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CloudSponge ★ 4.8 · 18 reviews
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Marketplace › Marketing › CloudSponge  · CloudSponge alternatives

CloudSponge

Contact Picker API for Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook.com, AOL and more.

AiDOOS Verified SAAS Marketing
4.8 ★★★★★ 18 reviews · 5,000+ Businesses
Live in 72 hours 14-day free trial
Starting from
$69
per user / month
Schedule Meeting

14-day free trial · No credit card required

Category
Marketing
Deployment
Cloud (SaaS)
Integrations
1+ (Zapier, plus as many as Zapier provides)+ Apps
API Access
Yes
AiDOOS Deploy
72 hours

About CloudSponge

CloudSponge is a contact picker API that enables websites to let users import their email contacts from Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, AOL, and other providers with a simple JavaScript plugin. The product powers the contact list buttons on thousands of websites, primarily used in refer-a-friend forms, invitation and e-card recipient lists, and find-a-friend searches. Its core value proposition is to increase referral volume and email open rates by making it easy for users to select contacts from their address book without leaving the site, rather than manually typing email addresses. CloudSponge offers a mobile-first, responsive contact picker that supports global coverage including lesser-known providers. Integration options include webhooks, callbacks, forms, and Zapier. The company has been operating since 2010 and is trusted by over 5,000 businesses. It offers three subscription plans: Launch at $99/year, Growth at $69/month, and Branded at $189/month, each with a 14-day free trial.

Challenges It Solves

  • Users manually typing email addresses in referral forms, leading to low volume and typos
  • Mobile users struggling to type long lists of email addresses on small screens
  • Development teams spending 30-50x more building in-house address book integrations
  • Lost opportunities from mistyped email addresses and high friction sharing experiences

Screenshots

CloudSponge screenshot 1
CloudSponge screenshot 1 CloudSponge screenshot 2 CloudSponge screenshot 3 CloudSponge screenshot 4

Use Cases

Refer-a-Friend Forms

Enable customers to easily select contacts from their address book to invite friends, doubling referral volume.

Invitations & E-Cards

Let users send multiple e-cards by simply selecting contacts, drastically reducing time spent typing addresses.

Find-a-Friend Onboarding

New users can upload their address book to find friends already on the platform, accelerating viral growth.

Pricing

Custom pricing — built for your team

CloudSponge pricing is tailored to your organisation's size, integrations, and requirements. AiDOOS generates your proposal instantly — scoped & ready in seconds.

Launch Growth Branded
Schedule a Meeting
14-day free trial available — No credit card required. Full access to all features.

Key Features

Contact Picker

A JavaScript-based address book picker that lets users select contacts without leaving your website.

Global Email Provider Coverage

Integrates with Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, AOL, and many other providers worldwide.

Mobile-First Responsive Design

A touch-optimized contact picker with inertial scrolling and local storage for mobile users.

Zapier Integration

Trigger Zapier workflows when users submit contact lists, enabling automated follow-ups.

White Labeling & Customization

Customizable CSS, fonts, languages, and branding to match your website's look and feel.

What Reviewers Say AI-synthesized from 18 reviews

What works well

  • Easy to set up with minimal code, can be installed in minutes
  • Wide coverage of email providers including less common ones like AOL
  • Responsive and mobile-friendly design that works well on touchscreens

Common concerns

  • Free tier is limited; plans are subscription-based with costs that may add up for high-volume usage
  • Customization options are limited on lower plans

