ryan Holmes, Ben Montalbano and a ton of others at Postscript that I am missing. Here are some pics from the event. Yes, that's a giant owl. Yes, I was scared.”— @mikemanheimer on X

Successful onboarding stories and an active customer advisory community suggest strong retention practices, tempered by one critical revenue teardown.

“Champagne day at the Nashville Postscript office (my bedroom office) Another brand has joined the 1,000,000 SMS subscriber club 🍾 They onboarded in 2023. Never touched SMS marketing. Zero phone numbers. Our team has been deeply involved since day 1. 2 years later. 1 milly.”— @BryanDickey_ on X

Postscript's Texas SB140 court win is the standout story, seen as protecting customers from costly registration requirements competitors pushed.

“I am so pumped to share this... we WON in texas. This means all Postscript customers are carved out from SB140 (the new texas sms law). To be extra clear, if you are a Postscript customer or EIA member, no registeration, bonding, disclosures, waking hours, etc. If you aren't a PS customer or EIA member, or you already registered in Texas, your situation is more complicated and you'll want to do your diligence. Unfortunately there's been tons of misinformation and bad advice spread by other players around this topic. Stoked to secure the bag for all our customers! And if you aren't a PS customer but want to work with by-far the industry leading SMS platform, you know where to find me 🙂 More from me below and in the blog post.”— @ringmybeller on X

Most performance mentions are positive, framing SMS as a high-return channel, though attribution methodology draws some scrutiny.

“Every brand is different and is free to allocate their resources however they like. Of course. BUT, to cut out SMS entirely means you believe a few things. 1) You believe the value of a double opt in number from a customer or prospect is $0. 2) email is growing and likely to grow its engagement in the future with shoppers. 3) email has higher revenue per recipient than sms. Think what you like, but all three of those things are 100% false. Plenty (I’m talking thousands) of 8 and 9 figure brands have SMS programs on Postscript that are equal or bigger in terms of revenue to email. We’ve done the incrementality tests (as @codyplof says). If you don’t have that, hit me up. DMs are open. 🤙🏼”— @mikemanheimer on X

Postscript's growth past $100M in revenue is noted as a milestone, with mixed sentiment on broader market positioning.

“When I joined Postscript 4+ years ago my thesis was: 1) Ecommerce would continue to grow even with potential headwinds 2) Brands would coalesce under Shopify as the top player 3) SMS was the next frontier for direct marketing. Now we've passed $100M with more to come!”— @SamMelnick on X