This article applies to the Appointments module. This is a separate module to the previously released Meetings module.
The SpotMe Appointments module streamlines the process of setting up and managing meetings at congresses and trade shows, by combining powerful scheduling, room management and engagement functionalities.
Installing and accessing the Appointments module
The Appointments module is a paid module. Please contact your SpotMe Account Manager if you are interested in using it for your event.
Please note that the Meetings and Appointment modules cannot both be used on the same workspace, you can only use one or the other.
How is the Appointments module used in Backstage and in the app?
The Appointments module can be used pre-event by the event planning team to schedule any number of one-to-one or group meetings between attendees at events.
It is especially designed to facilitate this task in the context of complex congresses or trade shows, thanks to a clear calendar view with filters that indicate the attendee and room availability, as well as when the main agenda sessions take place.
In addition to being able to create meetings for event attendees, Backstage users can manage all the meetings in the event, create and manage meeting locations, and manage all the settings available in the meetings module.
In parallel, the Appointments module can be used by app users on web and mobile, in order to receive and respond to meeting invitations, as well as schedule their own meetings directly. This includes using the calendar view with the same attendee and room filters.
Meeting planners using Backstage can also create and manage a dedicated list of external participants in the workspace, composed of event participants who are currently not using the event app.
This external participant list can then be used by app users to search for external participants and add them to meetings. For more flexibility they can also directly add new external participants while they schedule meetings onsite during a congress or trade show.
Below we've created a breakdown of what Backstage users and app users can do using the Appointments module.
How can Backstage users (meeting planners) use the Appointments module?
Backstage users can schedule and manage meetings as well as configure how they want the meeting scheduler to be used for the event. They can:
- Create and edit meeting locations (including virtual locations), that can be selected by Backstage users and by app users when setting up meetings.
- Schedule and manage meetings, from the calendar view or from the Meetings tab.
- Search for and invite internal participants (app users) to meetings.
- Search for, invite and add new external participants (non app users) to the workspace's External participant list.
- Access and manage the External participant list.
- Manage the meetings Settings.
How can app users (attendees) use the Appointments module?
App users, on web and mobile app, can receive (and respond to) meeting invitations, as well as schedule their own meetings. In summary they can:
- Create (organize) new meetings (via the meetings tab or the calendar tab).
- See and edit the meetings that they organized (change time, location, meeting name, invited guests, etc.).
- Search for and invite internal participants (app users) to meetings.
- Search for, invite and add new external participants (non app users) to the workspace's External participant list.
- Receive meeting invitations (with notifications in the app and emails) and respond whether they are attending or not (via the app).
- Join meetings virtually via a video chat.
Create meeting locations in Backstage
Meeting locations can only be created in Backstage, and can be selected when creating a meeting in Backstage or via the app.
It is important to keep in mind that the meeting location selected at the moment of creating a meeting will determine whether the meeting is fully in-person, fully virtual, or in-person with remote attendees (hybrid).
The below types of meetings can be created in Backstage and in the app:
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Fully in-person meeting: To create an in-person meeting, the meeting organizer will need to select a previously created non-virtual meeting location (or a custom location). Attendees will meet in-person at the meeting location.
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Fully virtual meeting: To create a fully virtual meeting, the meeting organizer will need to select a previously created location for the meeting that has the "Virtual location" check box selected. This typically means that attendees will only join the meeting through the app's video chat.
- In-person meeting with remote attendees: Any in-person meeting (even if using a non-virtual meeting location) allows the attendees to start a group video chat that includes all the meeting attendees, thus allowing remote attendees to join via the app.
To create a new meeting location, go to the Settings tab, and in the Location options, click on New location:
The below fields are used to create the new location:
Name of the meeting location - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
Meeting location names are limited to 25 characters, to ensure the best display across all platforms.
Description of the meeting location - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
This could for example be information on how to find it, any specific equipment in the meeting location, or anything particular about the location that you wish to share with attendees.
Meeting location descriptions are limited to 80 characters, to ensure the best display across all platforms.
Virtual location: Enable this if the meeting location is only for virtual meetings. This means that instead of being used for in-person meetings, this location can be selected for meetings that are only virtual, and that take place through the app on a video call. Virtual meetings can be double booked (used for multiple meetings over the same time slot) and can only be created and used if the option is not disabled.
Capacity of the meeting location - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
This is the number of people that the meeting location can accomodate. The maximum capacity of a meeting is 20 people.
Allow event participants to book this location - visible to users in Backstage but not attendees in the app. Use this option to configure whether or not this location should be available to attendees to book via the app. You can for example disable option this if you want to keep this location only available to be booked for meetings that are created by the event organizers via Backstage.
Date and time range for the meeting -visible to users in Backstage but not attendees in the app.
Here you can select over what period(s) of time the meeting location will be available to be booked. Outside of these times, the location cannot be booked:
- Start/end date: Choose the start date and end date for the period during which the meeting location can be booked. By default, the duration of the event is selected
- Start/end time: Choose the start time and end time for the period during which the meeting location can be booked, on the days that the location is available.
Note: While physical locations cannot be double-booked, virtual locations can. Please also be aware that all times are based on the event timezone.
You can create multiple distinct Start/end dates periods, for making the meeting available to be booked, using the Add date range button. You can also create multiple distinct Start/end time periods within each Start/end dates period, using the button. This is particularly useful if a location is not available on all days of the event, or if you want to make it available at different times on different days.
When you create additional Start/end dates periods, you can select the Copy time slots option in order to copy over the same Start/end time periods into the new date range.
Click on Save once you have finished creating the meeting location.
Here, for example, we have created 3 meetings locations:
The Room 1 location has a capacity of 8 people, the Room 2 location has a capacity of 4 people, and the Room 3 has a capacity of 2 people.
Note: In Backstage, event organizers can choose whether or not to allow custom meeting locations to be used in the app when attendees create their own meetings. More information
Create your meetings in Backstage
Event organizers can create meetings in Backstage. These meetings will be created on behalf of an attendee who will be the "organizer" of the meeting. The attendee who is the organizer of a meeting also has the ability to edit the meeting via the app.
New meetings can be created in Backstage via the Appointments module's Calendar tab (as described above) OR via the Meetings tab (that contains a list of the meetings already created in the workspace).
Note: Using the Calendar tab will provide the meeting planner with a customizable overview of the availability of the attendees and the rooms, and will significantly facilitate the scheduling of the meetings.
Creating a meeting via the Calendar tab in Backstage
The first displayed tab in the Appointments module is the Calendar tab.
Here you will find a calendar view that you can customize by choosing what calendar information will appear here.
For example, you can choose to show the calendars of one or more attendees as well as the calendars of one or more rooms. Displaying this information will help you easily schedule one or more meetings with multiple attendees, as well as manage the scheduled meetings:
In the above example of the calendar view, you can see:
1 - The date that is selected for the calendar view. Only the meetings that are scheduled on this date will be visible. You can change the selected date using the forward and back arrows, or by clicking on the date and using the date selector. When displaying a day, you can scroll up and down to show the different times during the day.
2 - A toggle you can use to display or not the main agenda sessions for the day.
3 - Buttons to create a new meeting, export a XLS report of meetings, or import meetings via XLS.
4 - When enabled, the main agenda sessions are shown to the left side of the calendar view.
5 & 6 - Use the Display calendars drop-down located to the right, to choose which attendee (internal and external participants) and/or room calendars that you want to include in the calendar view.
In the example above, in order to easily set up meetings between Miquel, Jamie, and Nicolas, and to see the availability of Room 1 and Room 2, we have selected the calendars of each attendee and each room in the Display calendars drop-down.
For external participants that are selected in the calendar view, the user will see all the meetings that the external participant has been invited to via the Appointments module.
