Need help juggling your social media accounts? Gremln helps you keep track of them all, allowing you to schedule posts, monitor your reputation and analyze the response to your content.

Much like Hootsuite,  Gremln lets you add multiple Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts,  so you can monitor them all from one place. The Free plan would be just right for one person, and paid plans ranging from $6 to $500 per month offer additional capabilities. For example, teams can use the built-in chat feature to coordinate strategy, and eventually the app will include sentiment analysis for reputation monitoring.

The layout is tabbed and looks very much like Hootsuite’s. One advantage of Gremln is that you can also add a panel that lets you monitor RSS feeds, though for some inexplicable reason there isn’t an easy option to share the content you find there.

Another cool feature is the ability to set and monitor goals for each social media account, like increasing your Klout score and numbers of friends or followers. However, the value of the goals you can set with the app are debatable: it’s not the number of followers, it’s how engaged they are that counts.

What do you think of Gremln?

Videos are a great way to kill time online…but sometimes the only time you have to kill is when you’re waiting around somewhere, cell phone in hand. Spool lets you store videos, articles and lolcat pics to view later on your phone or tablet.

As ReadWriteWeb points out, the underlying concept is basically the same as that of Instapaper and ReadItLater, but Spool also grabs videos in addition to articles and web pages. It formats the videos to fit your phone, then saves them for your later viewing pleasure.

Spool’s browser extension makes it easy to grab content with just two clicks of the mouse. The Android and iPhone apps enable to read or watch wherever you are, even if there is no Internet connection available.  ReadWriteWeb’s Dave Copeland had problems viewing YouTube videos offline due to licensing issues, but that appears to only be an issue with certain clips. I had no problem watching the videos I saved even after disconnecting my phone completely from the Internet.

What do you think of Spool? If you want to try it out, invites are still available via ReadWriteWeb.

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Facebook’s Event feature is great for event planning, but it has some drawbacks: it’s not that visually striking, and of course event attendees need to be on Facebook. Erly is a better way to plan events and remember them when they’re over.

Creating an event on Erly is as easy as entering in the event details, then customizing the text and background. You can choose from a variety of pictures or use Bing’s image search to find just the right one.  Uploading your own background is also an option.

Once the event has been created, invite guests by email or by sharing a link to the event on your social network of choice.  They can RSVP through Erly, using the discussion feature for questions or comments.

After the event is over, Erly becomes a sort of online scrapbook.  Use it to add pictures, videos and links. You can even use it to pull pictures directly from your friend’s Facebook albums and compile them all in one place.  The resulting compilation is much more attractive and better organized than a collection of photos scattered in various locations on Facebook and elsewhere.

I like Erly quite a bit; in fact, I wish I’d used it for my best friend’s baby shower. That said, I wish it were more deeply integrated with Facebook in some ways; I like having the option to invite attendees without Facebook pages but wish I could send Facebook friends invitations through Facebook more easily.

What do you think of Erly?

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Supposedly, Facebook has cut down the theoretical six degrees of separation into 3.74. Thanks to social networking sites, the world really is getting smaller. 3Degrees allows you to use this factoid to your advantage. (Via Mashable).

The idea behind the app is simple: to help you connect with people who are already connected to your Facebook friends. Just sign in with Facebook, give the app the access it needs to work, and search for connections by location, interests or both. Whether you’re looking for a new hiking buddy or a new life partner, odds are you’ll find someone interesting. Once you do, use the app to ask your mutual friend for an introduction. Brilliant!

The only problem is that 3Degrees can’t do a thing for you unless you have friends who are already using it. The app makes it easy to invite them to join as well, but I didn’t feel comfortable inviting anyone simply because most of my close Facebook friends are going to be leery of any third-party app that wants access to their profile like that (unless, of course, there’s a freaking quiz or a fake farm involved).  It also felt awkward to invite people I’m Facebook friends with but never talk to in real life.

For many if not most people, this is not going to be an issue. Here’s a video showing how well the app works when you actually have a decent number of early adopter friends:

3Degrees Video from 3Degrees on Vimeo.

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If you haven’t embraced Facebook’s new Timeline yet, the hour groweth late. Rumor has it, they will begin migrating profiles to timelines sometime next week whether you like it or not. Might as well do it in style, right?  CoverCanvas makes it easy to create an attractive, eye-catching cover photo collage for your Timeline.

All you have to do is authorize the app, then select a template to determine how you want your photos arranged and the background. If you want your photos in a different order, hit “Remix” until it looks right. Then, create your cover and select it in Facebook.

The downside is that the app wants access to a ridiculous amount of your data. We’re talking basic information, profile information, your Newsfeed, all your data at any time… I absolutely fail to see why this is necessary. Fortunately, after creating your custom cover, you can revoke its access in Settings and still keep your dressed-up timeline intact.

Another minor annoyance is that even after asking for the keys to your profile, the app still will only let you use the photos in your profile album, rather than allowing you to select your own photos from all of your albums.  Oh well. It’s still easy to use and the end result looks nice.

What do you think of CoverCanvas? Also, if you have a better app for Facebook Timeline, leave it in the comments!

Not sure where to go or what to do on your next vacation?  Teleportus is a website that finds flights for you based on your travel dates and interests.

To use it, simply select your days off, select your desired activity from the drop-down menu, the country you want to fly to and the temperature range you’re looking for. Teleportus chooses several possible destinations that meet your specifications and are noted for your desired activity. Then, you’ll be presented with a flight option for each destination.

It’s an interesting concept, but Teleportus’ claim to always offer the cheapest flight options is objectively not true. When I tested it, Hipmunk beat them almost (but not always), though usually not by more than $20-$30. Also, with the first flight I checked, the departure time listed on Teleportus was not available on the partner site where Teleportus sends you to buy the tickets. Finally, it would be nice if there were an option to toggle between European date formats and US date formats, and between euros and dollars.

