Many of us rely on the contacts in our contact management or email programs. Too often, the information is incomplete, inaccurate or missing. I think this is because the software companies haven't solved the data capture issue. For these programs to be fully used, we need an easy means to capturing and converting information into contact records. Till then, I suggest you use eGrabber's AddressGrabber. (Includes 4 minute flash tutorial.)

I believe this data capture problem is common to most contact management and email programs. I've yet to encounter a program that allows me to highlight and convert information into a full contact record. That is the beauty of AddressGrabber. The program has no allegiance to any software company. Instead, it masterfully converts information and delivers it into the format I need with little effort.

AddressGrabber is a data capture tool that resides in your system tray until needed. The program works best with US addresses because it integrates with the USPS database, but can accommodate other countries. When you see contact information you want, you highlight it and open AddressGrabber. The information source could be an email, resume, web page or external file.

In our testing of the standard version, we found few examples where it didn't work. The exceptions tended to be internal web applications. The standard version is just one of a series of eGrabber programs for capturing contact information.

During installation, AddressGrabber detects which applications are installed and adds them to the program toolbar. These include the major contact management and email programs such as:

• Microsoft Outlook
• ACT!
• GoldMine
• Outlook Express
• DYMO LabelWriter
• Microsoft Word

 

Once you highlight the contact information, AddressGrabber will parse it into the correct fields for your destination application. The program also provides various options for supporting applications. As example, if we select Outlook, we can choose how we want duplicate entries handled.

The program maintains many rules on how to parse the data to the correct fields. After you select your destination application, AddressGrabber opens a Parse Result dialog. This is where you verify and edit the captured information before it's transferred.

AddressGrabber also works with Microsoft Word. In it's simplest fashion, you can transfer an address to wherever your cursor resides in Microsoft Word. The program allows you to create templates and forms that take advantage of mail merge. For example, you could highlight an address from the web and have the contact information feed into a sales letter. This is a valuable feature, but does take added setup. It wasn't immediately apparent to us how this feature worked, but eGrabber's support personnel were able to point us in the right direction.

In retrospect, I wish I had acted on this program years ago. At the time, I held off purchasing the program. My reasoning was it only took me a couple minutes to enter a contact. Several years later, as I notice the number of contacts I have in Outlook, AddressGrabber would've been a far more accurate and faster solution.

• Cost: $69 for standard version
• URL: http://www.egrabber.com/addressgrabberstandard/index.html
• Trial: You can use the trial version for 3 days or to transfer 50 addresses, whichever occurs earlier
• 4 minute flash demo