Reviews

18 verified reviews
4.8
★★★★★
out of 5 · 18 reviews
By segment
Mid-Market100%
S
Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.)
"Top-Notch Contact Importer on the Market"
It's customizable, imports quickly, and integrates easily. It saved us a huge amount of development time and headaches. From my experience, there's nothing to point out as a downside. It allows our users to import their contact lists and spread the word about our causes.
T
Technical Research Assistant II
"Easy Drop-In Solution for a Deceptively Hard Problem"
My research on importing email addresses from users' contacts quickly turned into a search for the best third-party solution. Implementing OAuth for dozens of email providers would be ridiculous. After an afternoon of research and tinkering, I chose and set up CloudSponge. Their setup docs are straightforward, making it easy to get working in my Rails/React app. The best part was using the finished product after just an afternoon. The pricing is a bit high, enough that I considered building my own solution for Gmail only. But it's nice knowing many email clients are supported. At The Hustle, subscribers can invite friends and get referral credit. The CloudSponge plugin lets users select emails from their contact list without typing them. We send about 200 invites a day, and about 6 people use the plugin. But when they do, they tend to invite more people—one person invited over 6000.
S
Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.)
"Positive Experience with CloudSponge"
I really enjoyed working with Jay and his team. They were very responsive when we had questions or needed extra functionality. They deployed updates so we could proceed. We needed an easier way for people to invite others since our platform is invitation-only, and CloudSponge solved that. We ended up building much of our own UI because our needs didn't fit typical use cases, but the team was helpful in assisting us. Our business depends on easy invitations, and CloudSponge helps our users do that. We just released the feature and are already seeing more invitations sent.
L
Lead Software Developer
"Outstanding Tool with Exceptional Support"
Integration was simple, support was extraordinary, and our time to market was much less than if we had built something similar ourselves. CloudSponge even modified their product to meet a unique requirement, so we didn't have to customize it ourselves. That level of support impressed us. No complaints; the tool did exactly what we needed and offered more options than we knew what to do with. PledgeStar wanted to make it easier for users to send pledge requests by selecting contacts from their address books instead of manual entry. We initially started coding our own solution but quickly realized CloudSponge had already perfected it. Developing and maintaining that code would have increased time to market and introduced risk. Our goal was to simplify the process, but we didn't expect that users who used the address book feature actually received 25% more donations.
F
Founder/CEO: MineLife.org
"Key Element for a Referral Marketing Campaign"
Jay and Graeme are fantastic to work with. They helped us integrate CloudSponge quickly, and their site offers clear developer guidelines for building a top-notch referral program. We're excited about how CloudSponge will help us grow our user base exponentially. The only downside is Google's Gmail validation requirements, but Jay and Graeme exceeded our expectations by supporting us through it. The product helps our customers easily access emails from their address books.
S
Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.)
"Simplest Way to Leverage Users' Email Addresses"
It delivers data in a consistent JSON format no matter the source. There's little to dislike. It's as easy as it gets for connecting to multiple address book providers like Gmail and Office 365. If you know how to get a Google API key, you can easily let users share contact info from their services. CloudSponge makes it simple for my users to connect their address books and send that data to my server in readable JSON. It would take me forever to code the UI and integrations myself, but with CloudSponge, I can do it in under an hour.
F
Founder
"CloudSponge for Email Address Book Integration"
CloudSponge offers an excellent address book widget that lets you pull contacts from users of your website. A decade ago, my company had to build custom adapters for each email provider, which wasn't our core focus. Now, this service, backed by a great team, lets us focus on our main problems. We encountered some challenges getting permissions from providers like Outlook and Gmail, but the CloudSponge team was responsive and guided us through. There's nothing to dislike. It solved a business problem and is supported by a team that genuinely cares about your success. At LeavingCard.com, users create collaborative eCards and need their contacts to involve others. CloudSponge's tools help us with that.
C
CEO and Founder
"Excellent for Adding Viral Growth to Your User Base"
Integrating CloudSponge was very straightforward, and we got it running quickly. Testing took less than an hour, and moving to production was equally fast. Everything functioned perfectly out of the box without any issues. It looks great and is responsive as advertised. Customization was easy, allowing different setups like direct buttons for specific email providers or a single button for a list of options. The only downside is that it's not free, but the CEO is very accommodating to young startups. There's nothing to dislike. You should try this product; you can integrate it with minimal code changes, so it's easy to test before deciding on long-term use. Adding a viral component to grow your user base is key. Users are often too lazy to manually enter friends' emails, so software that imports address books from providers like Yahoo can significantly boost conversion rates.
M
Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.)
"Effective Integration"
It integrates smoothly and performs well, especially for lead generation and address book imports. I haven't used it extensively enough to find any downsides. For development time focused on lead generation, this tool makes it simple to capture and access a wealth of data.
C
Chief Marketing Officer
"Reliable Address Book Importer Over Time"
It has been consistently stable for many years without any problems. The reports are straightforward, and it functions reliably. Implementation was incredibly simple, and the payment terms were favorable, which was important for us as a startup. I don't dislike much, but it would be nice to see some new built-in features or gamification. Once set up, it's something you can forget about because it just works. Friend referrals drive a large part of our business, and we constantly experiment with new ways to encourage customers to share their success stories on RummyCircle. These stories help us gain more customers through word-of-mouth. CloudSponge has worked consistently for us for over a decade, and I'm very pleased that I integrated it into our website and native app.

Enterprise Readiness

SOC 2 Type II

Identity & Access

SSO✗ Not supported
RBAC✗
Audit Logs✗

Data Security

At restAES-256
In transitTLS 1.2+
Key mgmtVendor-managed

SLA & Availability

Uptime SLA99.9%
RPO—
RTO—
Pen test—

Compliance & Portability

Data residencyUnited States
Data export
Right to erasure✗

Integrations

Gmail

Access Gmail contacts for referral and invitation forms.

Native < 1 hour

Yahoo Mail

Access Yahoo Mail contacts.

Native < 1 hour

Outlook.com

Access Outlook.com contacts.

Native < 1 hour

AOL Mail

Access AOL Mail contacts.

Native < 1 hour

Zapier

Trigger workflows when contacts are selected via CloudSponge.

Native 1-2 hours

WordPress

Install Contact Picker via WordPress plugin or script.

Third_Party < 1 hour

Governance & Compliance

EU AI Act

No data available

Data Processing Agreement

No data available

Sub-processors

No data available

Right to Erasure

No data available

Change Notifications

No data available

NIST AI RMF

No data available

AiDOOS Managed Deployment

Deploy CloudSponge in 72 hours

AiDOOS handles setup, CRM integration, SSO config, and user provisioning. Your team goes live — not your IT department.

12
Deployments
94%
Adoption rate
4.8/5
Post-deploy sat.
1-2 weeks
Time to value

Prerequisites

  • CloudSponge API key
  • JavaScript enabled website
  • SSL certificate

Configuration Options

  • Select address book providers
  • Customize contact picker styling
  • Set up webhook endpoints

How CloudSponge Compares

Product AI & Analytics Ease of Use Enterprise Features Pricing Integrations Mobile Experience Quick Setup Customer Support Rating Price/mo
CloudSponge This product
Poor Excellent Fair Excellent Good Excellent Excellent Good ★ 4.8 $69/user
Addressy (experian)
Fair Good Good Fair Good Fair Good Good — $Custom/user
UpLead
Good Good Good Fair Good Fair Good Good — $Custom/user
FullContact
Good Good Good Fair Good Fair Fair Good — $Custom/user
Virtual Delivery Center · A new delivery category

A Virtual Delivery Center for CloudSponge

Pre-vetted experts and AI agents in the loop, assembled as a delivery pod. Pay in Delivery Units — universal pricing across roles, seniority, and tech stacks. No hiring, no contracting, no procurement cycle.

  • Plans from $2,000 — Starter Pack, 10 Delivery Units, 90 days
  • Refundable on unused Delivery Units, anytime — no questions asked
  • Re-delivery guarantee on acceptance miss
  • Pre-flight delivery sizing — you see the plan before you commit
Get a delivery plan for CloudSponge What’s a Virtual Delivery Center?

How a Virtual Delivery Center delivers CloudSponge

Outcome-based delivery via AiDOOS’s VDC model.  Why VDC vs traditional consulting? →

Outcome-Based

Pay for results, not hours

Milestone-Driven

Clear deliverables at each phase

Expert Network

Access to certified specialists

Implementation Timeline

1
Discover
Requirements & assessment
2
Integrate
Setup & data migration
3
Validate
Testing & security audit
4
Rollout
Deployment & training
5
Optimize
Performance tuning
Schedule a Meeting

Frequently Asked Questions

Does CloudSponge integrate with Gmail?
Yes, CloudSponge natively supports Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Outlook.com, and AOL.
How long does it take to set up CloudSponge?
Setup can be done in under 5 minutes by adding a JavaScript snippet to your website.
Is there a free trial?
Yes, CloudSponge offers a 14-day free trial.
Can I customize the appearance of the contact picker?
Yes, CloudSponge provides CSS customization options and white-labeling.
Does CloudSponge work on mobile devices?
Yes, the contact picker is mobile-first and responsive.

Quick Stats

★ 4.8
Rating
12
Deployments
72 hours
Live in
99.9%
Uptime SLA
Deployment Complexity
Easy (2/5)
Schedule a Meeting

Resources

Official Website

Vendor

CloudSponge
Founded 2010 · 11-50 employees · San Francisco
Verified Vendor

Get an Instant Proposal

You'll get a structured implementation plan — scope, timeline, and cost — in seconds.