Boost sales with online appointment bookings
Switching to a 'click here to book' system helped Soothe Spa grow its client base by 400%. Have you found software that helps your business? Tell us about it.
From Corenne Taylor, Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canada I work for a company that provides web-based spa management software and we also offer online booking. It has been extremely successful for our clients; you can read the case study here: http://www.book4time.com/www/files/Case%20Study%20-%20Bliss%20Spas.pdf
From John Online booking is a way to make it easier for your customers. If they need to talk to you then they should call anyway. You should never remove your phone! :)
From Mark Dixon, New York, NY We used Monetime.com , they offer appointment booking as well as tools for event planners. Its perfect for just listing new client promotions and it works with PayPal. It saves us a lot of time dealing with phone calls from new customers.
From David, Sunnyvale, CA I tried many online appointment services and I think Lattiss Online Scheduling has the best offering. The free plan is includes text messaging and unlimited appointments. Most other services charge for sms.
From Darren, Seatle Washington We use Bookingpad http://www.bookingpad.com . We find its simple and lets us draw our floor plan so pople can choose where to book.
From Angela, NY NY http://www.ClickBook.net – it's free except SMS reminders to clients. I tried a few and settled for this mainly because I liked the way it works more and cheaper.
From Steve Kenner, Greensboro, NC I think there are lots of businesses that can use online scheduling. The place my son is taking baseball instruction uses online scheduling for their private lessons. They use one from Netwave Online Scheduling.com and originally it was a separate website that was provided for them but now it is integrated into their own site so they can address other needs by their customer in one online visit. I have found it quite convenient to book his lessons in this way.
From Scott, Seattle WA We've been using an online scheduling service for 18 months for our music instrument store for scheduling private lessons. We still do all the scheduling by phone and in person. One of our owners is vehemently against "opening up 70% of our business to the public." I can't seem to convince her that it will help and not hurt us. Funny that she schedules everything online but won't give her own business that feature.
From los angeles, ca i have a mobile spa and in home massage business and i use free online appointment with http://www.servemehere.com
also they specialise on mobile services and they offer free web page.
From Dolores chicago il This won't work for dentist's offices. All procedures are based on an alloted amount of time and the patient's don't know how much time they will need. Also certain procedures require the doctor by the patient's side continuously throughout the appointment so there could not be a cleaning next to that patient that would require the doctor to stop to do an exam.
It will work for some but not for a dentist.
From Christine, Mountain View, CA I run a small beauty salon in Mountain View. My chiropractor uses online scheduling from Lattiss (http://www.lattiss.com). Their service is great and the UI is much better than the other online scheduling tools I have tried. My business has also grown a lot after I put in online scheduling. Lattiss also gives you a website for free. My clients love it!
From Jodey, Alexandria, Virginia I just opened Pure Aesthetica, a small facial studio situated in a wellness center in Alexandria, Virginia. I researched many different online booking systems and decided to go with SpaBooker (owned by SpaFinder). Since opening in August 2008, over 70% of my bookings have been online, the other 30% called for an appointment. And near 100% of those who booked online did so because of my advertising. The call-ins are usually the referrals. I am finding my repeat clients who called in their first appointment are using SpaFinder to book their next appointment.
From Amit Singh, Oxford, UK Online booking system is great. But what happens when costumer wants to talk to a real person about their services or if they have some problem in booking?
When business will grow they'll have to hire a real person in the end..
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My company, http://www.TimeTrade.com, makes two different appointment systems: a nifty little personal scheduler called TimeDriver, and a commercial product (TimeTrade) that scales from one-resource spa businesses up to the level of Homeland Security, New Jersey DMV, etc. This piece is correct – we have lots of case studies from users small and large who've achieved what the article discusses.