CTIA: Bccthis brings private email app to BlackBerry

Bccthis, a start-up that lets users send private messages within their Outlook emails, began its mobile push today, starting with a BlackBerry application that integrates into the device’s email client and provides the same functionality as the desktop version. It’s a simple concept, but one that anyone who’s ever sent the wrong person a compromising message or mistakenly ‘replied all’ to an email can appreciate.

“[Email has] been around for 40 years with very little evolution in how people compose messages,” said Bccthis CEO Dave Waldman. “The company started when I had gone through a number of email miscommunications and talked to a bunch of people who also had – someone mistakenly replied to all or the intent wasn’t there. I started looking at different ways to resolve those issues.”

The result was a service that essentially adds a footnote or context to any email that only selected recipients in the To, Cc, or Bcc fields can see. Waldman said it is designed to increase efficiency and cut down on inbox clutter. It’s also a good way to inform your colleague of the real intent behind a carefully worded email to a client – similar to sticky notes for email.

The company also has a Twitter version in which a user posts a Tweet and simultaneously send a private message to someone to let them know it’s up and link back to it. Waldman said the goal was to make sure users didn’t overlook something important as they sift through the hundreds of Tweets they may get at any given day. For corporations, it lets them have their own conversations by, for example, pinging only five followers to elicit their opinion and start up a discussion. Both the Outlook and Twitter clients of the patent-pending technology have been in public Beta for three weeks now.

On BlackBerry, the free app is downloadable through the BlackBerry App World storefront or from bccthis.com. The app is geared towards both consumers and enterprises, but Waldman expects business to be the first users – hence why Bccthis choose the BlackBerry as its first platform. “BlackBerry is the power house of the business user,” he said. “It was a really good fit for us to come out to that one first.”

For example, Waldman said a CEO may want to email a company to say that he is looking forward to meeting them, and instruct his assistant to have the paperwork ready and a taxi waiting. Instead of taking two separate emails to do so, he can BCC the assistant within the same email. The assistant gets a message within the larger email that the rest of the recipients never see.

Waldman said that wireless operators are also interested in promoting the bccthis app, and the company is making different language versions to accommodate users across the globe. The start-up is also focused on growing its user base through viral marketing. When someone sends a bccthis message, the user – who doesn’t need the plug-in – is instructed on how to send their own bccthis messages too. He said Bccthis will continue to expand its mobile push as well as add new features, like similar functionality for the Outlook calendar, but is focusing first on seeing how consumers respond too and use the mobile app on BlackBerry.