A Genius Way to Organize a Sign Up
November 30, 2018
A Genius Way to Organize a Sign Up
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with SignUpGenius
My department uses SignUp Genius in a couple of ways. The first is to allow students to be able to sign up for appointments with me for intake meetings or other 1-on-1 services that occur once and are not part of our week to week services. I was unable to make my work Outlook calendar available to students and setting up student meetings was painfully slow and inefficient. Enter SignUpGenius, where I enter days and times I'm open and whenever responding to new student requests, I just send the link to my SignUp for intakes and they can easily claim a spot and even get an email reminder 2 days before the meeting. When I trained my Graduate Assistant to start doing some intakes as well, it was very easy to expand the existing sign-up by creating a second block with her name in it and indicating the days and times that she's available. Essentially, this student appointment signup is just a perpetual link where I routinely add and delete dates and times, so no one has to keep up with new links.
Over time, we realized that many of our internal events could also be more efficiently handled this way, so we use it for things like signing up to work Open Houses, making appointment times for end-of-semester employee reviews, etc.
Over time, we realized that many of our internal events could also be more efficiently handled this way, so we use it for things like signing up to work Open Houses, making appointment times for end-of-semester employee reviews, etc.
- Entering a large block of dates and times (up to 200 time slots at one entry), which you can then click or unclick as availabilities. This makes it easier when you have 2 individuals with a variety of time slots available, some of which overlap and some of which don't. You can just enter something like 9:00-5:00 from 11/14-11/22 and indicate the length of appointments and it provides a table of all possible slots. You then go to each person's block and choose the slots that are available for meetings.
- One of the best free products I've used. There are some additional features available with the paid version, such as having more than one administrator email address and choosing a specific admin email for a specific signup, but the free version has done nearly everything we've wanted to do.
- The reminders that you can choose for signers up are very helpful. I've had more than one student say, "It's a good thing I got a reminder email because I would have forgotten this otherwise".
- Those who sign up can later go back to their sign up from the confirmation email they received if they need to cancel, edit or reschedule.
- Some of the layout and terminology are a little confusing and could be more user-friendly. It took me some time and playing around to figure out that the days and times you put in are a step which just produces a grid of possible times, and that choosing which slots to activate is a second step required. It later made sense why it was set up this was (allows you to input a large block of times at once and then select the particular ones you need, and makes it possible to add a second person with a different schedule on the same sign up, giving the appointment setters more options overall to choose from)
- Wish it would intuitively (or add an option to...) replicate location for any additional days and times you add to the same sign up. Has to be manually added (or copied and pasted).
- Students and even other staff love it! It improved the turn-around time from when I respond to student requests for academic coaching to setting up the intake meeting about 50%. Also, in the case that I respond quickly but the student is delayed several days, the link I sent is still live and always has relevant dates and times (whereas in the past, I would send a few days' worth of options and by the time a procrastinator looked at them, they were passed).
- It's an easy, mobile-friendly option that helps students to see that we're with it, not trapped in the stone age. That factors into their overall perception of our department, our services and our organization.
I have used Doodle for years to poll groups on possible meeting dates and times and choose one that works for the whole group. I still use the product regularly and find that SignUpGenius is a great compliment, as it works the other direction: when I have the dates and times set, but need people to choose one specific appointment or work time.