What’s a scheduling app hack that helps you improve your productivity?
To help you maximize your time with digital assistance, we asked writers and business owners this question for their best recommendations. From setting recurring alarms to relying on social media, there are several ideas that may help you increase your productivity with ease in the future.
Here are 13 scheduling app hacks that these experts found useful:
- Set Recurring Alarms
- Exchange the Big List for An Hourly List
- Make Use of the “Tags” Feature
- Use Trello’s Kanban Style
- Have Customized Calendly Events for Types of Meetings
- Prioritize Emails With the Follow-Up Flag
- Try the Pomodoro Technique
- Rely on Slack to Schedule Reminders
- Utilize Voice Technology
- Custom Shortcut Your Most-Used Links
- Automate Task Assignments Based on Dependency
- Limit Your Availability
- Take Advantage of Social Media Help
Set Recurring Alarms
One “hack” that I have found to be especially helpful is setting recurring reminders. For example, I have a daily reminder to review my calendar for the upcoming day so that I can plan my time accordingly.
I also have recurring reminders for important deadlines and tasks that need to be completed regularly. This system has helped me to stay on top of my responsibilities and avoid forgetting important commitments.
Antreas Koutis, Administrative Manager, Financer
Exchange the Big List for An Hourly List
As someone who is always looking for ways to be more productive, it intrigued me when a friend told me about a scheduling app hack that has helped her immensely.
The idea is simple: use your Notes App or Reminder App to create a separate list for each hour instead of creating one big to-do list for the day. Hourly to-do lists are much easier to manage than one extensive list, and they help to keep you focused on what needs to be done at that moment.
This scheduling hack has helped my friend to become more productive, and I have no doubt that it can help others as well.
Wendy Makinson, HR Manager, Joloda Hydraroll
Make Use of the “Tags” Feature
A great scheduling app “hack” that can help improve your productivity is to make use of the “tags” feature.
By tagging tasks with specific keywords, you can easily find and organize them later on. This is especially helpful when you have a lot of tasks to keep track of. For example, you can tag all of your work tasks with the “work” tag, and all of your personal tasks with the “personal” tag. This will help you stay organized and productive.
Benjamin Basic, Content Writer, Fast Food Menu Prices
Use Trello’s Kanban Style
I love using Trello to schedule my day. I like that it’s super visual, and I can see what’s coming up next at a glance. It also makes it easy to see which tasks are on track and which ones need some work.
One hack that helps me improve my productivity is the “Trello card” feature. Every time I finish a task, or even just get started on one that’s on my plate for the day, I move it into its own list called “Trello Card.”
That way, when I’m going through my Trello board later in the day or week, I can quickly see what I have completed so far (and if anything needs attention).
Amer Hasovic, Content Writer, Love & Lavender
Have Customized Calendly Events for Types of Meetings
Create a unique Calendly event for every type of meeting you organize. This way, you have a quick overview of all your meetings and can easily reschedule a meeting if something comes up.
For example, create a unique event for sales calls, client calls, meetings with your team, and meetings with external parties. This helps you plan your day and schedule around the most important meetings.
Luciano Colos, Founder & CEO, PitchGrade
Prioritize Emails With the Follow-Up Flag
One “hack” that I have learned from Microsoft Outlook to help improve my scheduling is the follow-up flag.
I can prioritize my emails and which emails I need to respond to first. If I do not have a follow-up flag, I ignore the emails at the bottom of my list as others come in and would fail to respond to the email.
Lindsey Hight, HR Professional, Sporting Smiles
Try the Pomodoro Technique
Believe it or not, blocking out short amounts of time to do some deep work and taking a brief break after has proven to be extremely productive. This technique is best known as the Pomodoro technique.
This technique works with time blocking. What happens is your Pomodoro timer lets you do your work for 25 minutes and once you reach the 25-minute mark, you get to take a break for 5 minutes. The cycle continues until you complete several Pomodoros to get a longer break.
Diana Royanto, Content Writer, Milkwhale
Rely on Slack to Schedule Reminders
Slack is a messaging app that is popular among professionals. You can use Slack to schedule reminders for yourself or other people in your organization.
This can be a great way to improve your productivity because it allows you to set reminders for tasks that you need to do, and it also allows you to see when other people in your organization are free to work on tasks.
To use Slack to schedule reminders, you first need to create a channel for yourself or your team. Then, you can use the /remind command to set a reminder for yourself or someone else on the channel.
Burak Özdemir, Founder, Online Alarm Kur
Utilize Voice Technology
One hack to help you boost your productivity is to use voice technology when scheduling your appointments. This is the ultimate way to multitask and allows you to continue working while working to fill things in your calendar.
Google and Apple both support voice commands with their calendars and it helps me stay focused on moving things forward without having to go into my calendar and book those appointments.
Scott Krager, Founder, TubeSplit.com
Custom Shortcut Your Most-Used Tasks
First off, I do 100% of my meeting scheduling via my online calendar booking page. As a result, I was constantly copying and pasting my calendar URL into my emails. Until I implemented THE hack to improve productivity.
I added a custom keyboard shortcut on my Mac, so when I type “cal” it automatically replaces it with the link to my calendar. Not only do I save time booking meetings, but I save time sharing my booking link.
John Siciliano, Content Creator, Create Today
Automate Task Assignments Based On Dependency
I find automated ways to notify the next person to do the task once I have completed a step quite helpful in improving productivity.
When you have a project with several dependencies, it can be time-consuming to monitor the tasks at every stage and let the next team member responsible know they’re up.
But when you automate it, the next person will know when the task is ready for them and can start immediately. It’s also easier to create a monitoring dashboard to see the progress and avoid micromanaging.
Aidan Kang, CEO, House of Debt
Limit Your Availability
Instead of leaving your scheduling app on the default settings and having availability based on open slots in your calendar, try reducing your available times to 1-2 hours on 1-2 days a week.
Just because you have open slots on your schedule doesn’t mean they should be available for people to book.
Roberto Torres, Owner, The Local Marketer
Take Advantage of Social Media Help
I rely heavily on Planoly, which helps me schedule and organize my Instagram and Facebook posts.
It saves time when I upload bulk posts and I can see what the feed will look like. I also really like the emails that they send to my inbox. The information they send keeps me updated with the latest trends on IG and gives me good ideas for posts.
Elizabeth Hardy, Owner & President, Espe
