Skymail, originally introduced as Nexmail, has already won an E-tech award in CTIA's Enterprise Division. Indeed, Skymail is a fabulous business solution for documentation. Originally conceived by Peter Lazinsky to track change orders for commercial construction, the enterprise possibilities are endless. Advertised to a wide variety of professionals from construction to government, real estate, sales, and medical; Skymail not only provides documentation tracking, but on the move dictation.

How it works

Setting up your Skymail account is simple, and they offer a generous trial period. The most difficult part of the process is adding contacts, and that is easy providing you use Outlook. (My contacts are all either in my Palm desktop or Thunderbird, so I had to add each contact manually.) You can set up individual contacts or contact groups, but perhaps more importantly, you can set up categories for personal use such as Tasks, Expenses, Patient/Customer Notes, Change Orders.

For every contact or group you set up you get a phone number to call. Add that number to an existing contact to send them voicemail, or create a new contact for groups or your own categories. A simple example of using Skymail is dialing your new contact "Tasks" when you're in the car and shouldn't be using your Treo's keyboard. Tasks answers "Skymail now recording," and you begin talking. You can remind yourself to pick the dog up at the groomer, the 3 grocery items you only remember when you can't write them down, or to check the url they just mentioned on the radio. The voicemail you leave is then emailed to you, and if you retrieve your email on your Treo, it comes in mp3 format which is automatically opened by PocketTunes!

Obviously it is not specifically a Treo application. You can use any cell phone with Skymail. For some functions, using a "normal" cell phone would be easier than using a Treo. For instance, when you set up a new contact/category, Skymail can send you a text message with the new contact phone number. Saving a number from the body of a text message on the Treo is cumbersome, but on most cell phones, it's simply a matter of saving the new contact.

You can add a contact as a texting contact, so that you can send that person a sms from the Skymail website. The neat thing here is that not only are you still keep records of the messages sent, but as soon as you add someone, you are automatically added to that person's text contacts. The term John Pescatore, CEO of Pacific Datavision, used for this is "viral." Your contacts self-populate.

Best used as an enterprise tool, it is ideal for the person in the field who needs to constantly call customer service or dispatch. There is no holding for an operator, you call your number and leave instructions or a request. The message is delivered immediately, and you now have a record of exactly what was requested and when. No more cases of customer service saying "but I never got that message," or dispatch saying "I didn't know that was needed." The record of the message is stored in your account, and even shows that it was received and when.

At $9.99 per month, it is not for everyone. But if you are in a business where you need to track inventory from the field, change orders, or expenses, Skymail can really improve your company's productivity. There is a free trial (linked below) if you are curious to check it out.

Related Links

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