Plaxo (original post) is another web-based contact management tool with a very specific focus on contacts (with a dash of questionably useful social networking). Like Gmail, the web interface. Utilizes the Mac OS X built-in contact database, any change and modification can sync with the built-in Contacts and iCloud, as well as any other service OS X Contacts supports (e.g. Google Contacts). Your Google Gmail contacts are important. As a small business owner, you know that your business is all about people. Keeping in touch with the people you do business with is one of the keys to business success. By organizing and managing your Gmail contacts, you can build and strengthen your.

• Google Contacts On Mac
• Google Contacts Sync
• Find Tools On Mac
• Google Voice
• Sync Google Contacts On Mac

Mac OS X has a great built-in address book and a number of useful third-party alternatives, but out of all the options Cobook is our favorite. It's a very new app, currently still in beta, but its intelligent search and social media integration make it very easy to love.

Cobook

Platform: Mac OS X
Price: Free
Download Page

Features

• Mac OS X can be a pleasure to help you organize your digital life. From iCal to Addressbook, Apple gives you the basics. There are many more excellent Mac utilities which organize your digital life.
• Pay $9.99 a month and you get 25,000 contacts, real-time syncing with Google, and daily contact updates. There's an iOS app out now, and Mac OS X and Android apps are in the pipeline.
• Search the world's information, including webpages, images, videos and more. Google has many special features to help you find exactly what you're looking for.

• Identifies the type of information you're searching or adding as you type it.
• Automatically updates your contacts via social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
• Utilizes the Mac OS X built-in Address Book database so you can still use Address Book if you want. This means you can still sync with iCloud and any other service Address Book supports (e.g. Google Contacts).
• Lives in your menubar for quick and easy access.
• Very simple setup process that walks you through everything you need to do to get started.
• Global keyboard shortcut allows for full keyboard control.
• Automatically checks for updates and offers to update itself.

Google Contacts On Mac

Where It Excels

Cobook understands what you're typing based on its format, whether you're searching or adding new information to a contact. If you type in a phone number that doesn't exist it'll offer to create a new contact. If a contact is listed, it'll offer to add whatever information you've put into the search field. Cobook just knows what you're trying to do. This makes it super easy to find and update your contacts.

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On top of that, Cobook pulls data from Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to updated your Address Book without any effort on your part. This saves a ton of time because your updates will involve adding notes more so than it will involve adding phone numbers and addresses.

All in all, Cobook automatically updates your address book for you and makes it much easier to perform an manual updates you need to make yourself. Plus it's free, and we love apps that both cost nothing and also happen to be pretty amazing.

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Google Contacts Sync

Where It Falls Short

Because Cobook's interface only lives in the menubar, this poses a few problems. First and foremost, if you want to view contact information while you're typing in another window, you can't really do that because clicking away from Cobook will hide the interface back in the menubar. Additionally, Cobook can really only live in one location and can't be resized. While I like having it tucked away in the menubar, it can be problematic on occasion and it would be nice to be able to switch to a moveable window when needed.

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Because Cobook syncs with your social media accounts, you're letting it change your address book based on what other people input into their profiles. Most of the time this is great because you don't have to update anything at all, but you also can end up with more information than you want or a different information than you need. This isn't Cobook's fault, but it's something to be aware of when using an app that uses data you don't control to change the data you do.

The Competition

Address Book is the obvious competition. It's already built into Mac OS X and is pretty great. Cobook relies on it, so it's hard to argue it can do anything that Cobook can't. In fact, you really have to use them together if you're planning on setting up sync with iCloud (or other services) as Cobook can't handle that functionality. While it's technically another app and therefore competition, both work very well together and you don't really have to pick one or the other.

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Microsoft Outlook for Mac is what you use when you need an address book app with Microsoft Exchange support. Other than that, there aren't too many plusses.

Contact Book ($5) is an Address Book alternative that pulls from the same databased but offers a slightly different interface and a few bonus features. You can color-code contacts, add social networking information, remind yourself of various events, and more. But it costs $5 and does less than Cobook, so it's hard to consider it as a better option.

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Private Contact ($7) is a simple address book that's designed for storing private contacts. The idea is pretty simple and straightforward, but pretty useful if you want to safeguard your contacts.

The Daylite Productivity Suite ($230 or $30/month) includes more than just a contacts app. It is, as the name suggests, a large suite of tools to help you get things done better. This allows for tighter integration with its other apps so you can better manage your contacts and sort them by relationship rather than just name. This is a good option if you're looking for something more business-oriented, though the cost is pretty high if all you want is the contacts app.

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Lifehacker's App Directory is a new and growing directory of recommendations for the best applications and tools in a number of given categories.

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Today, Outlook 2016 for Mac is adding support for Google Calendar and Contacts—available first to our Office Insider Fast community. We’re excited to be delivering on these highly-requested features for Mac users and matching our Outlook apps for iOS and Android, providing Google Accounts with a more powerful way to stay in control of the day ahead.

While today marks the beginning of this rollout, we need your help to test drive and provide feedback on the experience. We will be closely managing the rollout to Insiders, expanding availability over the next several weeks, before becoming broadly available to Office 365 customers later this year.

Note: These improvements will become available to those who have Office 365 plans that include Office applications.

More than just email

Outlook for Mac has long supported connecting to and managing your Gmail. With these updates, Outlook will now also sync your Google Calendars and Contacts. The experience will be very similar to what you are familiar with in Outlook today, with support for all the core actions—such as add, delete, edit time and location. All changes will update back and forth with Gmail or Outlook for iOS and Android, so everything is in sync across all your devices.

Find Tools On Mac

Bringing the best features of Outlook to your Gmail account

Up to now, many of Outlook’s best and most advanced email features have only been available to those with an Outlook.com, Office 365 or Exchange email address. With these updates, you will also be able to take advantage of several of Outlook’s advanced features with your Gmail account, including Focused Inbox and richer experiences for travel reservations and package deliveries. Additional advanced features will become available as we roll these updates out more broadly.

How to get started

Outlook 2016 for Mac users who are part of the Office Insider Fast program will be the first to try this new feature. To become an Insider, simply open up Outlook, click Help > Check for Updates and then follow the directions found here.

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Not all Insiders will see the new Google Account experience right away. We will closely monitor feedback and expand the rollout over the next few weeks. Outlook will notify you when this feature becomes available, with a prompt asking you to add your Google Account. If you have an existing Google Account connected to Outlook, you can remove it after setting up the new experience.

Sync Google Contacts On Mac

If you ignore the initial prompt, you can add a Google Account at a later time by going to Tools > Accounts.

We are still fine-tuning the Google Account experience in Outlook for Mac and will provide regular updates to Insiders before releasing the features more broadly. You can help us improve the experience by providing feedback and identifying bugs by going to Help > Contact Support. See this list of known issues.

Got a suggestion for how to improve Outlook for Mac? Please suggest and vote on future feature ideas on our Outlook for Mac UserVoice page.

—The Outlook team