Putting it all into Contxts

A couple of weeks ago I heard via Twitter of this new mobile feature at Contxts.com. Basically the purpose is to allow you to send your business card information via SMS messaging instantly and easily without needing to exchange tangible objects. What an ingenious idea!

The concept behind using Contxts is one where you can transmit your information to anyone you want just by having them text a shortcode (which typically would be your username) to “50500”. In doing so, that person would receive a text message within a few seconds with your contact information. You can customize the message to whatever you want however often you’d like, but there are a couple of caveats:

• The people who received your information via Contxts already will not get the updated information.
• Your information you populate in Contxts must be limited to 140 text characters.

So you must be thinking that this is just an electronic business card, but you’d be wrong. Sure, this is a way to help make sure you don’t have anything else cluttering up your desk or pockets because you have that extra business card, but just imagine the times when you’re at a conference or event and you meet a lot of people. Rather than taking out a pen and writing down how you know them, you can instantly jot their information down in your Blackberry, iPhone, or PDA and save it to your address book. Then, when you’re back at the office or at a computer, you can synch up your address books to Outlook or whatever email program you’re using and drop the new information there.

During South by Southwest, I unfortunately ran out of business cards mid-way through the conference but luckily I had signed up for Contxts and had the opportunity to use it in a crunch – especially in passing information off to Mashable’s own Pete Cashmore. I must say that this is probably a very applicable business tool that everyone needs to sign up for. Granted, there is a bunch of new things that could be done later in the future, but in its most basic form, Contxts seems to have it down right.

If you want to see how I’m using it, go ahead and text “KENYEUNG” to 50500.