Using LinkedIn Inside Outlook

I love this really useful FREE download from Microsoft – Outlook Social Connector for Microsoft Outlook

It lets you grow your social networks and stay up to date without leaving Outlook. It does this by adding an extra pane in Outlook below where you see the current email and shows you details from the contact whose email you’re currently reading (such as their photo and latest updates, it also creates a list of all the emails they’ve sent you (which I find very handy)).
 

It already works with LinkedIn, Facebook, myspace and Windows Live Messanger and Twitter is expected to be added in the near future.

It can be added into Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2003 and is built-in to the new Outlook 2010.

You can download it here Microsoft Outlook Social Connector 32-bit

More details below.

The OSC presents useful information including:

• Communication history Your mailbox is searched and the recent messages you’ve exchanged with that person appear. Can’t remember the last time you e-mailed this person? A quick look at the OSC reveals the last time you received an email from them, and one click opens up the message.
• Meetings When is the next scheduled meeting with this person? The OSC shows upcoming appointments that include you and the message sender.
• Attachments Can’t find the attachment that the person is referring to in a message? With the OSC you can quickly review attachments that you and the sender have exchanged. One-click access quickly opens the attachment or you can see the message that it is attached to.
• Activity feeds Stay on top of activities involving your colleagues and friends in real time. The OSC connects to business and consumer social networks.
• Did you say activity feeds? Yes we did! The OSC makes Outlook 2010 a social networking tool by connecting to the new social experiences in SharePoint 2010. That connection allows the OSC to download activity feeds for colleagues and display them inside the new People Pane: