Stop what you’re doing right now
and to to http://www.rapportive.com/ and install the extension. What? You’re not using Chrome or Firefox?
What the heck is it?
It’s an extension to Chrome and/or Firefox that replaces the sidebar where the google ads turn up with information about the sender– specifically, their blog, twitter, linkedin, etc. You can also extend the extensions with what they call “raplets”– plugins that add functionality to, currently, Crunchbase (useful for tech-geek entrepreneurs), a couple of CRM systems, a booking system, and more.
Why do I want it?
How else are you going to keep track of all those people? Ever get a speculative email from someone that looks good but maybe is spam? You can find out loads of information by looking at someone’s twit-stream, linkedin, etc. right off the bat. It’s super useful. And handy. And fills in the blanks that you get when someone emails you and says “we met at the X conference…” and you can’t remember who they are.
And, it allows you to take (private) notes on them. And they have a dead-simple privacy policy (they essentially respect it and don’t share anything, ever). And it uses OpenAuth, which means that they never see your gmail password, so no hackety hackness.
It only works with gmail.
Enjoy your new productivity