May 12 2011

Call List Manager – an app waiting to be born

I searched the app store recently for an app I was sure someone had come up with. But alas, no one had. So I thought I’d throw it out there in the hopes that someone wanted to take it on.

Like many people I maintain a “to call” list. I do a lot of work over email, but I’m also on the phone anywhere between 5 and 12 hours a day and at any given moment I have a healthy list of people to get back to. I’ve tried different ways of managing this list – from putting them in as calendar reminders (works to create the list, but it’s not persistent enough) to using tasks (this has been the best option, although still lacking) to writing myself emails with lists of people I need to call back (this works for specific situations, but I need to refresh the email once I’ve actually connected with a portion of my list; plus its kluge). Add to this that I’m often running through calls while driving, which brings with it its own challenges of accessing these lists and their associated numbers (and what if I need to remind myself of context and have to look through emails or a calendar entry to find it?). Like everyone reading this, I’m an above average driver, but despite that it’s still not the best way to work while getting from point to point.

My app idea is pretty simple – a Call List Manager application (ideas on a better name?). There’d be a web version of it as well which would connect to the app and let me input people, numbers and context that would load to the phone app (and vice versa so I could use the web app for calls while at my desk). I could easily add people to the call list, assign a priority level, the number I needed to call them on and any other information I thought might be helpful at the time of the call. I’d connect the calls from within the app itself and once done with the click of a button should be able to mark the call as complete, tag for followup (with notes if I felt like it), or mark it to try back later or forward to another Call List Manager user to add to their call list.

Someone was telling me about a service like this (I think it was an idea, not a product yet), but the way it was describe to me – which admittedly was 3rd or 4th hand – didn’t fulfill the most basic “management” of the list that I was looking for.

What do you think? Any app developers out there want to take it on? (I’m in iPhone user, so that would be my first choice of platforms!)