Software to Track Personal Contacts
If your job puts you in contact with a lot of people, keeping track of them can be a big task. How much information can you scribble on to those Rolodex cards? Is there another empty spot close at hand for one more yellow Post-it note?
A personal computer loaded with contact management software could make the job a lot easier. The best such programs go far beyond being mere electronic telephone books or schedulers to help you automate many tasks that result when you dial or answer your phone.
I’ve taken a look at four contact management programs that run on IBM and compatible computers with 640 kilobytes of memory and, in most cases, a hard disk.
ACT version 2.0, $395 from Contact Software International Inc. in Carrollton, Tex., (214) 418-1866, comes with a 60-day satisfaction guarantee and claims title to best seller of the group.
Biz*Base, version 2.1, $395 for its “gold” hard-disk model and $99 for the less-powerful single floppy disk “silver” version, is offered by Creagh Computer Systems in Solana Beach, Calif., (619) 259-7174, with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
The Maximizer, version 2.1, $295, from Richmond Technologies & Software Inc. in Burnaby, British Columbia, (604) 299-2121, has undergone two significant upgrades this year. A network version sells for $695.
Performer, $295, from Performer Systems Inc. in Alhambra, (818) 300-8570, offers a series of optional add-on packages to bring even greater automation to your tasks. It will run on a single high-density floppy drive if need be.
The contact management software market is highly competitive, and all four of these programs have introduced upgraded versions within the past several months.
All four have basic features in common. They let you keep detailed lists of the people and companies whom you contact. They schedule calls, meetings and other activities. You can automatically prepare letters, memos, invoices and other forms, properly addressed and personalized with your contact data.
You can search through your lists of data in various ways, such as the person’s name, company name, city, business category, last date of contact, next scheduled contact and so on.
Each has built-in word processing to write letters and other documents. ACT and Maximizer include spelling checkers. Once written, letters can be used over and over, with appropriate name and address supplied automatically each time.
They all will place telephone calls for you if your computer has a modem. But whether you dial or the computer dials, all will let you easily update contact information as you talk.
In addition to keeping a history of your dealings with each contact, all of these programs will also keep track of your expenses.
All except Maximizer can be suspended temporarily so that you can run other software and then return to the same point you were when you left. Each has many other features, some in common and others unique.
ACT, an acronym for automated contact tracking, is a program for people who can’t or don’t want to type. Nearly everything, including sending letters or virtually any other document or form, can be accomplished with just a few keystrokes.
Every part of the program is tied to the contact records, which provide basic identification data, including space for the secretary’s name, plus 29 user-defined fields.
Performer is a solid middle-of-the-road program and is the quickest of the four to begin using. A thorough but simple tutorial section in the reference manual gives you the essentials in about 10 minutes. After that, a well-designed set of menu choices and on-screen prompts will let you easily use what you have learned.
Two screens full of data can be stored for each contact, which is typical of all of these programs. Performer allows you to define 31 fields, all on the second screen, with your own category names.
Biz*Base Gold, version 2.1, is organized around a time management system that keeps track of all your activities. When the program opens, your day is laid out for you on a screen divided into four sections labeled “recalls,” “follow-ups,” “calendar” and “task scheduler.”
Recalls and follow-ups are similar, yet also different. You designate a recall when you want to call a client at a particular time for a particular purpose. A follow-up is scheduled for clients to whom you have already talked or mailed a letter or sent a shipment or whatever. Both are entered from the contact record so that they become part the history of your dealings with that person.
The appointment list suffers a serious limitation because the only times allowed are in half-hour intervals from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.
That is one of the few limitations, however. Biz*Base gives you the ability to redefine most of the 50 fields of information that it will store about each person. It also includes a word processor, a calculator and modem program.
It has a cluttered appearance and is complicated. But if you are an experienced computer user and maybe have been thinking about creating your own contact management software, Biz*Base is the would-be hacker’s delight.
Maximizer utilizes pop-up menus that sprout at various locations on your screen, depending on what portion of the program you are using. But you’ll have to memorize the keys needed for basic functions because there is no on-screen prompting system to help you.
The bottom line on contact management is that any of these programs will make the task easier. But only if you use them often.
Computer File welcomes readers’ comments but regrets that the author cannot respond individually to letters. Write to Richard O’Reilly, Computer File, Los Angeles Times, Times Mirror Square, Los Angeles, Calif. 90053.
