- [Scott] Would you like to make it easier for people to book time with you and to not have to spend extra money on a separate calendar scheduling tool? Well, in this video, I'm going to show you how to set up and use Google Calendar's free appointment schedule feature.
(machine rasps) (air whooshes) To get started with creating a number of slots
Creating an Appointment Schedule
in which people can book you, all we need to do is click on Google Calendar. Now, although we could add a title right off the bat, I'm going to come down here and select Set Up The Schedule, and on the left-hand side of our screen, we are going to be given all of the options that we need.
Now, when it comes to adding a title, you want to remember that this is what others will be seeing on their calendar as well. So, in this example, I'm going to call this a one-on-one with Scott so they know exactly who they're meeting with and what type of meeting it going to be.
Next up, we need to decide what is the appointment duration. So, for example, is this going to be a 30-minute meeting, a full hour, or some other custom length? In this case, I am going to leave it at one hour. And then we have our general availability section. Now, this is arguably
the most important step in the process, deciding when we are going to make ourselves available. Now, because I selected 9:00 to 10:00 a.m. on this Tuesday, that is going to be selected here, but we don't have to keep that.
You can click anywhere on your calendar just to get started. You'll notice that there is a plus button beside every day of the week, so let's say I want to make myself available on Wednesday afternoons.
All I would need to do is hit the plus button beside Wednesday, and now, I can adjust the time. You'll see that by default, it's going to add 9:00 to 5:00 p.m, but I've got other commitments, and maybe I only want to make myself available in the afternoon.
So, I'm going to come over here and I'm going to select 12:30, and I'm going to say I'm going to make myself available till 3:00 p.m.
So, this is the timeslot. This is where others will be able to choose an appointment time for themselves. And once you've created a slot, you'll notice that there's some other options available to us as well.
The first is this little no sign, meaning unavailable all day. I would select this if I wanted to remove this option. So, let's say I no longer want to keep the Tuesday option.
I'm going to select that, and now it is removed. But you'll also notice if you have a minimum of two days selected, let me go back and select a time period here on Tuesday, I then have an option to copy this time to all available slots.
Now, this doesn't mean it's going to copy this time to every day of the week, but let's say I want to make myself available 12:30 to 3:00 p.m. on Tuesday as well. Here, I would select Copy Time to All, and now the exact same block has been entered here.
Let's say I want to do that again for Friday. First, I would need to hit the plus button just to enter some time there,
and then I could come up here to Wednesday, say Copy Time to All, and once again, we have the exact same timeslot. Keep in mind, you cannot adjust these times by clicking or dragging on the calendar itself.
You do need to make these adjustments here within the Appointment Schedule panel. In addition, keep in mind that you're not limited to just one time period per weekday. Here, you can see I've created a timeslot for Tuesday morning, but I'd also like to make myself available later in the afternoon.
All I need to do is come here and select the plus button again, and now I have an additional timeslot for that day. So, I'm going to come down and select 3:00 p.m, and no, it cannot finish at 1:00 p.m.
I'm going to make myself available to 5:00 p.m. So now, I have two different timeslots for the same day, and I can continue to customize this as much as I like. Note you do not have to have your schedule repeat weekly.
At the top of General Availability, you can select this dropdown and say Does Not Repeat, and then this schedule would only be applied to the specific dates, so you do have that option available.
Lastly, when it comes to this section, you may want to double check that it is in your correct time zone when it comes to scheduling these times. Now, below this section, we have some very important options available to us.
The first is the scheduling window, and by default, it is set to 60 days in advance to four hours before meaning that someone can book me out two months,
60 full days in advance, but they cannot book me any sooner than four hours from now. Now of course, if I select this dropdown, I can change these options. The first option we have available
is if this scheduling window, if the settings within this section are available immediately, or if you only want to apply them to a certain date range. If that is the case, you would select this radial button here, but down below, we can adjust our maximum time in advance.
So, maybe I don't want people to book me out 60 days in advance. Maybe 30 days in advance is good enough for me, and four hours is maybe too soon. I may not check my email that frequently, so therefore, I want to make sure that I have enough time to prepare for the call.
