Tis the Season… to Work! [INFOGRAPHIC]

Xobni has released our 2nd annual survey results on email behavior around the holidays… and it ain’t pretty if you’re a believer in disconnecting over the holidays.  Overall, the percentage of people checking and receiving email was shockingly similar to last year’s results, leading us to believe this is a very valid representation of email behavior over the holidays.

The highlights of the survey are as follows:

• A whopping 79% of U.S. working adults say they receive work email on traditional holidays like Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, etc.; and 68% with email admitted to checking it.
• 19% of people said that they are actually “thankful for the distraction” or “relieved” to receive work email on holidays. 
• 37% of people surveyed admitted to feeling annoyed, frustrated or resentful after receiving work-related emails on holidays. This number dropped slightly from 41% last year, leading to more evidence that people are accepting (and for some, embracing) work on the holidays. 
• 41% of people that admitted to checking email because they believe doing so would ease the work load once they return from the “break.” 
• Funny bone stat: 6% say they use work email as a way to avoid awkward family/holiday commitments and “crazy” friends and/or relatives. ;) 

But, there’s good news for the holiday purists.  According to the survey, men are checking email LESS. That’s right - in 2010, 67% of men admitted to checking email in 2010, and that number fell to 58% in 2011.  And women are checking slightly more… meaning we’re closing the gender gap on who checks email while spending time with friends and family over the holidays.

If you’re intrigued and want to learn more, here’s a link to the full data released today (and here are the results from last year). We’ve only got one rule - don’t read this from the Thanksgiving table! 

INFOGRAPHIC: The Value of Contact Information

At Xobni, we believe the address book as it is today is broken.  We spend a lot of time around here figuring out how to make email and contact management easier, better and effortless.  Some call it the magic in the mundane, but we call it awesome.  Our most recent product called Smartr (now for Gmail and Android) has been called a “magic address book,” and PC Magazine said it best when they said “Smartr…dives into your contacts list and pulls up pearls of information, like the date you first communicated and who is frequently CC’ed on emails.  It’s an efficient way to search your list of contacts, while also keeping an eye on Twitter and Facebook.”

We’ve also surveyed our customers to better understand how much time they save with Smartr and Xobni (4/hours per week, for inquiring minds), but thought it would also be interesting to understand the value they place on their contacts.  We were surprised by some of the responses, and wanted to share.  Below is an infographic displaying much of this data, and the press release with more results can be found here.