Import Excel Meeting Requests to Outlook

I have an Excel named range with columns mapped to Outlook calendar fields. When I use Outlook’s import function I am able to import all rows to my Outlook calendar, but they import as appointments, and not as meeting requests. The “required attendees” field is always ignored on import.

Is there a way to import my Excel data as a meeting request, so the required attendees see the appointments in the shared calendar?

I am using both Excel and Outlook 2007 SP1.