Engagio (beta)

The most valuable commodity the Web tool Engagio (beta) has to offer is the ability to search through multiple social networks simultaneously for keywords used in discussion. You can't search everything that has been posted by every one of your contacts in every network, but you will find all the instances of a searched word or phrase that has been used in conversation with you on multiple platforms. This feature alone makes Engagio a unique and valuable prospect for self-promoting small businesses and individuals, as well as social networking power users. While the service is still in beta, it seems very near to being fully finished, with a fairly mature interface and selection of features.

Engagio differs from social media aggregators, like TweetDeck (4 stars) and Seesmic Desktop 2 (3 stars) by focusing specifically on conversations?"at" messages in Twitter, comments on Facebook status updates, replies in Disqus, and so forth?rather than the stream. While aggregator apps do typically provide options for homing in on social conversations, they don't achieve it as neatly as Engagio.

The Look
As a Web-based service, Engagio (at engag.io) is platform agnostic. Surf over the site, create a free account, and log in. As a new member, you'll have to authenticate at least one social network to share information with Engagio for the service to work, but more than two to get any real use out of it.

The complete list of websites and services that integrate with Engagio currently is: Disqus, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Hacker News, Tumblr, Foursquare, and LinkedIn.

Design-wise, the site replicates Web-based email rather closely, and Gmail specifically. On the left of the main page is a column called Folders, a misguided label for what the area actually contains: tabs for Inbox, Sent, My Contacts, Shared Links, Sites, Dashboard, and My Profile. None of these are "folders" or buckets where you would drag and sort files. They could easily be structured as tabs across the top of the page to more accurate depict what they are: sections.

Features
The Inbox shows a list of recent conversations or interactions you've had on all the sites you've connected. Each conversation appears as a threaded discussion, ? la Gmail. And like most email clients, each line entry gives a synopsis of what's included, like the names and images people who interacted with you, the icon for the website where the activity occurred, a snippet of the most recent comment, and the date at the far right. Unopened lines use bold fonts and a white background. Read messages have a light blue background and no bold.

Press the Sent link and you'll see a similar page, but highlighting what you have personally written, posted, or shared.

The My Contacts section, unfolds some of Engagio's powers. Boxes with statistics show people who have interacted with you and how often. Sorting buttons lets you browse the statistics in a interesting ways, like frequency of interaction or how recently the last conversation took place.

Another powerful area to explore is the Dashboard, where you can find a wealth of information regarding where you are most active, and perhaps most influential. Engagio shows its beta qualities in the Dashboard, however, by not including options for letting users customize their data. The app would be more impressive if it allowed users to define and customize the measurements that are most valuable to them.

An ever-present search bar at the top of the page is one of the most important aspects of the whole site, that I wonder why it hangs in such an understated location. The search bar lets you look for instances of any keyword or phrase across all the interactions from all the sites that you've connected to Engagio. Type any word that's significant to your typical conversations, and you can instantly figure out who among your connections engages in those discussions. And because Engagio allows integration with platforms for commenting on blogs and websites (Tumblr, Disqus, Hacker News), you can even find all those engaged strangers who have taken the time to reply to your thoughts. If you are a blogger or frequent commenter on sites that use those systems, it's extraordinarily useful to be able to surface people who have taken the time to write thoughtful responses again and again. Now you'll know to treat them well.

More Promise Than Need for Polish
Even as a beta, Engagio shows more promise than need for polish. While I would like to see the ability to connect to more than one account per service, the basic tools that Engagio provides work wonders at letting you manage and keep track of the people and discussions happening online. It's an intriguing tool that delivers a respectable amount of information you can really act on.

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