This will become a bit more detailed when we put it on TheTechnologyPro.com - but for now, this should suffice to get some of  you using Google Calendar more effectively.

First: SMS and email is very effective:
One of my favorite ways to use email and phone text messages is to have my co-workers, contractors, family, clients, etc. send me text messages about phone messages and emails. A message to your phone - with key information - is more effective than a phone call for a number of reasons.

1. If I am in a meeting or on another call, I must either disrupt the meeting or tell the other party to hold or put let the call go to voice mail.  If I send it to voice mail, I must then retrieve the message.
2. If I am driving, I must take the call - perhaps not safe or convenient or let it go to voice mail.  Furthermore, if the call is to relay some piece of information - like, “You need to call Jim at ABC Co.  here is his number… ###-###-####.  While driving I must write Jim’s number down or remember it.  Hazardous and chancy.

The caller wanted to get me a message to call someone - or relay some information.

The more effective way is to simply send an email message to my phone (using their standard email program) with a short bit of text that includes the number.  It could be in the subject even.

Subject: Call Jim at ABC Co  800-555-1212
Message body: About meeting today

The person who needs to get me this information must simply address the message to my number @vtext.com.  Vtext.com is the email domain for Verizon Wireless text message.  Virtually any Verizon phone number that receives text messages can receive a text message at the area code + phone number @ vtext.com

If you are on another provider, check with them to get the text email domain.  More on this later…

The benefit:
When you receive the text message, if the number is embedded, you can simply press “Send” while viewing the message and the phone number will be listed for you to dial.  Select it and press “Send” again and you are dialing the number.

A secondary benefit is you can “save” the number to create a contact later.

Additionally, if you are in a meeting, it is easier to glance at your phone, read the message and determine whether it warrants an interruption.

I’ll cover this in more detail in a later post.

Matt, what does this have to do with Google Calendar.
Oh yeah.  Well, I have really begun using Google documents, sheets, and other services to help me organize information.  I showed my Google homepage in my last message.  Absent from that was the Google Calendar widget. This is due to the fact that I have been using Outlook.

However this feature alone could tip me towards using Google Calendar exclusively.

You can receive appointment notifications via cell phone text message (SMS).  Here is why that is very cool.

If you construct your appointment information properly, you can embed the phone number of the person you are meeting with right into the SMS notification.  Just as with using email to receive important data, this has the added benefit of giving you a reminder and a call back number at the same time.  If you are running late, no need to search for a number, simply select the message and press send.

A test appointment I set this morning…

A couple of important notes:

1. This assumes you’ve setup SMS messaging in Google Calendar (settings/mobile setup) 
2. Be careful about strange characters.  If you have odd numbers near the phone number, your cell phone may have trouble extracting the phone number in the text message.

   999-999-9999 works fine but 99999999999 is even better.  Also, you can put more than one number in the message - separated by a space.  So, 8005551212 4805551212, will result in two potential numbers when you press “Send”

Once again, I’ll be covering this in more detail, again, at TheTechnologyPro.com - in the very near future.

How do you use Google Calendar?  How do you use text messaging?