Diorex

Just installed Xobni for Outlook this week. So far I am terribly impressed.

Xobni is kind of a personal assistant for Outlook. One of my issues with my email is that I long ago started creating folders for different tasks around the office. So I have a folder for my Google team, another one for Affiliates, another for IT, Creative etc. Then have folders for my direct reports and colleagues I email frequently.

Well this turned into a mess in almost no time. Say I had a creative for my Google team, but it was based on something from Yahoo and now we needed a little tweaking from IT. A single thread now ends up in maybe 5 different folders. Which means to do a search to find the attachment I am looking for, I might actually have to wait through outlook’s slow ass searches in 5 folders.

Then I need to find that itenarary on the trip I took in February to Miami, I flew maybe 15 times so far this year, and probably had 10+ emails around each trip - I basically had to open 15 emails to find the right one.

Or what about someones phone number - the way my interoffice addresses work, I actually have like 5 different contacts folders. I dont know how or why this is the case, but it is. With Xobni, I just type a persons name and it gives me their number - it does not even have to be something I saved, it can be from their signature - has yet to steer me wrong yet.

Xobni solves all of this and lots more. I can type in a persons name and it will show me every person with that name I have ever sent or received an email from, click the name, and I now see every conversation I have had, it even tells me what time of day they send me email, what the best time of day to get a fast response is and who I email the most with.

Today, I could not remember that sales reps name from something I renew every 3-4 months. Just type in a keyword that identifies that product and up pops a list of anyone I have emailed using that keyword. Click on the reps name, his phone number and email address pop right up - what used to be a frustrating few minutes of searching was a 5 second process.

The creative teams sends me no less than 10 attachments a day - finding the one from last week I need is always a nightmare. Now I can type in the name of the creative - or the person who made it or even the client it was made for and I get a nicely sorted list of attachments - which never fails to identify the attachment, I dont even have to open the email, just click on the attachment listed and it opens.

I am less than a week in and I am in love with this product! It may not be for everyone, but I probably get close to 90 emails a day and our company is pushing 70 people now - no way i remember everyones last names or can spell some of the really hairy ones.

I was honestly spending 15+ minutes every day just looking for old emails (or the spreadsheet with the results from the multivariable test we ran sometime last spring or was it summer). I can see how someone who gets lots of affiliate junk mail could put this to work. Looking for a new dating offer - just type ‘dating CPA’ into the search tool and voila all of the emails that had the hot new dating offer I never even read until I needed them.

Alright now that I have praised Xobni - what other Outlook plug-ins are there? What else can I not live without once I have it installed.  I have had it for 4 days and I would pay a monthly subscription to keep it.

Here is a screenshot of a page I found, but the images and my ramblings do not do the functionality any justice.

(sorry for stealing the image I got it from www.digitalhome.ca - but I am clueless as to how to take a screenshot and then upload it - I frequently amaze myself at what I cannot do online)

This entry was posted on Friday, May 23rd, 2008 at 12:50 am and is filed under Cool Sites, Tools. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.