In the ring of appointment scheduling apps Engageware (formerly known as TimeTrade) and Calendly are two heavy hitters, but who would come out on top in a bout of Engageware (TimeTrade) vs Calendly?
Both of these apps can work well for basic professional appointment booking needs, but there are some key differences that might make one or the other better suited to meeting your goals.
Engageware (TimeTrade) vs Calendly: Overview
Engageware (Timetrade)
The TimeTrade scheduling app, now officially rebranded as Engageware after a merger, is primarily targeted at enterprise business users, but there’s also an individual version.
The core functionality of the platform aims to let customers and prospects easily book appointments with the right person at your company, whether it’s you or someone else, through an appointment scheduling link on your website, on social media, or in an email.
Engageware also offers customer experience analytics and Salesforce CRM integration to easily track various engagement and performance metrics.
Originally designed to do one thing, eliminate back and forth in emails, Calendly is one of the older scheduling tools out there.
Calendly
Calendly’s appointment scheduling functionality can work for individual use and teams of all sizes, as well as for scheduling both external and internal meetings (group meeting polls work great for internal scheduling).
Like Engageware, Calendly offers analytics tools, and your booking page can be shared via a unique link or by embedding it on your website.
Engageware Pros and Cons:
| ✅ Pros | ❌ Cons |
|---|---|
| Has individual and enterprise team versions | Geared towards businesses with physical branches (banking/financial services) |
| Works for scheduling one-on-one or group meetings | Mainly sales/customer experience focused |
| Offers reporting and analytics | Only has CRM integration |
| Has Salesforce CRM integration | No free version |
| Provides customer queue management | |
Calendly Pros and Cons:
| ✅ Pros | ❌ Cons |
|---|---|
| Works for individuals and teams of all sizes | Paid versions charge per user |
| Has features for streamlining both internal and external scheduling | Can get quite expensive for big teams |
| Provides analytics | |
| Offers many integrations | |
| Has group meeting polls | |
| Free version available |
Now that you know some of the pros and cons of Timetrade and Calendly, let’s take a closer look at how they compare in terms of features, ease of use, integrations, customer service, and pricing.
Features
Calendly and Engageware offer similar basic appointment booking features and functionality, including the abilities to set your availability, sync with various calendar platforms, share your booking page via email, social media, or a website, and send appointment reminders.
Beyond these basic scheduling automation features is where the two platforms start to differ a bit.
Engageware is particularly geared towards enterprise businesses with multiple brick-and-mortar locations, specifically banks, credit unions, and other financial service providers.
One unique feature that Engageware offers for such businesses is a queue management system that allows customers who want to visit a specific location to see all available appointments, check wait times, and check in at an on-site kiosk.
This feature is aimed at streamlining the customer experience for businesses by allowing their customers to book and check into appointments from anywhere, reducing the amount of in-person interactions needed at brick-and-mortar locations.
Calendly, on the other hand, doesn’t offer any particular features for managing appointments across different business locations.
However, Calendly does have a bunch of useful features not available in Engageware, such as routing forms for streamlining sales funnels and group meeting polls that help you find a time to meet that works for multiple people.
Winner: Tie — if you just want basic appointment scheduling automation features, either Calendly or Engageware could work for you, but each platform has its own unique features that could make one or the other better, depending on what your specific needs and goals are.
Ease of Use
Anyone who’s fairly technologically savvy should find Calendly’s and Engageware’s basic booking pages simple to set up and intuitive to use, although there may be a bit of a learning curve for some of the more involved features and integrations.
The client-facing side of things should be fairly straightforward for anyone you share your booking link with, too, but Calendly seems to have an overall simpler customer interface/experience.
Winner: Calendly — this one was a close call, but after looking at both platforms and checking out TimeTrade reviews from past customers, we think Calendly is just a little bit easier to use.
Integrations
In terms of integrations, the only third-party tool that Engageware currently integrates with is the Salesforce CRM system.
Calendly also integrates with Salesforce, as well as at least 99 other platforms. For example, there’s Zoom integration for video conferencing, Slack integration for chatting, and HubSpot integration for relationship building, to name a few of the popular ones.
Winner: Calendly — with such a high volume of useful integrations, Calendly is the clear winner in this category.
Customer Service
Both Calendly and Engageware have online support resources on their websites, although Calendly’s help center seems to be easier to navigate.
Neither Calendly nor Engageware offers phone support, and the only contact forms on their websites go to their respective sales teams.
However, Engageware does allow current users to open support tickets via a chatbot found on the support page, or by logging in and submitting a request through a Zendesk support portal.
The only way we could find to contact Calendly’s customer service team is a support email buried on the site’s terms of use page.
Winner: Engageware — although Calendly offers a lot of self-serve support resources, they don’t seem to want users to actually contact them about support issues, so Engageware wins in the customer service department.
Pricing
Engageware offers free 15-day trials of the individual and business versions of their products, but after that you have to pay $79/year (individual) or $149/year (business) to keep using the platform.
Calendly offers an always-free version with basic scheduling features and integrations, as well as various more robust plans ranging from $8/user/month to $16/user/month.
Winner: Calendly — the option to use Calendly for free, forever, is why we chose Calendly as the winner when it comes to pricing.
Engageware (TimeTrade) vs Calendly: Which One Should You choose?
When Should I Choose Engageware?
Engageware is a good option if your business wants to manage booking across multiple physical locations, although it works for strictly virtual appointment booking as well.
Engageware is also ideal if you’re looking for a very sales-focused and customer experience-focused scheduling platform, and you’re not too worried about using the tool for scheduling internal meetings.
When Should I Choose Calendly?
Calendly is the best option for individuals and professional teams across a wide variety of teams, from sales and marketing to customer success and recruiting teams, and for more casual individual use.
Overall, Calendly is the most versatile of these two products, so it’s a better one-size-fits-all tool, especially if you have a large, diverse organization and you want to implement a piece of scheduling automation software that will work for everyone (both internally and externally).
Wrapping Up on Engageware (TimeTrade) vs Calendly
Engageware and Calendly are great tools that have earned very positive reviews from their customers over the years.
Ultimately, the decision about which platform to use should come down to what specific features and user experience you’re looking for.
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