What a personal CRM is for
A personal CRM is a contact list with a memory. Next to each person it keeps what you talked about, what you said you would do, and when to get back in touch. Unlike sales CRMs there are no deal stages, forecasts or team seats. It is for one person keeping their own network warm.
The hard part is never the software. It is capturing details in the minute after a conversation, before they fade. Merlions is built around that minute.
Capture in seconds
- 1
Speak or type
Hold the mic and say something like “Remind me to call Sarah on Friday at 2”. Merlions shows what it understood and saves nothing until you confirm. Everything you can say, you can also type.
- 2
Scan their card
Scan both sides of a paper card and check the fields. See the business card scanner.
- 3
Swap QR cards
Scan their QR contact card, or show yours. See the digital business card.
What Merlions keeps for each person
- Contact details: phones with country codes, emails, company, title, website and address.
- Dated notes, shown as a timeline, so you can see the whole history at a glance.
- Tags for grouping people your way: an event, a city, a project.
- Follow-ups with a due date, priority and a reminder on your phone.
- A WhatsApp button on the contact page when they have a phone number.
Find people by what you remember
You rarely remember the name. You remember that someone asked for a quotation, or that you met them at a particular event. Search covers names, companies, phone numbers, tags and every word in your notes, and each result shows the note that matched, so you can see why it came up.
Example: searching “Who asked me for a quotation?” finds the person who asked, with the matched note “Requested a revised quotation after the October meeting”.
Follow up without maintaining a system
Home shows today's schedule, your latest notes, the next thing due and a follow-up checklist. Tick a follow-up to complete it, swipe right to change it, swipe left to delete it. Overdue items stay visible until you deal with them. Reminders are local notifications, and their previews hide names and notes unless you turn that on.
Not sure what to write? The networking follow-up guide has copyable templates.
Merlions, a sales CRM, or your phone's contacts?
| Merlions | Sales CRM | Phone contacts | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Notes and history per person | Yes, dated timeline | Yes | One notes field |
| Follow-up reminders | Yes | Yes | No |
| Search inside your notes | Yes, with the matching note | Varies | Limited |
| Pipelines, deals and teams | No | Yes | No |
| Account required | No | Yes | Usually a cloud account |
| Price | Free | Usually per user, per month | Free |
Who it is for
Founders, freelancers, consultants, sales people and anyone who meets more people than they can remember: at conferences, client visits, meetups or community events.
Honest limits
- It lives on one phone. There is no cloud sync between devices and no team sharing.
- To move to a new phone, save a backup file or use the optional Google Drive backup. Backup files are not encrypted yet.
- No email or calendar inbox integration. Merlions does not read your mail.
- iPhone first. Android is in progress and not available yet.
Last updated by Testware Informatics, the makers of Merlions.