So, I'm going to say the earliest they can book is eight hours from selecting my schedule. Now, you'll notice that you can actually turn off either of these options, but I would caution you ever to do so.
By unchecking this first option here, they could essentially book you any time into the future, yes, even six or seven years from now, so I would recommend keeping this on, and if you unchecked this option,
this means they could book you literally minutes from now depending on your availability.
So, keep these two checkboxes checked, and then set the days and hours to your desire. When you're finished with the scheduling window, you can minimize this and you can still see what it is set at here.
Now, below the scheduling window, we have the adjusted availability, and this means if you'd like to make yourself available or not available on a specific date.
Adjusting Availability
By selecting Change a Date's Availability, we are presented with a small calendar, and let's say on September 20th, I know I'm not going to be available. So, here is my standard time, which is dictated by what we selected up above, but I'm going to come over here and select Unavailable All Day, and by selecting that option, you can see that everything has been removed from the 20th. T
he rest of my schedule will remain the same, but because I'm planning to take this day off, I don't want someone to book me on that date. But we can also add other additional dates as well. Let's say on that particular Monday I want to make up for lost time, so I'm going to create a one-off availability.
Here, I'm going to select Change a Date's Availability once again, and I'm going to select the 18th, and instead of saying unavailable, I'm going to hit the plus button, and I'm going to say I want to make myself available from 2:00 p.m. until 5:00 p.m.
Now, this is only going to make me available for that particular day, and not on any other Monday, because up above, I've selected Unavailable.
Next, we have a section called Booked Appointment Settings, and this can be really helpful when it comes to making sure that you don't go over time or leave someone waiting. This gives us the ability to add some buffer time in between our appointments.
So, for example, how confident are you that you will be able to wrap up this meeting exactly by the top of the hour and not leave someone waiting who has booked you next? In this case, we can select a buffer time and adjust the minute duration, so visually, we can see the difference as well.
I can be booked from 2:00 to 3:00, but my next booking won't be available until 3:30. This gives me a little extra time if I need to prepare for that next meeting or if I feel that my meeting may run a little late.
We can also check the box down below, which is Maximum Bookings Per Day, meaning that you could make yourself available for an entire day,
but only limit yourself to perhaps two bookings at a time. For example, here you can see that I have four booking slots available on Tuesday the 19th but if I select the number two and have this checkbox selected, as soon as any two of these slots have been booked, the other two will no longer be available.
They will no longer be shown to those who have access to my booking page.
Next, we have the option to check which calendars will it check for availability, and this is where we are limited. By default, it is only going to check my primary calendar for any conflicts,
meaning if I create an event for this Tuesday morning, it will be blocked off and no one will be able to book me at that particular time. However, if I am using multiple Google calendars, it will not be checking any of those additional calendars.
If I want that functionality, I would need to upgrade to Google One Premium in order to add additional calendars.
Lastly, if we want to change the color, we can do so, and maybe I want these to stand out, so I'm going to choose this yellowish color so I can see that it differentiates from everything else on my calendar.
Adding Details
When we're happy with these settings, we can select the Next button, and now we are presented with options that both the user will either need to fill out or details that we will include in the event itself.
So, number one, we still have the option to change the title of this booking if we like. Down below, we have the booking page photo and name. Now, your booking calendar will show both the image and your name as listed within your Google account.
You don't have the ability to change this otherwise, so if you'd like to change either of these, you'll need to go into your Google account to adjust or edit your photo and name.
Down below is the location and conference information. So, for example, is it going to be a Google Meet video? If you select this option, it will automatically create a Meet link after the booking, but you can also choose an in-person meeting.
Here, you would be required to add a location, such as an address or if you're wanting someone to meet you at your office. Our third option is a phone call, where, no, you don't have to include your number, but those who are booking will be required to provide their phone number.
And then lastly, we can select None or To Be Specified Later.
This would be your best choice if you are using a video conferencing software outside of Google Meet. So, for example, if you are using Zoom, here in the description is where you would add that Zoom link,
or any other information that you like, and of course, we have some basic formatting available to us here as well, but here, you can include other details that perhaps they need to prepare for or what they can expect from the meeting.
Next, we have a booking form in terms of what is the required information that someone will need to fill in.
