Hi there!
Interesting, I'd been struggling with the same idea for the past few days; I actually have a project in OF now entitled "Figure out networking system."
I've been looking at
CRM4Mac, which is at a discount for the time being, but I can't bring myself to pay for it. I like the fact that it keeps the data where it belongs (iCal,Address Book, etc), but it's not what I'm looking for.
At this point, I don't have a solution, but I think the system would have to provide this functionality:
1. Create structure:
This could be done with groups/ smart groups in AddressBook with the people you should keep in touch with weekly / monthly / every 3 months/ every 6 months etc.
2. Capture interactions:
This is the real problem - capturing all interactions; it's easy to capture emails, but what about chats? what about phonecalls? what about meetings?
Options:
- use Mailboxer to create smart folders of emails from the 'keep in touch' groups in AddressBook; review regularly and input into AddressBook notes
- capture phone call notes in Journler, create smart folder, review every week to input data into AddressBook notes
- during weekly review, go over completed tasks in "Calls" contexts, input completed phone calls into AddressBook notes
- In any of these scenarios, I can't avoid the use of heavy discipline and stern hourly / daily / weekly reviews to go though that list of people and input notes about recent contacts.
- I remember reading some posts - possibly on
board.43folders.com/ - suggesting to simply put a '.' in the notes section of the AddressBook card.
3. Review and assign actions
Options:
- using AB smart folders to surface cards that haven't been updated in the desired period of time
- simple review of the groups / lists / etc
In the end, I would think my ideal system would take data from AddressBook, iCal (for events), Mail.app, optionally even Adium / Skype, and the note-taking application of choice, and give me a simple, clean update of who are the people I haven't contacted in a while, allowing me to quickly add emails and phone calls to my OF inbox.
Maybe this could be a future project for OmniGroup?
Bonus would be:
- integration with Stikkit
- integration with LinkedIn