Schedule on Your Website!

As a small business owner, you probably wear multiple hats but the biggest hat that you wear is probably client activity. Managing client calls, appointments, cancellations can be a major headache. We have appointments with prospective clients, existing clients, vendors / suppliers and we use everything from Franklin planners to some pretty fancy Customer Relations Management (CRM) software - and let's not forget the dozens of florescent sticky notes to manage appointments. Imagine a work environment free of busy signals when clients are trying to book appointments; accidentally double booking because it is so busy; not scheduling someone by accident.

Maybe the above scenario does not apply to you (...I'm jealous if it does not) and the system that you have now may be working perfectly. But if you are looking for something new and possibly more convenient, I recently came across this online scheduling solution that is pretty awesome.

How would you like to have the following?

• Your contacts can book appointments on your website and you can capture their email information at the same time, via an attractive looking website widget
• You can manage your appointments from your cell phone
• You can add a "Schedule Now" tab to your Facebook page and your clients can schedule appointments from Facebook
• Clients can change their appointments
• You can notify your clients of special promotions or offers when they schedule appointments
  

How can you receive these benefits and so much more? Schedulicity! Schedulicity is a web-based appointment scheduling tool that allows you to manage your appointments on time and to plug your business into the dynamic world of social media.

As with most software downloads, you can try out Schedulicity for a 30-day trial to see if it is for you. Upon signing up for your trial account, you will have the following options:

• Invite your clients to schedule appointments from Facebook
• You can tweet to your clients that they can now schedule appointments
• You can add a "Schedule Now" button to your website or blog for easy access. Code will be generated that you can add to the coding on within your HTML coding so that your clients can easily book appointments
• Not only can you invite your clients via Facebook to schedule on your website, you can actually add a "Schedule Now" tab within your Facebook page so that appointments can be booked within Facebook!
• You can add a great looking scheduling widget to your website and your clients can book online. Code will also be generated that you can cut and paste within the body section of your website.

You can select one or multiple options. They actually work very well together because if you have a Facebook account, you can invite your fans on Facebook to visit your website or blog and send them a link that will direct them to your "Schedule an Appointment" page.

If you use the scheduling widget on your website, when a client visits your website and goes to the scheduling page, they will see "Schedule Now." You set up the services and the duration of the services that clients can select when you set up the account. So if you are a web designer and conduct 30 minute phone consultations with your clients, they can make this selection. When the client clicks on the service they want to book, a calendar appears with available times. Once they select the date and time, they are taken to the "Book it Now" page.

On this page, the client will see the appointment they scheduled. But also, if you have any promotions or a cancellation policy, this is where it will appear. This is a great feature because so often, it can be difficult to be sure that everyone receives the same information. This way, you know that anyone who books an online appointment with you will be aware of any specials and your cancellation policy - if you have one.

Schedulity has added another great feature that really helps you with customer service. In order for the client to book an appointment, they must sign up for a free Schedulicity account where a username and email address is required. Some clients may want to know why and the brains at Schedulicity saw this in the tea leaves and answer that question. If the client hovers over "Why," they are given the three reasons needing a Schedulicity account:

1. To manage appointments in one place
2. To send appointments to your Outlook or Google Calendar (or Mac Mail for Mac users)
3. To rebook past appointments with a single click

That is really convenient for the client but it also good for your business because now you have a way of retaining email addresses so that you can add them to a newsletter distribution list - a great way to market your business. Of course, they will have the choice to opt in (you can also read the email marketing newsletter for more information).