Soocial: Hassle Free Contact Management

Soocial won points with me right away through the accessibility of their company members. Above all else, they are available, friendly, helpful and they really want their application to succeed. I like that in a company. It makes me want to use their product.

Soocial is the new contact syncing and management application by the folks at Eight Media in the Netherlands. They have their fingers on the pulse of their product. I actually got my Soocial invite after discussing Soocial on Twitter and mentioning I didn't have one - the folks at Soocial were quick to respond with an invite even though they weren't “following” me and didn't know who I am or what I do - very nice.

When I first heard about Soocial I wondered whether it was trying to compete with GooSync. Fortunately, it is not. Soocial is its own application, focused on contact management. GooSync is an application designed to sync your Google Calendar to your PDA or phone (to also sync contacts in GooSync you have to upgrade to a paid account). One thing they did have in common: use of SyncML technology. This means that unfortunately there are a large number of phones and PDAs that Soocial (and GooSync, for that matter) simply won't work with. Many LG phones and Motorola phones and PDAs, for example, use PCSync instead (my LG VX9900 included).

In order to evaluate GooSync I had to enlist the help of a colleague and their PDA. I thought I'd have to bother them again for Soocial, but luckily Soocial also works with your computer. Currently they offer a sync agent that works in Mac OS X with the Apple Address Book. I used this and it worked flawlessly. In the pipeline for early this year is compatibility with Microsoft Outlook for PC clients. Soocial also offers FaceBook and Highrise integration.

Installing Soocial on your compatible phone or PDA is as simple as receiving a text message and following instructions. Installing on my MacBook was even easier - one quick download, activation of the application file, and presto! I was taken to System Preferences and the new Soocial integration and syncing pane. With a few simple toggles and clicks my Apple Address Book was synced with Soocial.

Once you are synced, any changes you make on the Soocial contacts page or in your Apple Address Book (or your phone or PDA, if you chose that method) are automatically synced in. No more wondering if you have the latest contacts in this computer or in your other computer, either. Both my MacBook and the eMac in the office now have been synced to Soocial. I made a few test changes on the web site to see if it worked, and it did, flawlessly. A few minutes after I saved the changes they were synced to both computers.

The folks at Soocial talk about hassle free contact management, and I think they are well on their way to achieving that. They have a few things to work out (adding PCSync compatibility to more phones and PDAs could join in the fun would be much appreciated, as would iCal and Google Calendar syncing), but overall they are achieving what they set out to achieve. Even better: they seem to be reaching their associated goals for integration of other product connectivity right on schedule - good news for Outlook users next in the feature pipeline.

As for using the application, their web site is easy on the eyes and easy to use. Navigation is clear and concise with no unnecessary clutter. Adding photos, web addresses, mailing addresses, extra emails, contact numbers and more to your contacts is very easy to do. The application has no trouble syncing in either direction for me. Before I had to rely on manual data entry multiple times in multiple places for contact management and Soocial is shaping up to become my one source for managing my contacts. The more connection options and web site connections they add, the more likely I will turn to them more and more.