21 Wonderful Benefits of Online Appointment Scheduling for Small Business

For small businesses that take bookings, there is an unsaid rule - if it’s working well enough, don’t tinker with it. When it comes to bookings, most businesses don’t stray from the archaic telephone-based systems, requiring manual calls and organizing books. If your business depends upon bookings and appointments, then a scheduling software is the lubricant that will help keep it running smoothly.

As a software vendor of online bookings, we have seen the impact of an online platform like ours and how it can positively affect a business. The system is called online scheduling software, online booking software, appointment management software. An online scheduling system is a Web-based application that allows individuals to conveniently and securely book their appointments and reservations online through any Web-connected device. Real-time online appointment scheduling is a solution to the frustrations that both the clients and businesses face.

If you have a query in mind seeking answers to what exactly are the benefits of using an online scheduling software over traditional methods. In this post, we narrate the benefits of having an online scheduling tool for your small business. If you are undecided whether or not an appointment booking application is worth your investment, the following pointers offered in the article, will help you make your decision easy.

1. Grow and Increase your revenue

An online scheduling booking platform can help your business bring home the bacon, with its online pay feature. You can also charge customers for late cancellation or no-shows. If you are in the market to make money, online scheduling can help you fatten your bottom line. Another significant benefit is that it is straightforward to create, publish, promote and sell online. You can combine the offerings or let customers choose the package they want.

It will further increase the revenue you generate while customers will be able to get what they want. You can also introduce upselling into the booking process, letting you offer context-specific offers to desired customers.

2. Develop A Relationship With Your Customers

At first sight, it may appear to be counterintuitive, but the fact is that booking appointment for a user saves him time. Online scheduling also allows people to allows clients to access your services more efficiently. If you choose to offer same-day or next-day sessions, an online scheduling app is a great way. A client can easily make these last-minute appointments if their schedule opens up.

With the ability to facilitate customer meetings, an Appointment Scheduling Software makes it easy to provide quality service that drives Net Promoter Scores. Increased customer satisfaction leads to a higher customer lifetime value while building brand loyalty.

3. Grow And Detail Your Customer’s Profile

Few online software like ours come with an additional feature to capture the client’s information at all the touchpoints they have had with the organization. This detail preserved over a longer duration serves as a store-house of context for any client, their preference, and behaviours.

4. Save your Staff Time

The customer service staff spends most of his time handling phone calls, explaining options to customers and managing schedules, all of which can be automated. The time-saving benefits work similarly for your prospects. The individuals who want to book an appointment with you do not necessarily have to commit part of their busy routine to call you for an appointment.

They can do it on the go as they carry on with their respective duties. If there’s space available for a given date, your customer can choose their options, pick a date and time as per their preference. The system will send them an email confirmation once the appointment is scheduled, all of this without reequireing any human intervention at your end.

This frees up your staff to do more valuable things with their time. That’s a massive advantage of online booking platforms and one which can significantly benefit your business.

5. Monetary Savings

The time-saving benefits you get from using online appointment scheduling app translate into financial gains. The time which would have otherwise been spent booking appointments is now spent on other revenue-generating business activities. The resources that were initially used to manage appointments may be further directed to other productive tasks.

A scheduling system may also eliminate the need for hiring extra business staff or the need for the existing team to work longer hours when managing business appointments. This could potentially result in considerably higher annual savings.

The time savings experienced by a facility can translate into monetary savings, as both staff time and services translate into expenses and revenue, respectively. Additionally, automated appointment reminders can also create monetary savings by reducing the number of “no-shows” who fail to make their scheduled appointments. Surveys have shown that these types of reminders can decrease this number by 50 per cent.

6. Online Booking means Faster Payments

An online booking system can require customers to prepay for their schedule. Online booking systems allow you to capture that new revenue as soon as players schedule. You can expect from your attendees to pay when they book, further increasing your income, and not worry about payments when they arrive. Also, in case of a no-show, you can keep some of the money as compensation.

7. Greater Sales and Marketing Synergy

One-click Book Now buttons and links on your website and social media pages allow for easy scheduling but are excellent marketing tools as well. When you have all the information about your brand on the website, why not offer the opportunity to book alongside that compelling write-up? By making your customers leave your product page or website to place a booking order, you’re introducing unnecessary complications for your customers. This adds friction, and their chances of making the kinds of impulse bookings which bring in large sums of revenue are reduced.

8. Customer self-scheduling with 24-hour convenience

At a time when 75% of Millennials choose texting over talking on the phone, more and more people will appreciate the freedom that comes with an online appointment scheduling. Studies show that 35% of clients prefer scheduling appointments during non-business hours, and 40% of online bookings happen after hours. An online scheduling system allows for 24-hour booking, not just during usual facility or office hours. Your customers and clients can make a reservation whenever it fits into their schedule.

9. Staff Scheduling

An online appointment management software can manage your staff schedules while accounting for flexible scheduling to keep your employees happy and handled efficiently. We at Karen have designed features, where we offer bookings for individual teams; this allows for a group of people to divide workload amongst themselves.

10. No More No Shows

Regardless of the industry, you’re in; there are always customers who repeatedly no-show, cancel or try to rebook their appointments last minute. Implementing automatic email and SMS reminders allow you to track how often a customer cancels. Business owners often carefully consider their staffing and scheduling for the week, based on the number of appointments they have.