7 - A legend that indicates the type or status of the meetings that are displayed in the calendar view based on their appearance.
To schedule a meeting from the calendar view, you can simply click on a suitable time slot in the calendar, or on the New meeting button.
Doing so will display the New meeting screen that is explained below
Creating a meeting via the Meetings tab in Backstage
To create a meeting via the Meetings tab, go to the Meetings tab and click on New meeting.
Doing so will display the New meeting screen that is explained below.
Entering the information for the new meeting in Backstage
The below fields are used to create the meeting:
Title of the meeting - mandatory field visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
Date of the meeting - mandatory field visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
Here you have to choose the date and start time of the meeting.
Duration of the meeting - mandatory field visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
Here you have to enter how long the meeting will last.
Note: It is not possible to create meetings that span over a single day (beyond 00:00). All times are based on the event timezone.
Organizer of the meeting - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
This is the attendee that will show as the organizer of the meeting in the app, and who will have the ability to edit the meeting via the app. You can use the dropdown to the right of this field to predefine what the attendance status will be ("pending", "accepted", "declined") for the organizer of the meeting. The organizer will still have the option of changing their attendance status in the meeting invitation in the app.
Participants of the meeting - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
Here you can enter the name and select each attendee that will be invited to attend the meeting.
You can select existing internal participants who are on the User list of the workspace (and who will have access to the app in order to respond to the Meeting request) and/or you can select "external participants" who are not on the Users list of the workspace and do not have access to the app (but who instead are added to a dedicated External participant list in the workspace).
If a user name appears in gray, this means that the user has a "hidden" status in their profile in the workspace, and is therefore not visible to other attendees via the app.
You can use the dropdown to the right of each participant to predefine what the attendance status will be ("pending", "accepted", "declined") for that participant. Participants will still have the option of changing their attendance status in the meeting invitation in the app.
Add external participants - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app (name only).
Clicking here will allow you to add people who are not currently using the app to the dedicated External participants list in the workspace. Once added to the list, external participants can be selected and invited to meetings, and you can easily manage their information in Backstage.
External participants can be added to the workspace and then edited by Backstage users. App users can also add new external participants to the workspace, via the app, when scheduling meetings. More information on managing external participants
Location of the event - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
Here you can select a location that is already created in the event. Here you can select a physical location (for purely in person meetings or for meetings that will have both in-person and remote attendees joining) or a virtual location (for fully virtual meetings via video chat). Locations will only be available to select here if they match the criteria of the meeting: this includes the meeting capacity, meeting date/time/duration, the location capacity, and the location availability for booking.
Note: If you select a physical location for the meeting, attendees will also have the option to open a group chat from within the meeting, and start a video call with all attendees that are using the app. This therefore allows all in-person and remote attendees to join the meeting.
For example, if the meeting you are creating has 6 participants, then meeting locations with a capacity that is below 6 participants will not show in the dropdown. Likewise, if a meeting is scheduled to take place at a certain date and time, and that date and time does not match with the configured availability date and time slot(s) for booking the meeting location, then the meeting location will not be available to select in the dropdown.
In case there is no suitable location, you can enter your own - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app.
The last field in the screen can be used as a free text field to describe a custom location for the meeting. It must be used when no predefined options are available to select in the above Location field. These open text locations do not have any configured capacity or time slots.
Adding a meeting location is mandatory when creating a meeting. Instead of selecting a predefined meeting location, users will have to create "custom" meeting locations using the "Enter your own location" free text field.
Description - visible to users in Backstage and attendees in the app
Add a description for the meeting
This meeting, once created (after being saved in Backstage), will appear in the list of meetings in Backstage (the first one in the list below):
Once the meeting is saved, the meeting invitation will immediately be received by the participants, in the form of a notification in the app or an email for attendees that are not using the app.
