So you are looking to schedule a meeting with someone you don’t know very well…

Doodle is a free online appointment scheduler that can be used to book meetings and other events with friends, colleagues and anyone else. Email threads trying to book a large number of appointments can quickly become confusing and trying to mark off available and booked time slots on a piece of paper is not conducive for amendments and changes of plans. Your first email should include specific time slot offers, instead of unhelpful invitations such as 'my whole Tuesday is open'. Rule #2: Offer half hour blocks. All meetings should default to 30.

What is the correct protocol to ask for a meeting?
How do you get the meeting without seeming like a jerk?
What if they turn you down?

These questions can cause you anxiety, especially if you’re an introvert who is not good at talking to new people (like me).

Below are my tips for how I approach getting a meeting with someone new:

How To Get A Meeting

1. Have Context

I generally avoid asking someone for a meeting that I don’t have context for. I define “context” as a point of reference… either you met them at an event, or you know someone who knows them, or you’re a big fan. Context is anything reason valuable enough for you to reach out to them.

Request a follow-up meeting on the spot

If I talk to someone at an event, I try to get a follow up while the conversation is still fresh.

Example: “I would love to chat more about ABC, would you be interested in grabbing coffee or lunch sometime this week?” If possible pull your phone out and send a meeting invite right away. Cezar poker zagreb.

Write a note their business card

Make sure you write some information about the discussion on the back of the card to refresh your memory if you send out an invite later on. When you send out an email after an event, be sure to mention where you met them and what you discussed, e.g. “It was great meeting you at the fundraiser on Friday. I enjoyed chatting with you about ABC. Per our discussion, I would love to grab a meeting this week to chat more about ABC.”

Find mutual friends or contacts

Available time slot for meeting email template

LinkedIn can be pretty useful for figuring out who knows who. If someone you know has a connection with the person, don’t be afraid to ask them for an intro. e.g. “Hey Jamie, I am looking to reach out to Kris Smith to pick his brain about mobile UX. His presentation on his blog really resonated with me. I saw on LinkedIn you are connected to him. Would you be able to introduce me?”

The key is giving them a sense of why you want to talk to the person and allow them to filter the information in advance of introducing yourself. The more details the better. This will allow them to provide as much information as possible.

Important: Do not burn someone who referred you. If someone refers you and you piss off their connection, they may never refer you to someone again.

You’re a “fan” of their work

Being a fan of someone’s work can be flattering, but it can also come across kinda creepy. I would recommend having a strong reason to reach out to someone if you’re a fan. If you aren’t able to meet the person at an event or get a referral, you have to go with the old “cold request”.

When you send a cold request, you need to be very clear about why you want to meet them. If you send an email that reads: “Hey, I would like to have a meeting with you. Thanks!” – you probably won’t get a response. Your intro should be very clearly crafted.

Example: “Hi Kris, My name is Brett Cooper and I do mobile dev work on iOS projects for a company here in Atlanta. I saw you speak last year at Web Afternoon, and I really enjoyed your presentation. I was wondering if could buy you lunch and pick your brain about a mobile problem that I’m looking to solve around multi-screen size format. Do you have any availability this Thursday or Friday? Thanks!”

2. Scheduling the meeting

So they respond back to your meeting request with “Sure, what time do you want to meet?” Your objective is to quickly get something set on the calendar.

The calendar game – My rule of thumb is to ask for 2-3 time slots within the next 5 days. If they can’t meet any of the time slots, ask them for some alternatives.
Target the morning – Try to get something first thing in the morning (e.g. a coffee meeting) so you are less likely to get bumped because one of their other meetings ran late.
If all else fails, try the phone – If you are struggling to get something scheduled, ask if you can do a quick 90-second phone call to resolve calendar alignment issues.
Pick a specific location – Try and pick a specific location near where they work or ask them if it would be most convenient to meet at their office. The more specific you are in the request, the more likely it will be to that you successfully schedule the meeting.
Use helpful tools – There are a lot of tools out there that try to solve the scheduling puzzle. I would take a look at Calendly, Bookeo, or Acuity if you are trying to schedule a lot of meetings. These tools can be very useful for larger groups, but I would stick with emails and the phone for 1:1 meeting scheduling.
Try A.I. – Recently I tried out https://x.ai which offers a virtual personal assistant AI that will work to look at your calendar and coordinate with multiple other parties to finalize a meeting time. The experience was pretty smooth, but it did still require 2-3 emails to get the meeting finalized. Another more recent entrant in the AI assistant field is MeetSally.eu. I have no doubt that AI meeting assistants will continue to get better over the next few years.
The invite format– When you schedule a meeting, send out a calendar invite to make sure each attendees time gets blocked on their calendars.

The key things you should include in a meeting invite are:

Title – the Title of the meeting invite should be clear on what the meeting is about.
Location – Include the location in both the location field and body/comments. Preferably the address if you are driving there.
Summary – Have a summary of the meeting request in the body.
Objective – Clearly state the objective of the meeting.
Agenda – When you send a meeting invite, make sure to have a clear agenda (with some time-boxing). Thinking about the agenda and time boxes ahead of time will help you get a clearer picture of what you want to talk about and whether you actually have enough time to cover everything.
Notification – Be sure to include a notification equal to the amount of travel time (or 5 minutes if it doesn’t require travel).
Contact – Include your cell phone and their cell number (if possible). This makes it easy for them to reach you if they are running late.

Here is an example of a meeting invite.

Title: Cooper / Kris Meeting to talk about Mobile UX Challenges

Attendees: Brett Cooper, Kris K.

Location: Octane Coffee Emory Village

Reminder: 15 minutes before

Body:

Kris,

Per our email discussion, I would like to grab a coffee and pick your brain on mobile UX topics

Objective:

Discuss mobile UX challenges on iOS vs Android

Agenda:

Intro and key problem areas – 5m
Deep dive into use cases – 15m
Discussion and Recommendations – 20m
Next steps / take-aways – 10m

Contact:

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Available Time Slot For Meeting