Reader,
How many times have you heard âsend me the calendar inviteâ?
It is such a liberating feeling to invite other people and receive their acceptance.
It is comforting and reassuring to know that theyâre most likely to show up.
But sometimes you would not be able to send an invite to your meeting/event. This happens when:
- Your event/meeting is public and anyone can join it
- You donât know the email ID of your attendees (imagine some community event)
- Your invitees are outside your organization
When youâre running an event campaign inside or outside an organization, this may happen.
But why the obsession to get on a calendar?
Fair question.
Couldnât we direct the invitees to a webpage, a Google Form or directly share YouTube/Zoom links?
We could and most people do that. But the problem is, none of these links lands you on your inviteeâs calendar. An event on the calendar helps send notifications about upcoming events and increases our chances of making sure that the invitee indeed attends the event.
Think of it in this way:
Your announcement poster, email, or WhatsApp message has a limited amount of usable space i.e. real estate. And you want to offer one action. Just one action, that will make sure that your audience attends your event, without forgetting.
If you play with this enough, youâll find out that getting on peopleâs calendars, by their own choice, is a far better idea than leaving them some random hyperlink.
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Add to Calendar Links
We can do this by using the free Add to Calendar Links tool. This tool was developed by Google Developer Expert Amit Aggarwal.
Event Details
An event can be anything: a celebration, a meeting, or a multi-day brainstorming session.
To generate a Google Calendar event, you need to fill in the relevant fields:
- Event Title
- Event Location
- Event Description
- Timezone
- Start Date/Time and End Date
Getting the links
Once you have added the details, just copy the Add to Calendar Link using the clipboard icon. For example, this is an example of a Google Calendar link.
Using this method, I have created the following Add to Calendar Links:
Add to my Calendar:
âGoogle Calendar | MS Outlook | Office 365 | Yahoo!â
If youâre sure that your audience mostly uses Google Calendar, you can provide only one option: Google Calendar.
You can also hit the Preview Link to see how it will look to the invitee.
My example Google Calendar link looks like this:
Power of anonymity
Anyone who clicks this Add to Calendar link, will see the exact same thing without seeing who created this event. This anonymity is the most powerful feature of this Add to Calendar link. Not everyone needs to know who the organizer is.
So, do you know anyone who obsesses over adding events to the calendar? Theyâd probably go mad after this kind of tool.
How would you use this tool in your work? Hit Reply and share it with me.
Reads of the week:
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a prominent Atheist author, is now a Christian. Ayaan was born a Muslim in Nairobi, Kenya. 20 years back, she left the religion for atheism. In this lengthy, rich essay she takes us to her journey as a Muslim under The Muslim Brotherhood. Ayaan has been vocal for womenâs rights â in a way that is logical and goes beyond contemporary ideological dogma. I hope you enjoy this piece as much as I did.
I have been vocal about the DEI scam for some time now. Especially, the non-profit space where I have earned my bread, makes my stand counterintuitive. But it is not. In any case, the way the once-respected feminine brand Victoriaâs Secret has lost its way shows how people vote through their money.
You can fool people a few people for a short time, but not many people for a long time.