Creating and editing a meeting using the app
Creating a meeting in the app
App users can create meetings via the app. To do this they need to open the Appointments section, and in the Calendar or the Meetings screen, tap the + button:
Note: App users can use the same Display calendars dropdown to choose exactly which attendee (internal and external) and room calendars they would like to see in their calendar view in the app, in order to help them schedule/create a new meeting.
In the next screen, app users can create the meeting:
The fields here are exactly the same as those described in the Creating a meeting in Backstage section.
App users will need to enter the meeting participants and the meeting start date/time/duration before they can select an available location, as the system will use this information in order to suggest the most suitable locations.
The meeting location is mandatory when creating a meeting. The app user can either select from the list of available meeting rooms, or enter their own custom location in the text field (if the "Allow custom location input when creating a meeting" option is not disabled in the Meetings > Settings > Location options section in Backstage). If no meeting locations are created in Backstage, then the Locations field (used to select predefined meetings) will not be available when scheduling meetings in the app.
The app user creating the meeting is considered the meeting organizer, and is the only person who can edit the meeting via the app.
Note: If a physical location is selected for the meeting, attendees will also have the option to open a group chat from within the meeting, and start a video call with all attendees that are using the app. This therefore allows all in-person and remote attendees to join the meeting.
The app user will tap Create, at the bottom of the screen, to finish scheduling the meeting.
Once the meeting is created, meeting invitations will immediately be received by the participants, in the form of a notification in the app (for the app users) and an email (for app users and non app users). More information on the emails and notifications received.
Editing a meeting in the app
Once an app user has scheduled a meeting, they can access the meeting and make any necessary changes.
This is done by tapping the "edit meeting" button in the top right of the screen. Only meeting organizers (or the attendee that created the meeting in the app) can see this button and edit the meeting:
Once the meeting is modified, participants will receive notifications and emails informing them of the changes.
Managing external participants
External participants are event attendees who are not currently using the event app, but who can still be invited to attend a meeting during a congress or a trade show.
External participant profiles are saved in the External participant list in the workspace.
This is a completely separate list to the Users list in the workspace, that can be leveraged in order to collect whatever information you may need regarding external (non app user) participants.
Once they are added to the External participant list, these external participants can be selected when creating meetings via Backstage or via the app.
External participants profiles can be added to the workspace:
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Via Backstage: By XLS import or by adding external participants manually (via the External participants list or when creating a meeting in Backstage).
- Via the app: When creating a meeting and adding attendees, app users can create new external participants that will be saved in the workspace and can then be invited to the meeting.
The external participant information stored in the External participants list can also be edited via Backstage. In addition to the default fields that are used to capture external participant information (First name, Last name, and Email address), custom fields can be added in order to collect the information you need.
Remember that external participants do not use the app. They therefore cannot receive meeting invitations via the app, and they cannot join virtual meetings.
Coming soon: Thanks to new google calendar invitations that will be included in the invitation emails, external participants will soon be able to respond to meeting invitations via the email.
Adding a new External participant via Backstage
Via the External participants tab:
Backstage users can add external participants to the workspace by accessing the External participants tab in the Appointments module:
The list of all existing external participants is displayed.
Here you can click on New external participant to add an external participant profile to the list:
By default you must enter a First name, Last name, and an Email address for the external participant profile, and click Save to finish adding the profile.
To note, additional metadata can be added to the workspace if needed in order to collect the data you need for external participants. This is done through the Settings > Metadata manager > Lead profile data type.
Via the New meeting window:
When you create a new meeting in Backstage, when adding the participants to the Participant field, there are three possibilities:
- The participant will appear in the dropdown list: this means that they are on the user list in the workspace and can be selected to be added to the meeting.
- The participant will appear in the dropdown with "External participant" displayed next to their name: this means that the attendee is already saved on the "External participants" list in the workspace, and can be added to the meeting.
- No participant will appear in the dropdown to match your search: this means that the participant is not on the user list or the external user list in the workspace. You will have to add the attendee to the "External participant" list before you can invite them to the meeting.
