Your calendar is probably the most basic productivity tool that you use.
In many ways, it's the lowest common denominator when it comes to getting things done.
I mean, we all use email to some extent, but some of us use it a lot more frequently than others.
Some use it a lot less.
Some use it a lot more.
A lot of us use a to-do list or a task manager app.
Some of us don't use that at all either.
If you have watched some of my previous videos, you will know that I often use Google Calendar.
I use my calendar to manage my tasks as all-day events.
It's a great way to keep them front of mind.
They're at the top of my list, and I can't ignore them because I'm in my calendar so often, looking at other appointments and other events, places that I need to be.
I really like having those tasks in front of me at the top of my calendar.
Well, today, I want to show you how to adjust some of your notifications in Google Calendar.
Make them optimal for you, make them optimal for your specific workflow, and in particular, I'm going to show you one little checkbox that you may not have used before in the past that's going to help you set yourself up for a great day.
To adjust your notifications in Google Calendar, we want to select the little gear icon in the top right-hand corner and find settings.
Now, the very first tab that you're going to see here in settings is going to be a general one.
We want to click on the calendars tab here, and here you're going to find the list of all of the calendars that you have associated with your Google calendar.
Now, in this particular example, I really don't have that many other calendars, but if you have more, you're going to see them under this other calendar setting.
But if we go all the way to the right, we're going to see the notifications column, and we want to be able to select the edit notifications link.
This is going to give us a variety of options of how we receive and when we receive these notifications.
Now, at the very top, we've got two different types of notification settings.
The first one is event notifications.
The second one is all-day event notifications.
Now, the second one probably has cleared up what the first one means, right?
The second one is things like the tasks I just showed you on my calendar.
These are things that are all-day events.
They don't necessarily have a start and an end time, but they're attached to an entire day, or they may be stretched over multiple days.
The one up above, event notifications, are specific meetings or activities, places that you need to be.
These have a distinct start time and finish time, right?
It can be a meeting with Greg at 1 p.m., or a dentist appointment, which starts at 10:30 in the morning.
Now, we've got a few different options as to how and when we will receive those notifications.
So here you see I have set up for my event notifications.
I'm going to receive a notification 10 minutes before each event.
Now, when it says notification, it means that I'm going to receive a desktop notification.
Right when I'm here in my browser, that's where that notification will appear.
And this notification will also apply to your smartphone, phone, or your tablet device, if you'll be notified by those notifications as well.
The only other option that we have here is email.
If you'd rather have an email notification, you can make that selection.
And then you might want to adjust the time difference as to when you will receive that notification.
Ten minutes just before an event might not be long enough.
You might want an hour before.
You may want a few hours before to remind you for those events.
But for the way that I use Google Calendar, just the desktop, just the in-browser notifications suffice my needs, and 10 minutes is about right for me.
Now, the one thing to note is that you can have multiple notifications set up.
So if you do want email notifications as well, you can do that.
You can do that too.
You can continue to add notifications, maybe at different time lengths, or maybe just at different times, you know, different types, email and regular notifications.
You can also change these settings within your individual events.
So, for example, I like the default here of 10-minute notifications for all of my events.
And if there's something particular, I might adjust the length, or I might adjust the type in that individual event.
A good example would be something significant like a birthday in my family.
I will often have multiple notifications for someone's birthday coming up.
I might have an email that comes out maybe two weeks before someone's birthday, my mother's birthday, for example.
And then maybe I'll set up a second email three or four days before her birthday in case I've forgotten.
Because in case I ignored that first email, just another reminder, hey, this special event is coming up.
You don't want to miss it.
You want to make sure you've got your presents or your cards or whatever else you need to get together for that event.
Now, for my all-day events, you can add further notifications if you like, but I prefer not to.
You know, these are my to-dos.
I'm very engaged and involved in my calendar, so, you know, for me, I would rather not have a notification shown.
But of course, just like our time-based event notifications, you can add multiple ones as well.
Now, the only thing left on this notification settings page is the last section, which is entitled "Choose how you would like to be kept up-to-date."
And here you have two options, either email or SMS.
These would be text messages.
Now, you will need to set up your mobile phone in order to receive those text messages.
And here you can see I have not linked up my phone with this account.
That's because I really have no interest at this time in receiving text messages for these updates.
Email will suffice.
And you know, these first few choices have a lot to do with events where you have been invited to or you've invited others to.
So I have things here like new events.
Receive an update when someone sends you an invitation, when someone changes an event, when someone cancels an event, or here, receive an update when guests respond to an event for which you can see the guest list.
So again, most of these things are involving other people, either people that I've invited to a calendar event or I've been invited to.
But the last one on this list is where I really want to focus our attention.
The daily agenda sort of gets hidden here at the bottom of the page, so I'm sure there's many of you who have maybe not been aware of this option.
So by selecting this box, "Daily Agenda," you will receive an email with your calendar's agenda every day at 5:00 a.m. in your current time zone.
So depending on your personal workflow, depending on how you receive information, depending on how you would like to get a summary of your day, this may be an excellent way to receive it.
Google is going to send you a very short, a very concise email showing both your time-based events but also your all-day events in one single email.
And the great thing is that if you do manage multiple calendars within Google Calendar, you might have seven, you might have 12, you might have many, many more calendars.
For each one that you check this box, you will need to go into each calendar to select this box.
But no matter how many you've selected, you're only going to receive one email.
A single email.
So don't worry about checking this box for four or five or six different Google Calendars thinking that you're going to receive four, five, or six different emails at 5:00 a.m.
No, it's going to combine it all into one single email.
One single email for you to review.
So it can be an excellent way to start your day or review your day to get that email in your inbox and see all of your events there.
Now, be sure whatever changes that you make on this page, be sure to select "Save" so that those changes can be applied and you can start to receive your daily agenda.
Now yes, that time, as you can see, it is hardwired.
You cannot adjust that time for 5:00 a.m., and it is going to be based in your current time zone.
But I think for most people, that's probably a good time.
I can't see many people wanting it much earlier than that.
And if you're wanting it for sort of a planning purpose or what's coming up today, that's typically a good time to receive that daily agenda.
So try out and investigate some of the notification settings that you have for your Google Calendar.
You can experiment with different time lengths and different times and see if you like the daily agenda.
Thank you so much for watching.
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Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult.
In fact, it's very simple.
