The people, the date, the time, the location, the venue - getting them all right, and agreed upon when setting up a meeting can be a real pain.
According to PlanSnap statistics, the average plan takes nine apps, 22 app switches, 77 swipes, 13 minutes on the phone and 10 texts. And 40% of the time, it still fails completely.
So, what's the solution? Fortunately, there are some websites and apps that can help you to get people to agree on four most important things: who, what, where and when.
WHO and WHAT: What kind of activity is going to be attractive to the people that you want to attend? Is it a coffee, dinner, or cocktails? Or do you need a shared interest to bond over, like cycling, golfing or a whiskey tasting session? Get ideas from websites like Time Out, which has inspiration for lots of activities in most major cities, or on the go using the BarChick text message service which recommends bars in London (only) based on the vibe you're going for.
WHEN: Make sure the right people can make the time you choose. Something like Doodle can help you work out who is available when, though it can be tricky to get people to actually fill it out as it needs them to proactively engage. There are services like x.ai, a robot assistant that claims to organise meetings for you, but many users report their contacts being irritated by "computer says no" moments, and the pomp of getting a robot to organise your lunch meeting.
WHERE: Hopefully you know the people involved well enough to know where they work or live, and can mentally triangulate where's a good venue with accessible transport links that will be easy for them to get to. The fancier the occasion or venue, or the more important the other attendees are, the less you have to make the location work for everyone. Google Maps or Citymapper might help you work out venue locations and travel times.
Finally, you need to get everyone to confirm. If it's a big event you could use something like ticketing website Eventbrite. Or, you could start a WhatsApp group - this is best for smaller meetings as the otherwise the number of notifications lighting up your phone might be a bit overwhelming.
The new app to watch out for is PlanSnap. It's getting positive feedback from early users and already has over 200 people, and companies including AB InBev, invest in it through Crowdcube.
PlanSnap intelligently suggests plans that work for everyone, and sends that plan to your friends or colleagues even if they're they haven't downloaded the app. It currently integrates with text messaging, but email and other integrations are coming soon.
Technology is assisting us with all aspects of our lives, and with the rise of Artificial Intelligence, that is only set to increase. Ideally the robots in our lives will sort out the repetitive tasks like planning, which will leave us far more time to do the things we love.
The Tools:
