Have you ever wanted to have a quick chat with someone, a potential client or someone you met networking, and ended up in a back and forth exchange of emails that seems to go on for ages to arrange a time? Well this can be solved in an instant with a scheduling tool.
There are lots of tools out there but a great free place to start is with Calendly. It offers a single ‘appointment type’ for free (which can be a 30 minute chat which is perfect for those chats mentioned earlier). First you set the times that you will be available in a standard week for this kind of appointment. Then you connects to your Google calendar or iCal calendar and checks for any appoitments that you have booked in.
When someone wants to book some time with you, just email them the link for Calendly and they can book directly into your calendar, only seeing available timeslots when you are not otherwise booked.
If something crops up they can also change the booking without having to go through the whole back and forth exchange again. This can really save some serious time!
The free account gives you a single appointment type and leaves the calendly branding but it’s a great starting point. You can sign up here.
NOTE : If you want to have more appointment types, take payments or add intake forms or terms and conditions then I would recommend Acuity Scheduling. It’s more complicated to get set up but has more features at a better price than Calendly.