What do you think of Teleportus? I personally don’t think it will revolutionize my travel planning, but I could see how it might appeal to some people.

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For all the talk about the impending demise of email, most people still use it extensively to communicate online. BrandMyMail lets you dress your email up with themes, pictures and links to the social networks of your choice.

Creating a template is easy- all you have to do it drag and drop the plugins you want, add your information and links to your social networks (if desired) and you’re good to go. BrandMyMail works via browser extension for Firefox and Chrome, so it’s a lot like WiseStamp. However, with BrandMyMail you have the option to customize the entire email, not just the signature.  Also, WiseStamp has moved to a “freemium” model, but with BrandMyMail you can have multiple templates free.

Of course, with great power comes great responsibility, and you should think carefully before you add a theme that’s going to totally change the look and feel of your email. It’s probably best to save the more colorful designs for personal emails only!

Used wisely, though, BrandMyMail is a nice way to spruce up your email and showcase your activity on your social networking accounts.

What do you think of it?

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You’ve probably heard about Pinterest by now. It is, after all, the new darling of the tech startup world.  If you haven’t jumped on the bandwagon yet, here’s why you might want to give it a try.

There are probably a crapzillion of companies built around the idea of allowing users to bookmark and share information they find online. How much is a crapzillion? I don’t know, start counting…Delicious, Springpad, Digg and the list goes on and on.

So what makes Pinterest special?  It’s especially well-designed and easy to use, with a clean interface that makes pictures of what you found the focal point of the user experience. Sign up is easy, though you still need an invite to join. If you choose to connect your Facebook or Twitter account, you’ll be automatically connected to the people you follow on those networks if they have a Pinterest account. You might be amazed at who shows up; the fact that my Great-Aunt Patty uses it is nothing short of astonishing. (Also, my Great-Aunt Patty beat me to a website. Epic fail on my part.)

After you join, Pinterest sets you up to follow some users with similar interests, so it’s easy to get started and to see what other people are up to. Like Tumblr, you have the option of “Liking” or “Re-pinning” content that other people have posted.

Pinterest decribes itself as an online pinboard, but it’s really more like an online art gallery, curated by you.  The “art” can be anything-pictures of products you like, pictures of food you’d like to cook, pictures of places you’d like to travel…the possibilities are almost endless. You can use the handy toolbar button to save pictures as you find them, and you can also upload pictures of your own.

Pinterest doesn’t work well for saving and sharing text-heavy material that isn’t accompanied by relevant photography, but it could potentially be a powerful storytelling tool if you carefully curated visual images around a certain event.

There are rules, however, as the welcome email makes a point of reminding you. “No nudity” seems to be the big one, though my chaotic heart longs to create a beautiful pinboard of breastfeeding pictures just to see what happens.

I think Pinterest’s ease of use and accessiblity will serve it well in the months to come. Too often, the tech world promotes companies and concepts that don’t really have widespread appeal outside of our little techie bubble. Twitter is an incredibly revotionary tool in many respects, but no matter how much they try to simplify and streamline the interface, I’m not sure it will ever gain the kind of ubiquitous adoption that Pinterest could potentially have. Pinterest is just easier for people to “get” than Twitter.

What do you think? Share your thoughts in the comments!

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Hotel booking sites are legion, but HotelMaps, a newly launched entry into this space, offers users an improved visual experience. Most travel sites are geared to display hotel results in list view; maps showing the hotel are almost an afterthought, and tend to get cluttered with markers if there are a lot of hotels in one area.

With HotelMaps, the results are displayed on a map instead of as a list, so it’s easy to see where everything is. HotelMaps also displays important information like prices and star ratings right on the map. When there are one or more hotels located right next to each other, HotelMaps groups the entries together so the map stays neat, uncluttered and easy to read. When you find a promising establishment, click on it to zoom in and see a list of amenities, plus pictures, webcam streams and Wikipedia entries on the surrounding area and nearby landmarks. Then, if you like what you see, you can book.

I liked the way HotelMaps was laid out. It’s not going to change your life, but it does make it easier to find a hotel in the best possible location. However, some improvements could definitely be made . For example, there needs to be more filter options. At the moment, you can filter by price (which is stuck in Euro even though I have my settings on USD), star rating and guest rating. Adding options like the ability to filter for pet-friendly establishments, shuttle service, etc. would make the site more useful.

What do you think of HotelMaps?

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It’s always exciting to watch how the apps I cover on Useful Tools evolve and grow. Recently, the team behind Solo asked me to take another look at their project management app for freelancers (previously reviewed here). Here’s a fresh look at the new and improved version of it.

Targeting freelance designers, Solo remains one of the most attractive project management apps out there.  It’s a cinch to add new projects, and they’ve updated their timer so that you can turn it off and on with one click. Meanwhile, it’s now possible to generate invoices from your time sheets if you bill by the hour. The planner keeps you on track with access to tasks, milestones and to-do’s, so you don’t get behind and end up needing to alter the space/time continuum to make your deadline.

Still, there are definitely obstacles to adopting Solo as my freelance command and control center (even though it’s cheaper than Freshbooks and I’ve been generously provided with a free trial.) The main obstacle is collecting payments, as there is still no integration with PayPal. Sadness!

Even more exciting than the incremental improvements they’ve made so far are the new features that are on the horizon: according to their website, we’ll soon see a client portal for clients to log in and check the status of their projects, messaging,and Apple iCal and Outlook integration (would you mind integrating with GCal while you’re at it?) Plus, they’re working on an iPhone app.

What do you think of Solo?