Now, the first three options will always be required, first name, last name, and email address, but the phone number, although included here by default, does not have to be included. So, for example, I'm going to remove it, and instead, I'm going to come down here and add an item.
Now, we are still given a phone number dropdown as an option. I'm going to come here and select Custom Item, and I'm going to say website address.
Maybe I'm looking to help people with their websites or providing them with some SEO consultation, so that's what I would like them to fill in as a part of the form.
I don't have to make it required, but if I want to, I can select this checkbox and say Add Item, and here, we can see it is listed beside the other required fields. You can add as many additional items as you like, some required and some not, depending on your needs.
And lastly is the booking confirmations and reminders, where once again, we are limited if you are simply using a free Google account. If you would like to customize your reminders and calendar invitations,
you will need to upgrade to the Google One Premium plan, but by default, those who book with you will get a confirmation email with a calendar invitation. Once we're fine with this page, we can hit Save,
Sharing Your Schedule
and now our bookable appointment schedule has been created. Now, it's all right if we close off from this menu, because anytime that we select any one of our available booking slots, that same menu will be available to us.
Now, the first thing that we're going to want to check is to open our booking page. By selecting this option in a new tab, it will show us our booking screen.
Now, because we are logged into our own account, we're viewing it as ourselves, so you may want to select this option, and here, we see a very similar view, but you can see exactly what others will see.
So, we can see that my first available date isn't till next Tuesday, so they could go ahead and select one of these timeslots, or they could use the mini calendar and go to a future week, and say maybe they want to select the 3:00 p.m. timeslot. And after selecting a specific time, they are asked to include their first, last, and email address,
and as I had asked, to also include their website address. If they select Book, anything that is a required field will prompt them at this time, but once all required fields are satisfied, they can select Book and their booking has been confirmed.
And if we return to our Google Calendar, here, you can see that I have been booked for 3:00 p.m. on Tuesday the 19th. So, what are some of the ways in which we can share our booking calendar with others? Well, as long as we select any of our available booking slots, here, you can see that there is a share button.
By selecting this option, we are presented with a few different ways in which we can share.
The first and perhaps the easiest is just to share the link itself.
So, we can copy this link and include it in an email, or we could post it somewhere within our website, but we also have the opportunity to embed our booking page as well.
The first option here is to create a button with a popup, and this can make it look very, very sleek. So, for example, by expanding this option, we can change the button text. So, instead of "Book an appointment," maybe I'm going to change this to "Book Scott Now. Something along those lines.
And maybe I use a green color on most of my website, so I can change the color, and if I want to, I can add a custom color as well. Now, all I need to do
is copy and paste this HTML code here down below. I can select Copy Code and paste it where I need to, either on my website or any application that will accept HTML code, and if you want to test it out yourself, you can do so from this dialogue.
So, if I select Book Scott Now, this is exactly what people will be presented with.
My website will still remain in the background, but they can come here and use the booking screen. The second option we have here is if we want to embed it directly into a website. So, no popup. Just on the screen itself. By expanding this option,
again, we are given that embed code. We can select copy that code, and then paste it where we need it to be. Lastly, what if we want to delete our schedule or just certain components? Well, once again, we are going to open up our booking appointment schedule, and in this case, we are going to select the Delete Appointment Schedule.
Now don't worry, it's not going to delete everything. It's going to give us a few options. By selecting the trash can, we are presented with three different options.
The first one is this week only, meaning it is only going this particular timeframe, Tuesday, September 19th, from 9:00 to 11:00 a.m. If I go ahead and select OK, you can see that this Tuesday has been removed, but if I go back or forward, those Tuesdays will remain.
If I click on this again and select the trash can, the second option is all weeks,
meaning if I select this, every Tuesday from 9:00 to 11:00 will be deleted. Last but not least, if I want to remove my entire appointment schedule, I would choose the third option here, but don't worry, anyone that has booked with you up until this point,
nothing will change with their appointment. It will not be deleted or removed. Any existing appointments will remain. So, now that you know how to create your own bookable appointment schedule, I'd love to hear from you next.
What questions do you have about this new feature, and what would you like to see next? Be sure to let me know in the comments down below.
Thank you so much for watching, and remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.
