A Look at Plaxo: My Interview with Plaxo VP John McCrea

Have you ever had a good gut feeling about something before you even fully tried it out?

Well, that was the case with me and Plaxo: as soon as I saw it, I signed up for the premium version of it, because my gut told me: “this is the way to keep all of your scattered data in sync.”

I have not been disappointed with it. In fact, I think highly enough of it that I want to tell you more about it, and I am fortunate that John McCrea, Plaxo VP of Marketing, has agreed to talk us through Plaxo.

A couple of thoughts before we get into the interview:

• I have been extremely impressed with Plaxo’s support team. I have left emails in the support center and have received answers in the middle of the night. No joke, I have awoke at 2 or 3 in the morning a couple of times, checked my Dash for email, and lo and behold there was a lengthy email from a Plaxo support person telling me how to solve what I was trying to solve. That kind of service is hard to find.
• Hence, this is one of the reasons I want you to be aware of Plaxo so you can consider whether to add it to your own bag of tricks. It’s important to note that the free version of Plaxo offers a lot on its own, so you could always try that out and then consider later whether you want the premium package.

Note that I have segmented the interview into two basic topic areas: Syncing and Sharing.

Bruce: Good morning, John. Thank you for taking the time to tell us about Plaxo. As you know, keeping multiple data sets in sync can be a nightmare. I can’t tell you how many hours I have wasted trying to sync my Windows Outlook data with my Mac’s iCal data. Yet, Plaxo seems to offer a simple interface for accomplishing it. Can you give us an overview of the Sync features of Plaxo? Then later we will get into the Share features of Plaxo, something that I think is also really cool.

John: Sure. First off, the goal. Our vision is “sync and share.” We believe you should be in control of your identity and your personal information, including the contacts in your address book and your various calendars. And you should be able to use that information across all the tools and services you use, and have fine-grained control of how that info gets shared with others.

Key to achieving that is tackling the very hard problem of automated multi-way sync between the various applications and services you use. In the all-new Plaxo, we’ve made enormous progress down that path. There’s still work to be done, but even now, we offer the first and only online address book and calendar that syncs with the worlds of Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Apple, AOL, LinkedIn, Thunderbird, and mobile phones. We make all that possible through a new feature called the Sync Dashboard.

We make setting up a “sync point” really easy. Once established, it’s “set it and forget it.” Access all your data in all the tools you use. Make a change in any one place, and it gets reflected in all the tools, automatically. Plaxo acts like a hub. Or as I like to say, we’re the “Switzerland of the social web.”

Bruce: How does one go about getting Plaxo to do “its sync thing?” That is, do I need to tell Plaxo to sync to changes that I just made in Outlook, or does it do this on its own whenever it starts up, or what? And, does it matter whether I am running Windows independently, or within a Virtual Machine environment on my Mac (such as VMware Fusion or Parallels)?

John: It doesn’t matter if the user is using parallels or a virtual machine, Plaxo will still be able to sync like normal as long as that virtual machine can access the network.

Bruce: A lot of folks worry about the security of online data. What would you say to set them at ease?

John: Plaxo is trusted by more than 15 million users, and by major partners, including Comcast and AOL. We have one of the strongest privacy policies in the industry, and we undergo periodic security audits to ensure that we are current with best practices.

Bruce: What seem to be the most common sync problems users are having so far and how are these problems being addressed?

John: First, we don’t yet have sync with Gmail contacts, while we await an updated API from Google. That’s confused/disappointed more than a few people. Other than that it’s mostly issued related to how well the web-based services can handle the rising load from us – and how gracefully they fail when they can’t. That said, sync is a hard problem and we’re still in beta. So we hope anyone who experiences any issue lets us know. They can contact me directly, john at plaxo dot com.

Bruce: Many of our readers use their PDAs a lot to stay on top of their data. How can they use Plaxo?

John: I assume you mean smartphones, like my Treo? In my case, I am connected to our exchange server, which means I get the benefit of Plaxo via sync with Outlook. So, I’ve got an always-up-to-date address book and calendar in my pocket. Also, anyone with a mobile phone can now access their Plaxo account for free via our latest WAP app. Just point your mobile browser to m.plaxo.com.

Bruce: Yes, I was thinking of Smartphones. Shifting gears, what are your plans for additional sync modules, perhaps like Remember The Milk or Entourage for the Mac?

John: We invested a lot in the last year building out our sync platform. We definitely intend to leverage that investment by adding additional sync points over time. Stay tuned…

Bruce: Syncing with Notes seems to be unique. Doesn’t look like it is able to sync categories, but does colors instead, which is nice. As a long-time Pocket PC user I am accustomed to ActiveSync not syncing category information. But, the color use seems to offset not having the category information: I’ve noticed that the color changes I make to Notes sync nicely between Plaxo and Outlook. (This is not really a question but maybe it jolts your memory to talk about something related.)

John: The only thing to add here is that the newer version of Outlook recently changed how they handle categories / notes, and we’re not yet fully supporting the new model. So it’s possibly you are seeing the discrepancy in the new version, since in general we try to sync all of the data.

Bruce: Do you have plans to Google-Gear enable Plaxo, for offline use?

John: Nothing to announce at present, but we’re always looking for ways to extend the service.

Bruce: Now to some of the Sharing features of Plaxo. Pulse seems to be unique: One of my former associates, who is also a Plaxo member, updated some of his contact information and Plaxo notified me of it. Now that is neat.

Can users turn off Pulse features from friends when they don’t want to see them? For example, I have made my blog posts available to those in my Plaxo pulse account, but what if they want to know when I update personal info but not when I update the blog?

John: That’s one of a number of features on the roadmap for Pulse. We’re really excited about what Plaxo can do in the next-generation of social networks. Expect to see more coming in the Pulse tab.

Bruce: What does the premium package add?

John: Plaxo Premium, at $49.95/year (and available via 30-day free trial) adds: LinkedIn sync, a De-Duper for address book and calendar, 24/7 VIP support, and unlimited eCards.

Bruce: Anything I’ve missed asking you about? For example, anything you want to add about the history of Plaxo, or its future direction, or anything else we haven’t touched on?

John: In many ways, Plaxo was a pre-cursor to social networking, with a socially-oriented service that kept you up-to-date on the people you know. But as social networking became a craze that helped you connect to a friend of a friend of a friend – or even declare your affinity for a brand of vodka, we chose to stand on the sidelines. Now that social networking is growing up, and focusing more on enriching your connection to the people you actually know and care about, Plaxo is jumping back in. Expect to see a number of interesting things coming.

Keener’s Closing Remarks:
Obviously I thank John McCrea for taking the time to give us a great summary of Plaxo. As I mentioned at the beginning, I have been extremely impressed with Plaxo’s abilities to keep my data in sync: Outlook, iCal, Outlook, GCal. John and the whole team at Plaxo are doing a fantastic job to solve a complex problem.

And, I am starting to be more appreciative of the Sharing aspects of Plaxo: the Pulse feature. Today I experimented a little with Facebook, because I have heard so much about it and other social applications. While it was an interesting experience, and while I may continue to tinker with it, I think it is designed for more casual interactions. Plaxo, on the other hand, seems to me to be a social networking application for professionals. This is not to put down Facebook, or any other networking method, and I am not suggesting that they are unprofessional. And, as John indicated, social networking applications are maturing. But it just seems to me that Plaxo is designed from the ground up for the needs of professionals.