LinkedIN’s goal of being the go-to site for professional relationship management has just been taken to a new level with the unveiling of a new and improved contacts management feature.  The desktop and iPhone app will aggregate and consolidate address books, online calendars, email conversations, and LinkedIN profiles as well as data from apps like Evernote, TripIt and CardMunch.

To minimize confusion, LinkedIN Contacts merges duplicated contacts into single entries and will even create entries for all people a user has exchanged emails with even if a formal contact entry for that individual has never been created.  Contacts profiles will contain not only basic information but will include logs of past meetings and email correspondence.  Users can append notes and easily make manual updates to entries as well.

LinkedIN Contacts allows users to filter and sort contacts in a variety of ways and offers a “lost touch” option that lists people the user hasn’t interacted with in a  while.  The application can function as a personal assistant, providing alerts on birthdays, major profile updates such as a contact’s promotion or new job and can connect you with people in specific locations through it’s integration with TripIt.

With Contacts you can view a person’s LinkedIn profile, and see at a glance when the last time you were in contact with that person, and what you talked about. For instance, viewing an old business contact might bring up your last piece of email correspondence — a message about a product from over a year ago — and a calendar entry from your last meeting.

LinkedIN is currently offering a limited invitation only release of the application and the mobile application is currently only available for the iPhone but plans are in the works for an Android app as well as a version optimized for mobile browsers.  Once the application is available for wider adoption and use, it should not only save you valuable time but may even make relationship management enjoyable.

For more information on solutions for running your businesses’ technology more efficiently, visit our website or contact Megan Meisner at mmeisner@launchpadonline.com or 813 920 0788 x210.