My email continues to overflow as I receive large amounts in several email accounts. I have written about email management a few times before so needless to say I was very excited to witness the private beta launch of Xobni at TechCrunch40. Xobni is more that just "inbox" spelled backwards as it offers a Microsoft Outlook plugin that helps to attack the email management problem and in doing so exposes the social network behind email. I installed Xobni and was quite impressed with its capabilities.
Upon installation Xobni creates a right rail sidebar in your Outlook Inbox (shown to the right - click to enlarge the image). When you click on an email item, Xobni offers up statistics about the item and sender. It displays a heat map of email activity for each particular sender. It offers a popularity rank by inbound and outbound emails to a specific contact, pulls the phone number from the body and displays related contacts. Rather than having to search for attachments from a contact buried somewhere in your Inbox, Xobni includes them all in your right rail. Xobni's email metrics expose your emailing habits. Xobni's powerful search makes finding items a lot easier. Xobni also pulls in your Outlook to do lists and calendar entries. It even reminds you of contacts you have lost touch with. I wonder if they could make it smart enough to transcript emails from certain contacts and text message them to me? :)
Check out the Xobni video introduction (below). If you want to give Xobni a try shoot me an email, I have Xobni private beta invites.
| Add Somewhat Frank Product Demos to your page |
