VerticalResponse APIJourney from SOAP to REST & Lessons Learned

Agenda● About VR

● Early VR API

● SOAP to REST

● Lessons Learned

● Road Ahead

VerticalResponse helps small business grow and connect

with their customers wherever they are. Our full suite of

online tools lets SMB’s do all marketing – email, social

media, mobile and more – easily from one account.

VR Features

● Founded in 2001.

● Released new product in March 2014

● Email and Social marketing platform

● Responsive, professional-looking templates

● Drag and drop email editor

● Robust list management capabilities

● Powerful analytics for email and social campaigns

● REST API

● Integrations Marketplace

Early API

● Inspired from Salesforce’s AppExchange

● Built to give partners and resellers more control

● REST was still nascent , lack of organization support

● Not built with scalability in mind.

● No clear design processes were followed.

● Shift to REST was not easy.

Enter REST

New Platform, New Methodology

Operation Developer Love.

API’s not an afterthought

● Build relevant API

● Create Smart Integrations

● Create Integrations Marketplace

● Develop a rich developer community

● Marketing and Support

API as a Product

Design

REST API Design

HATEOAS based Design

○ Hypermedia as the engine of

application state

○ Consistent API Design

○ Easy for Client Applications

○ Know one object, know them

all

○ Growing pains

{ "url": "https://vrapi.verticalresponse.com/api/v1/contacts/8796094885659", "attributes": { "id": 8796094885659, "first_name": Lily, "last_name": Evans, "email": "everyone@social.networks", "optin_status": "optin", "messageable": false, "status": "blocked" }, "links": { "up": { "url": "https://vrapi.verticalresponse.com/api/v1/contacts" }, "lists": { "url": "https://vrapi.verticalresponse.com/api/v1/contacts/8796094885659/lists" }, "messages": { "url": "https://vrapi.verticalresponse.com/api/v1/contacts/8796094885659/messages" }, "stats": { "url": "https://vrapi.verticalresponse.com/api/v1/contacts/8796094885659/stats" } }}

Challenges

Challenges

● Mindset Change - API as a Product

● Demonstrate Value Proposition to Business

● API Management - Build vs Partner

● Design First, Implement later

● Document design guidelines

● Adhere to design

Lessons Learned

Build an API Program, not just API’s

Create a Roadmap and implement against it

Measure Success, Identify KPI’s

There is no substitute for good design

Set up design guidelines and adhere to it

Code Reviews should check against design guidelines

Market and Support your API’s

Build support plan and process

Lessons from API Support

● Solid documentation is essential

● Self-service onboarding

● Support tickets vs. Web Forum

● “Dualing APIs”

● Sunset and Migration

Road Ahead

Future of the VR API

● Work with developers to build third party integrations.

● Create strategic integrations with partners.

● Building a robust marketplace

● Actively participate in developer events

Useful Links

● VR Developer Portalhttps://developer.verticalresponse.com

● Support Grouphttps://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/vertical-response-rest-api-group

● Bloghttp://www.verticalresponse.com/blog/product/

Q and A