BusyContacts: a simple and easy to use CRM alternative for OS X

The guys that brought you the famous OS7 Now Up-to-Date, followed by BusyCal, have done it again with a contact application on steroid: BusyContacts.

I have been using the beta version for the past few weeks and I must say it turns out to be a very stable, useful and easy to use piece of software. Much easier to set-up and deal with than CRM software such as Daylite and others. The software is now out of beta and V1 is available to buy…and you do get a reduced price (“Sidegrade” they call it) if you are a BusyCal user!

First the application sync seemingly with Apple Contact app and presents its full contents and more! Any addition or editing gets sync back to Apple software, so no loss of information. It also means full compatibility with all Apple services including iCloud. It further connect to Google, Exchange, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, aggregating in a single all of your contact information. This behavior is somewhat similar to Cobook (which I had been using since it came out). Again, did I say that the final results get sync across Apple services…

First time running the app, you will be guided to guided via the set-up assistant to access your contacts and so on. BusyMac have an excellent Getting Started guide. All of your various mailing lists inside Contacts will appear as Tags or Keywords (see Item 1 in the image below) in BusyContacts and individual contact (zone #2) will inherit all Tags or Keywords it was associated to in Apple Contacts (see at the bottom of column 3 below – “mot-clés” in French!).

This is where the “simple” CRM portion of the software kicks in. You can add any Tags/Keywords as you wish. You can further add directly Events, Meetings and Tasks (that will sync to iCal or BusyCal) from within BusyContacts. The other nice feature is the last column (#4) view which provides an overview of upcoming (or pass) events and meetings that you have with the currently selected contact, as well as any e-mail exchanges or iMessages, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter Entries. You have the control of what is presented in that last view.

A nice, clean and easy to learn interface. A nice entry introduction to CRM-like activities without the steep learning curve. Hassle-free connectivity to your Apple stock software, such that you always have your info available even on computers that do not have BusyContacts or your iOS devices. Overall, a very nice set of features of a version 1  😉