Let me ask you a question. How many more appointments could you make if you never had another double booking or never missed an appointment because someone in the office forgot to put it in your diary?

Ten percent more? Twenty percent? More?

I am betting the answer is more. It certainly used to be in our office. Half the time we seemed to spend fire fighting because of some diary cock up. I used to carry my diary with me so I could schedule follow up appointments while with clients. The trouble was, our practice administrator also took calls and made appointments for us all. Most of us also had our spouses taking calls and making appointments too.

Any of this sound familiar?

Of course, it was a recipe for disaster. But there didn't seem to be an alternative. When MS outlook came along (come to think of it, we tried to use Lotus Organizer too) things were a little better. I would print out my day's activities and take the print out with me. At least the practice administrator could see the MS Outlook diary.

In truth, MS Outlook caused as many problems as it solved.

In all businesses the old saying, “Time is Money”, is true. Nowhere is it truer than in the financial advice game. All this diary 'co-ordination' takes time. At its worst it not only stops you earning money, it actually loses you hard earned sales too.

When you have missed an appointment with the same client twice in a row you are not likely to do much business with that client. Nor are you going to do much business with their friends and most of my lead generation came through referrals.

All I wanted was to be able to carry my diary in my pocket secure in the knowledge that it was always up to date no matter how many people make appointments for me. In these days of modern computers and global communications it really doesn't seem too much to ask for does it?

Sadly the answer seems to be yes.

We tried using PDAs. PDAs synchronise with my PC when I am in the office and I could certainly carry it in my pocket. But I might not go into the office for days at a time. So we resorted to the telephone to resolve conflicts. Not really a lot of help in the end.

Then came the Blackberry. The Blackberry seemed to be the answer to all our prayers. Unfortunately, it only really does email, needs MS Exchange or Lotus Domino as enterprise mail servers (neither of which most mid-sized companies are really able to afford or run), and has pretty lousy coverage outside of the major cities.

Oh well, I guess we just have to soldier on with MS Outlook.

Hold on a minute.

What's this?

The Intelligent Diary!

Operates on a Pocket PC with built in smart phone. Provides online diary, email, ability to retrieve and work on MS office documents. Constantly updated via GPRS (3G when available), seamlessly switches to wireless or infrared when available. Works across 80% of the UK.

Now that's more like it.

The Intelligent Diary is new on the market. Users are already reporting changes in their lifestyle. Reduction of stress in the office.

And almost zero missed appointments.

What more could any financial advisor be looking for?

About the author:
Keith Longmire is a self-confessed technophile and a director of Intelligent Diary. His philosophy is, "If it doesn't deliver cost-effective business benefits, it's worse than useless". Take a look at www.intelligentdiary.co.ukfor more information.