Recently we assessed how we manage our contacts.  Traditionally you have your Outlook contacts and you may have a CRM for sales.  The problem for us is we do not need to sell much, because people come to us.  So the CRM has languished, rarely used.

We have various ways to track advocates, but not a good, centralized way.  Until last night at 11:30 PM when I was on Seth Godin’s Blog and came across Highrise.

Many people are going to look at this and say, “I don’t need another contact manager.”  You are probably right.  However, I feel fairly confident you are not tracking all your advocates and fans in their own database, and that is where I see the big value.

This software has a fully functional free version.  There is absolutely no excuse to not build an advocate database for yourself.  And if you use the email function (drop box) you can quickly forward emails and populate the system with the right contacts. Then you can use the tasks to make sure you are following up regularly.

The funny thing for me is we have a plan on the table for a custom database system geared only towards advocacy…. Did I say on the table?  I mean in the trash.