Pocatello Market review for Shopify Inbox

April 16, 2026

Getting Better! **I believe customer "has" to use there email to use the system, so more likely it is a real person, saving you time. This might discourage some contact, but if someone wants to use a fake email, they can at least contact you in "real" "live" time still, I think? Not sure if inbox requires the emails to be "verified" or not? I think its not verified, because if they leave the "live/active" chat window, when you respond it will bounce, knowing the person was either fake or not that serious, or just wanted to remain anonymous, which actually is what I do prefer, so kudos for inbox to NOT making them be verified email. ((However I think the customer may be able to still access the chat if they return to it (with or without a real email address). Meaning somehow inbox is identifying them beyond just an email address. (Probably a cookie.)) THIS IS A HUGE ADVANTAGE over an email form that Requires an email address which turns many people away from even interacting with you. **Automatically gives the "item" they are interested in, incase the customer fails to type what item in the message. (inbox system must be automatically using whatever page they are on to reflect back what they are inquiring about.) Something that doesn't happen automatically with a contact form EVEN if you ask the customer to provide that info. **Works with the built in Windows 10 Notifications (You know where the "Defender" notification pops up.) without having to be in or having the "inbox" open . **This is much better than an email contact form. **The AI responses are ok, it actually helps you get ideas quickly, or reflect how to respond more than the response you probably will give back. Probably actually really good if you have all your ducks in a row and can ship every item you have listed, not so much if you have only pickup only, however I think the AI is reading product descriptions to help with this in the responses now. **I also like that it shows you the customer email, and location. You can usually use the email address to know if it is a real person or a bot. But remember the location might not be real if they are using a VPN? However if they actually order you can compare the email location with the order ship to or bill to location. **I'm not sure but I think if the customer exits the "live/active" inbox window system; it still sends as an email as your next message, which may or may not lead back to a backlog of messy confusing emails lumped together when the customer responds. Hopefully this is not the case, if the email sends a link back to the inbox, and if the customer uses that, I believe the you can still use inbox; if the customer uses the replay link back in there email. IF they don't your probably stuck with the email, which is harder to know if it is junk mail or not as well as just the general delay with email. **It works fine with chrome on my system. **Gives message history. Have not looked into it deeply but I do believe it has a "search" function. ** The only suggestion I would make is a simple clickable link on the product word. Not sure why the inbox programmers don't include this?!?!; to make it very fast to see the item the customer is wanting; Rather than going back to Shopify and typing in or cut and pasting the wording of the item from the inbox.