To add a new external participant, click on Add external participant +:
By default you must enter a First name, Last name, and an Email address for the external participant profile, and click Save to finish adding the profile.
To note, additional metadata can be added to the workspace if needed in order to collect the data you need for external participants. This is done through the Settings > Metadata manager > Lead profile data type.
Adding a new External participant via the app
When using the app, attendees can also search for, select, or add External participants to the workspace in order to invite them to meetings.
This is also done when creating the meeting and searching for participants using the Add Participants field. Again, there are three possibilities:
- The participant will appear in the dropdown list: this means that they are on the user list in the workspace and can be selected to be added to the meeting.
- The participant will appear in the dropdown with "External participant" displayed next to their name: this means that the attendee is already saved on the "External participants" list in the workspace, and can be added to the meeting.
- No participant will appear in the dropdown to match your search: this means that the participant is not on the user list or the external user list in the workspace. You will have to add the attendee to the "External participant" list before you can invite them to the meeting.
To add a new external participant, click on Add external participant +:
By default you must enter a First name, Last name, and an Email address for the external participant profile, and click Save to finish adding the profile.
To note, additional metadata can be added to the workspace if needed in order to collect the data you need for external participants. This is done through the Settings > Metadata manager > Lead profile data type.
How do virtual meetings work for attendees?
Whatever the meeting type, meetings can always take place over video chat in the app, so that both remote and in-person attendees using the app can easily meet.
Note: External participants (attendees who are not using the app) cannot attend fully virtual meetings, as they take place through the app. They will receive a meeting invitation but there will not be a link or a "join call" button present.
To start or join a virtual meeting, mobile or web app users can access the meeting via the app, and select the Join call button:
This will open a chat window that includes all the participants of the meeting. At this point attendees can type and send instant messages to the group, or use the Video call button to start or join the ongoing video call.
Please remember that for virtual meetings to be available in the app the Enable virtual meetings setting must not be disabled.
Meetings notifications and emails
Meetings notifications (only participants using the app)
Push or in-app notifications are received by meeting participants and meeting organizers to inform them of new invitations, changes in meetings, or in some cases actions performed within the meeting:
Action | Meeting organizer receives notification |
Meeting invited attendees receive a notification
|
Meeting invitation received | No | Yes |
Attendees accept/decline meeting | Yes | No |
Attendee added or removed from an existing meeting | No | Yes |
Organizer starts/ends call | No | Yes |
Attendee starts/leaves call | Yes | No |
Chat message received while having chat window closed | No | Yes |
Chat message received while viewing meeting group chat window | No | No |
Chat message received while video call is running | No | No |
Mobile app users will always receive push notifications, and web app users will receive pop-up notifications.
In the app menu, red bubbles will also appear over the Notifications and Meetings app menu items to indicate that notifications have been received.
Meetings emails (all attendees)
External participants that are not part of the user list of the workspace, and who therefore do not use the app, cannot receive app notifications.
All meeting attendees, whether they are using the app (i.e., on the user list of the workspace) or they are external (i.e. not on the user list of the workspace), will always receive notifications via email.
These emails are received when attendees are invited to a meeting, when an update is made to an existing meeting that they are invited to, and when a meeting that they are invited to is cancelled. This cannot be deactivated.
These emails include the details of the meeting (title, date, start/end time, location, the name of the meeting organizer, and "add to calendar" buttons.
These emails can be customized via the workspace email templates, available at Design > Emails > Templates, however please do not insert dynamic placeholders for user information (for example {{fname}}), as these will not be supported when emails are sent to external participants.
These email templates are only present in the workspace if the Appointments module is installed.
More information on editing email templates.
Adjusting the settings for your meeting
In the Meetings > Settings tab, you will find the following the following sections for adjusting the module's settings:
Location options
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Allow virtual meetings: Use this option to enable or disable virtual meetings from taking place in the event. If you disable this option, Backstage users will not be able to create virtual locations, and attendees will not be able to schedule or access any virtual meetings.
