Information extraction software

Originally Posted by Divest

So, at work I'm in charge of marketing which means I send out mass e-mails, physical letters, and gather phone numbers for our telemarketers to call. I know this probably makes me sound evil, but jesus christ I have to make a living somehow.

The way I do this is basically by thumbing through various websites and extracting this information by copying and pasting it into an excel spreadsheet and importing it into ACT (a sales database and contact management program).

I know there has to be a more efficient way to do this. I'm hoping to at least cut out the copying and pasting by hand. That shit takes forever and is really boring and tedious. I've done searches on this stuff and the only software I've been able to turn up are ones for extracting e-mail, and sometimes phone numbers and faxes, but no addresses.

So do you guys happen to know of any software out there that'd be able to help me out with something like this? Money is not an issue - the company will pay for it if it seems useful enough, which there's no doubt that this would be.

I use ACT too for my work. I copy and paste leads and inquiries into my database from emails. Luckily, I don't have to go out looking for business - they come to us.

But that doesn't make the task any less boring and tedious. Data entry, baby.

The only way I've found that I can mass-import data is via an excel sheet. I do this with leads we generate at exhibitions and things - but the data is already in a text-delimited format. I can throw that into excel, and then from there, throw it into ACT.

But if you're hand-picking from the internet, I have found virtually no way to import that sort of thing. Copy and paste is the way to go. (I have to do it occasionally with end users who don't give me enough info) Excel wont help you in this situation.

If I were you, I'd look into a lead dealer or something. I don't know jack about them, though.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Divest

Well, mostly what I do is create new databases and import them into ACT using the information I copy and paste into the spreadsheet (in this case, excel). I found it's far easier to copy and paste into excel THEN import the whole thing, rather than create a new contact in ACT, then copy and paste, etc. etc.

There's software that'll pick up e-mail and phone numbers, but for some reason not address. I'd imagine it might have something to do with the format, but damnit it all to hell anyways.

Yea, Excel is easier for input because there aren't retarded fields and shit like there are in ACT. I don't know if you use the Users, Follow-up, and all that unnecessary bullshit ACT has built in, either.

Good luck with the address extractor, though. I know about a million emails extractors, but no address ones or anything. ;_;

There's nowhere I can't reach.