Having email reminders and SMS reminders is crucial in earning money and preventing lots of opportunities because a client forgot when their meeting was. Take the hassle out of rescheduling or cancelling bookings. Once again, your booking app can be a huge help here. By allowing your customers to change their reservation online (instead of doing it over the phone), you’re making it easier for them to reschedule.

11. Email And SMS Reminders Are more Client Friendly than the Human Receptionist

Similar to how you don’t want your work being disturbed by client calls, with email and SMS appointment reminders, your clients will won’t be disrupted during their day to answer your calls. The benefits of implementing an online management software with appointment reminders do not just benefit your business but help your customers as well.

Not all customers spend their days near a phone or by their computer. Email and SMS reminders alert your clients of upcoming appointments to their mobile devices, wherever they are. The same benefit works for you as the service provider. If your Client responds to their appointment reminder asking to cancel, you as the business owner also receive notification on-the-go.

12. Avoid Overbooking

Have you ever had a scenario where two clients turned up at the same time? This is something not new for any small business, and mistakes like these happen more frequently, to avoid such errors, it is mandatory that an online appointment scheduling system is put in place, which will remove all the redundancy in the booking.

13. Easier Booking Experience for Customers

The traditional way of booking appointments can be quite cumbersome and usually involves multiple back-and-forth communication even when done via an email, instead of the phone. The process not only takes much time, but it also leaves room for human error and miscommunication. By using an appointment scheduling website, your customers can access on their own time, and the email back and forth is eliminated. The system displays the services you offer and all available time slots, so the customer can reserve the one which works best for him. The risks of dealing with a busy, rude, or distracted can altogether be avoided.

14. You get Valuable Insight into your Business

Trying to manage the growth of a growing, small business? Alternatively, are you with a larger organization looking to improve your operational efficiency? Regardless of the size of the company, the detailed reporting available in online scheduling systems will help you to make better decisions.

Online booking systems come with an analytics dashboard that helps you quickly determine your performance indicators.

• The number of no-shows per day, week, or month
• Number of completed appointments by staff
• Comparison of productivity
• How many meetings were booked as a result of a marketing campaign.
• The full appointment history for a customer

The above are a few of the metrics that can be seen. Most scheduling systems also allows you to run reports on daily or periodic sales and customers. This quick and easy access to crucial business data can help support both regular and longer-term strategic decisions for your organization.

15. Provides a Good Return on Investment

If cost is the only factor which concerns you, consider how much you charge per session. Chances are, your fee is higher than the monthly price of the online scheduling service. If offering online scheduling gets you even one new customer, the software has already paid for itself and then some, since you’ll likely see that Client more than once a month.

16. Helpful for People with Audio Impairments

Clients who suffer from hearing impairment should find an online appointment booking service the most comfortable and most convenient facility to use. It gives them a significant advantage, especially during emergencies.

17. Have More Time Doing that which you Enjoy

Another benefit of self-scheduling is that you get to spend more time doing what your customers expect you to do – provide the service that you excel at delivering. They do not want you to schedule appointments all day, and it is not very cost-effective to have a receptionist to book appointments for you. Small things like these can make a big difference in the time you spend with your customers.

18. Self-Scheduling Reduces Communication Gap and Miscommunications

Think about when you are trying to book an appointment, often you are left recommending possible dates and openings. It’s hard to give all the choices, and also hard to get the customer to understand it at times. Again, you fail to book a customer. Maybe one of the most significant positives of self-scheduling software is the fact that you can capture some of those missed appointments. The self-scheduling booking page lets your customers have a visual look at the availability of services and schedules, helping them make an informed decision.

19. Reaching Out to Prospects

When you have to book an appointment with your customers, your customers are coming to you. So your marketing efforts or word of mouth is bringing them to you. What if they could convert the very moment they chose to buy your service. With Karen, you’ll get a free booking page, for teams, and individuals in your organization, which you can integrate into your website or use it separately if you don’t have one. When your customers schedule their appointments with you, Karen will take over from there. We will keep a record of the meetings and show on your dashboard where you can check all the appointments you’ve got.

20. Centralized Information System

Online scheduling systems for appointments also have management of client data as part of the package. The organization can create a single point from which to save, update, manage and analyze patient information. Recording, reporting, and analyzing such information helps to manage the case file of a customer efficiently. It can reduce the amount of documentation and the time it takes to access physical data.

Provide quick and easy access to crucial business data that can provide support to both daily and long-term strategic decisions for your organization. It is also possible to avoid redundant data entries about the same customer. Besides, the ongoing records can be updated at each appointment, making information available for easy and fast access in one place.

21. You’re going to Need an Appointment Booking Software

As of now, you might not feel the need of having an online appointment scheduling software. This strategy can seem feasible maybe even for the next year or two, but ultimately, the time will come for your business to embrace the technology. The sooner you do it, the sooner you can get your staff trained and the sooner you can enjoy the benefits of it.

Online booking is gaining steam. Moreover, there are many reasons as to why you should embrace this technology as we have described in the article the service allows businesses to develop a seamless system for creating, managing, bookings.

These services are highly flexible, customizable, and come with a ton of integrations. They can be tweaked at instances to meet your specific needs. If you manage to get the implementation well, your business is guaranteed to benefit tremendously.

Related article

• Top 25 Questions to help you choose the Best Online Appointment Scheduling Software
• 5 Ways Online Appointment Scheduling drives better Customer Relationships
• 7 Signs that your business needs Online Appointment Scheduling
• 7 Steps to convert your Small Business to Smart Business and Grow Faster