If it is enabled, the link to the virtual meeting will automatically be added to the invite, and any meeting location can be virtual (with a max capacity of 20 attendees).
- Allow custom location input when creating a meeting: Use this option to choose whether to allow custom meeting locations to be used in the app when creating meetings. If this option is disabled, the app users will have to choose a predefined meeting location when creating their meetings. This option should only be disabled if you have created a sufficient number of predefined meetings for your event audience to use.
Schedule rules
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Default meeting suggested start date: This is the default suggested start date and time when creating a meeting. You can use this field to modify the suggested start date and time. For example, if you are planning on holding meetings only at a specific day/time during your event, you can change this field to that specific day/time.
- Meeting possible starting time every: When creating a meeting, users will select the start time of the meeting. This field is used to determine what start times will be available. By default, start times can be selected for every 5 minutes: for example 10:05 - 10:10 - 10:15, etc.
Permissions
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Allow external invitations: Enabling this option means that meeting planners will be able to add external participants to the meetings they create. Disabling this option means that external participants cannot be selected or added when creating a meeting.
- Create meetings from within the app: Enabling this option means that meeting planners will be able to create meetings via the app and via Backstage. Disabling this option means that meetings can only be created via Backstage..
Duration
- Define meetings duration: Here event organizers can choose what the selectable meeting durations should be when meeting planners create a meeting using the app or Backstage. In the above example, the meeting organizers will have to choose between 30 or 45 minutes or 1 hour durations. You can select as many of these durations as you need.
Communication
Meeting planner notification
Here you can add one or more email addresses, in order to notify those people via email of any newly created, modified, or deleted/cancelled meetings. This is a great way to keep a person or group of people informed of all the activity around meetings in the event, so that they can for example ensure that everything is going smoothly, or monitor the usage and availability of meeting locations. To note meeting participants will by default receive email notifications, so the email addresses here are in addition to the meeting invitees.
To note, no emails are sent when attendees accept or decline meetings, these meetings emails are only sent when a meeting is created/updated/deleted.
The default email templates look as follows:
The information included in the email is as follows:
- The name of the meeting.
- The name of the meeting organizer.
- The date and start/end time.
- The location.
- The number of participants.
- A calendar link.
Meetings email templates
Here you can select the meeting invitation, meeting updated, and meeting cancelled email templates that will be used. These emails will be sent out automatically whenever a meeting is created, updated (modified), or cancelled, to all meeting invitees/attendees, as well as any email addresses that are added to the "Meeting panner notification" field. You can choose to use the default email templates that are present in the workspace, or you can create your own custom templates using the Email template editor and select them here to be used.
Exporting or importing meetings
Meetings can be exported by clicking on the Export XLS button in the Meetings tab in the Appointments module in Backstage.
The exported .xlsx file contains one row per meeting, and it includes the following details:
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fp_ext_id: meeting id for export purposes
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title: meeting’s title
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date: meeting's date and time (yyyy/mm/dd HH:mm)
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duration: meeting’s duration
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meeting_location: meeting's pre-defined location
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location: meeting’s custom location
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organizer.fp_ext_id: meeting’s organizer id
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organizer.fname: meeting’s organizer first name
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organizer.lname: meeting’s organizer last name
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organizer.attendance: organizer attendance status (accepted, declined, pending)
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participant.0.fp_ext_id: participant 0 id
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participant.0.fname: participant 0 first name
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partificpant.0.lname: participant 0 last name
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participant.0.attendance: participant 0 attendance status (accepted, declined, pending)
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participant.N.fp_ext_id: participant N id
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participant.N.fname: participant N first name
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partificpant.N.lname: participant N last name
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participant.N.attendance: participant N attendance status (accepted, declined, pending)
Meetings can also be imported by clicking on the Import XLS button. The imported file should be a .xlsx file with one row per meeting, and include information following the same structure and formatting as above.
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