3 Free Tools To Make Scheduling a Conference Call a Breeze

3 Free Tools To Make Scheduling a Conference Call a Breeze Picture

by Shannon Lewis

Raise your hand if scheduling conference calls is a pain in the neck? Yup, just as I thought, I see a lot of hands being raised out there. Well it doesn’t have to be! I have several great (and free) tools that can help make scheduling a conference call dare I say “fun”. (Ok, I’m pushing it a bit, but these tools will make your life easier!)

THE OLD WAY
The old way of scheduling a conference call via email: 

  1. Send an email proposing a few times that work.
  2. If you are lucky, you get an email back saying at least one of the times works.
  3. You confirm the time.
  4. If you’re not lucky, you will get an email back saying none of the times work and maybe a few alternative.
  5. Repeat the cycle X times until you find a time that works.

There has to be a better way, and there is!

SCHEDULING A ONE-ON-ONE CALL
Need to schedule a one-on-one call? If so, check out Calendly (www.calendly.com). Calendly syncs with your Google or Office 365 calendar and show the times that you are free for a meeting. It’s simple to use:

  1.  Send your Calendly URL to the person you want to met with.
  2. She can choose a time that she is available and easily books the time in your calendar. No need for you to be involved at all.
  3. Calendly automatically adds that appointment in your calendar and emails you to let you know an appointment has been booked. Calendly also sends the participant a confirmation email.
  4. Violà the meeting is scheduled and the only action you had to take was providing the URL to your Calendly page!

SCHEDULING A CALL WITH MULTIPLE PEOPLE
Need to schedule a meeting with more than on person? This is when the real headaches start. Not anymore, Doodle (www.doodle.com) will do this for you! Doodle makes scheduling a meeting with multiple people a snap. All you need to do is suggest dates and times for your participants to choose from, and then Doodle creates a polling calendar that can be sent to participants. Each participant selects the dates and times that he or she is free, Doodle aggregates the responses and tells you which option works best for everyone.

Once everyone has participated, you can select the best date and time and Doodle will notify everyone.

I HAVE SCHEDULED THE CONFERENCE CALL… NOW WHAT? 

I use UberConference (www.uberconference.com) for all my phone and video conference calls. UberConference is integrated with Google Hangouts, so I can easily have a meeting that is a video call, a phone call or a combination of the two. When you sign up for UberConference you get a personal conference call number and pin as well as a permanent Google Hangout URL. Participants can choose if they want to join via the phone, computer (VoIP) or video.

There are a few things I really like about UberConference: 

  1. When I connect via my Google Hangouts URL, UberConference automatically connects me to the conference call number so I don’t have to do anything extra to make sure phone participants are connected. It’s seamless.
  2. UberConference sends a text to let me know if someone is on the conference call waiting for me -very cool feature!
  3. The hold music is really cool.

I include my UberConference information in the confirmation email Calendly automatically sends. I don’t have to follow up with call in information, all I have to do is call in at the scheduled time.

I hope that using Calendly, Doodle and UberConference helps to make scheduling your next meeting a breeze!

Leave a comment

Avatar About the Author: The Rhode Island Small Business Journal is a printed monthly magazine and an online resource for the aspiring and start-up entrepreneur and small business owner.

previous arrow
next arrow
Slider