Here at Appointedd, we most often see businesses within the Retail industry use our software to take bookings for fittings and online consultations. Whatever services you offer, we aim to provide a smart and efficient solution to all your online scheduling needs.
Getting started
Resources
Here at Appointedd, we call bookable calendars resources. Resources are either the person or space facilitating your services. In retail cases, resources can be a person assisting your customers with a fitting, or it could be the room itself. You can manage your resources here, and learn all about resources here.
Services
You can create the services you wish to offer customers by going to Setup and clicking on Manage services. In most cases, you will require a standard service, however if you wish to offer a service as two or more parts or offer different prices depending on what option the customer selects, then multi-part or multi-tier services may be useful. If you offer a block of appointments to your customers, then you can make use of our recurring bookings feature.
Setting up your communications
Emails
You can set up email notifications for every booking made by your customers. The design of those communications can be edited and branded to your business through HTML headers and footers. You can find out more about editing emails here. Sending an email to customers when they book provides them with a confirmation of the booking and summarise its details so that there is no confusion.
SMS
If you would like to send text messages to your customers in addition to emails, you can set up a text for booking notifications. If you usually communicate through SMS, this may seem like the more natural choice. Learn all about SMS here.
Reminders and follow ups
We highly recommend that you make use of our reminders and follow-ups functionality for your business. By sending a reminder before the booking and a follow-up after, you'll be able to reduce no-shows and drive repeat custom. You can send the customer an email and/or a SMS a few hours prior to the booking to remind them it is coming up soon, and a follow-up afterwards to thank them for attending and inviting them to book again. You can set up reminders and follow ups here, and learn all about them here.
Setting up your online booking tools
Booking page or widgets in URL
If you don't have a website for your business, you can use your Booking Page instead, which is created when you start an account with Appointedd. If you click on Booking tools and select go to the business booking page, you can view your Booking Page and copy the URL to share with your customers to book with you.
Alternatively, you can use widgets in URL mode, which allow further customization.
Booking widgets
If you have your own website and would like customers to book your services from there, then you can create a booking widget either in embed or popover modes. Click here to learn more.
Customize your booking flow
You can customize your booking flow to create a streamlined process for you and your customers. You may wish to make use of the block availability after feature to set how far in advance customers can book with you. If you have multiple staff members offering the same services, you may want to allow your customers to choose who they would like to book with. Additionally, you may also want to ask questions on the booking flow to gather all the information necessary prior to the booking.
Integrations you may be interested in
Calendar sync
You can sync your resource's external calendar to their profile in Appointedd. This way, events in their external calendar will be copied over to Appointedd and vice versa. This ensures that you won't become double booked. You can sync calendars or send invites to sync here as well as alter any settings that may be applicable to your business. Learn all about calendar sync here.
Zoom
If you offer consultations, you may like to make use of our Zoom integration so that you can offer your services virtually. Learn all about our Zoom integration here.
Payment gateway
Whether you are offering your service virtually or in person, you may want to take the payment for the service, either in full or as a deposit, at the time of booking. This will also help to reduce no shows. Appointedd integrates with three payment providers: Stripe and Square. Here is a guide on starting to take payments through Appointedd.
How to manage your account
Day to day use
Once you have set up your account to fit your needs and started to take bookings, the calendar page in Appointedd will start displaying all those bookings. Clicking on those sessions will display all its information so that you're always prepared before seeing your customers. When a resource has an appointment, they can login to Appointedd and click on the booking in their calendar, where they will be able to see the customers' details. They'll also be able to use our status feature to keep a record of who has attended.
User logins and permissions
You can give access to your resources by creating a user login for them from this page. You will also be able to set which permission they can have within the account. Find out more about the differences in permissions here.
However, if you sync your resource's external calendar with Appointedd, there will be no need for them to login to Appointedd as any new booking will automatically populate their calendar.
How to measure success
Reporting suite
Appointedd allows you to gain insight into how your business is doing via the reporting suite. You may wish to understand which resources are getting the most bookings, which services are most popular, how much money is being generated through online bookings and which of your booking widgets is performing best. You can find the suite in your account here and learn all about reports here.
If you aren't satisfied with what you are getting out of Appointedd you would like to reach the success you set out to achieve, please get in touch with our support team via our 24/7 messenger.
Account demos and example of bookings tools
Click here to see a Booking Page.
Click here to see a booking widget.
Interested in using Appointedd?
If you like what you've seen and think Appointedd could help power your business, please feel free to explore our functionality by signing up to a free trial.
If you have any feedback we would love to hear it π