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Doodle is a standard for consensus based group scheduling. As soon as a meeting date is fixed, Doodle’s main job is done. Days or weeks later the actual meeting happens. At this point you may ask yourself: “Who’s going to be there, again?” The Doodle poll now acts as a participants list because everyone participated with their own name.

The more people participate the higher the chance you or the other participants will not recall everyone’s name when you meet. For people you have met before this may put you in an embarrassing situation. RememberTheName has a solution for this: invite your participants to add themselves to a shared memory list (see example). A face picture, name and job info will be pulled from the participants profile of choice like Facebook, LinkedIn or Xing. Now you can use flashcards to playfully learn the other participants and prepare yourself for the actual meeting. For each person you can further add a personal mnemonic and notes like where you met, what you talked before etc.

Such memory lists are really helpful for networking events, seminars, classes or even big family reunions. RememberTheName gives each face a name and will ensure you leave a great impression. While you already enjoy stress free scheduling with Doodle you can now enjoy stress free meetings using RememberTheName. Have fun remembering!

A guest blog by Reto Lämmler, Founder of RememberTheName and former Product Manager at Doodle.

The Doodle Mob was the first “sponsored phonebooth sidequest” in Gbanga, taking place between January 26th and March 1st and was part of Gbanga’s ongoing Startup Quest. The winners of the Doodle-sponsored round were “Orxx”, “Tikanis” and “Tiberius” who all recieved a Doodle Premium Solo subscription.

Congratulations and a big thank you to Gbanga and the engaged players!

These days, many people are trying to live and work in a smarter way, and it’s important that they know how to manage their time and calendar wisely. To help with this, Doodle has compiled the following list of ten tips and tricks that can decrease the amount of time that you’ll spend on coordinating meetings and managing your schedule.

Consolidate – Use one tool as the central place for your schedule. Everybody has a different preference (paper agenda, online calendar, etc.), but the key is that you make sure that you have everything in the same place. This prevents double-booking issues and general confusion.

Share - A sharable online calendar like Google Calendar should be used by individuals who frequently need to coordinate meetings with other people. Depending on the situation, the calendar can be shared with coworkers, family, friends, or anyone else.

Separate - Add appointments to your calendar, but don’t mix them with your To-Do List. Keeping your tasks separate will keep your mind clear, and a tool like RememberTheMilk can help with this.

Declutter - Don’t store random notes in your calendar. Instead, store your notes in a paper notebook, a document, or a service such as Evernote.

Simplify Scheduling – When you need to setup a meeting or social event with more than one person, use Doodle for online scheduling instead of sending email messages or making phone calls. This will eliminate the constant back and forth communication, and your inbox will thank you.

Focus - Make the calendar entries (or the events from the online scheduling tool) the communication channels for your appointments (invitations, updates, location changes, etc.).

Organized Travel – Including travel information in your calendar can help to keep you organized while you travel, and a tool like TripIt will do a lot of the work for you. Also, instead of traveling for meetings, consider scheduling conference calls or online meetings to save even more time.

Visualize – Highlight particularly important appointments in a different color so they stand out. Use calendar feeds in different colors for appointments related to work, family, vacations, etc.

Personalize – It’s your life and your schedule. Find the calendar management methods that work best for you and stick with them.

Expert Advice – Productivity experts like David Allen, Merlin Mann, and Tim Ferriss have shared a lot of good advice that you can use to make your life more productive and enjoyable.

Doodle speaks Romanian thanks to the extra hours of our new software engineer Adelina Ciurumelea! With that new version we are back to 28 languages that are more or less completely supported. We are always happy about volunteers who support us translating our service.