If you own a website without a booking system, you schedule all of your appointments by a traditional method like phone calls, texting and paper calendar, you are wasting your time, your human resources and your effort. If your company is one of those appointment-based, you must know how important appointment scheduling affects your cash flow. 

There is an all-in-one solution called Appointment Scheduling Software which helps you take care of all of your booking requirements. Not only offering your customers anywhere and anytime auto-booking facilities, but it also helps promote customer loyalty, improve efficiency and increase income by plugging revenue leaks from absence. Almost all appointment scheduling software is flexibly built-in with easy cancellation, rescheduling, viewing and editing features, helping you to sync with business activities without ever having to miss out on a deal. 

And to make this thing clearer, we will show you some statistics about the appointment scheduling software market that help you have better insight about the value of the online booking and the benefits of using appointment scheduling software. Check out now.

  • According to Allied Market Research, the estimated growth rate of the appointment scheduling software will increase 13.1% through the year 2026, with its total market value reaching $546.31 million in 2016.
  • The United State continues to have the largest share of the total online booking market size while China and India are expected to overtake the US. 

Source: Financesonline

  • SaaS appointment scheduling software market size is highest due to increased demand for cloud-based scheduling appointment software solutions thanks to cheaper costs.

Now you know the overview of appointment scheduling software market and how important it is for your appointment-based company, but if you are looking for more information about what exactly appointment scheduling software is, the true benefits of using this software, tips on using this software for each type of business and what is the best appointment scheduling software for small business, let’s dive into this article now.

1. What Is Appointment Scheduling Software?

Appointment scheduling software is a total business solution that allows business professionals and organizations to enhance their business efficiency in booking and scheduling appointments.  It is also known as online scheduling software or appointment scheduling software, online booking.

With this software, it provides customers a portal to book appointments online and allows organizations to track and manage those appointments. 

This software allows businesses to schedule appointments, view calendars, customize schedules, cancel and edit scheduling with ease. Email and text reminders not only minimize absence and improve staff efficiency, but also shorten the time of manually confirming appointments. A recent online booking study shows that appointment scheduling software has proven to be highly beneficial to organizations, helping them to boost operation efficiency and customer loyalty. They are also minimizing no-shows which are considered to be the cause of revenue loss for some sectors. According to Phorest, 46% of bookings could be lost if spas and salons don’t provide online booking or booking apps. 32% of salon and spa owners say that online booking is the most important feature of a salon’s appointment website. 

That's why Appointment Scheduling Software is an indispensable software for any appointment-based business. So, what types of industries will be suitable for these tools? These tools are used by a wide range of business segments, such as:

  • Salon & Beauty 
  • Health & Wellness
  • Medicine & Clinics
  • Education & Class,
  • Fitness & Gyms, 
  • Governmental Organizations
  • Professional Services
  • Fitness And Recreation
  • Training Institutes

2. Standout Functionality Of Appointment Scheduling Software

Online booking

Let’s think about how much time you and your staff spend time sending emails and taking bookings over the phone. You are wasting your time. If you want to create an appointment scheduler website, you need an online booking system.

Now, with an online booking feature, your customers have the ability to book appointments online in real-time. They no longer have to make inquiries and wait for your response to book appointments. Instead, they can see all the available dates directly without any hassle and make a booking easily. If there is no availability on one date, this will be blocked to prevent further bookings, and it’s all automation.

Besides, with online booking features, your customers can book appointments anywhere and anytime they want. According to research from Phorest, 25% of bookings were made in the evening after salons close, 18% of bookings were made during the early morning before salons open, and 54% of bookings are made during working hours. Therefore, if you don’t have an online booking feature in the appointment scheduler for website, you are cutting your cash flow.

Real-time Automated Scheduling

Real-time automated scheduling is absolutely one of the indispensable features of appointment booking for websites. Real-time automation is where cloud-based appointment scheduling software works. When making an appointment request, the system can automatically confirm or deny it immediately, depending on its availability. Real-time automated scheduling enables staff to make appointments and schedule follow-ups without worrying about overbooking. 

Calendar management

Calendar management allows you to create appointments/meetings on your calendar and share them seamlessly with employees in multiple locations

Automatic reminders

With automatic reminders, confirmation emails and texts are sent automatically once an appointment is confirmed. This reminds customers of the appointment and helps decrease the rate of no-shows. Also, they can make changes and cancellations if they want. When any changes are made, notifications are sent instantly.

Customer scheduling

Provide clients with a calendar of professionals so that they can schedule an appointment

Staff scheduling

Help business owners keep track of employees' calendars in real-time

Online payment acceptance

Of course, online payment is a must-have feature if you care about customer experience. Nowadays, customers are accustomed to receiving instant confirmation for their purchases. Besides, being able to accept payments through these means will positively impact your profits. In some cases, the customer pays in advance for appointments or is charged when the customer cancels the appointment. If either of these applies to your business, it will greatly reduce no-show.

Promotions and deal management

By using appointment scheduling software, it allows users to create promotions and deals that can be applied for a specified period of time on an employee's calendar to encourage reservations.

3. Benefits Of Appointment Scheduling Management Software

Appointment Scheduling Management Software has many benefits for your business. And your business can benefit tremendously from having the right appointment scheduling solution. Let’s check out:

Reducing no-shows.

If your business had a high no-show rate, you would face loss of productivity, and they also represent a lot of wasted time and effort. Instead of spending precious time waiting on a customer that never shows up, it would be better spent on a customer that does turn up. So, get an appointment system online that sends automatic confirmation and reminders to clients. Nowadays, appointment scheduling solutions can track upcoming appointments and automatically send emails or text messages to customers about their appointment, so the customer can easily confirm appointments through their smartphone or laptop, thus reducing missed appointments. Furthermore, in a study on the effectiveness of SMS appointment reminders, they show that no-shows decreased by 39% when facilities sent out text reminders.

Improving staff efficiency

If your business is often extremely busy, your staff will inevitably be overwhelmed by scheduling client appointments. It's probably that there are double appointments for a client and the other customer’s appointment will be lost. It leads to bad customer experience and reduced business performance. However, by using appointment scheduling software, it allows you to automate tasks like record customer details, add appointments to your calendar, and send reminders so your staff is much less likely to have to deal with manual tasks. It delivers a better customer experience and minimizes human errors.

Driving revenue

If you free your employees from these boring appointment scheduling tasks, your employees will have time to focus on other tasks that are more efficient and generate more revenue. Besides, automatic appointment reminders and tracking also help reduce the no-show rate, thereby increasing the number of completed appointments, helping to drive revenue.

Attract and retain clients

With appointment scheduling software, it enables users to easily schedule appointments. The easier it is for a client to schedule an appointment with you, the better experience they are likely to have. With the 24/7 appointment schedule online feature, your customers do not have to abide by normal business hours to make an appointment, they can book appointments anytime and anywhere they want.

Prepayment and Refunds For Online Bookings

One of the huge benefits of appointment scheduling software is the prepayment and refunds feature. It allows your appointments to be paid in advance or receive a deposit so you don’t have to worry about a client's absence.

4. Who To Use Appointment Scheduling Management Software?

Who to use Appointment Scheduling Management Software? It depends on the size of your business.

Individual professionals

For individual professionals, their earnings depend on the number of appointments they are able to manage efficiently. So, for these people, providing a smooth online booking interface and allowing web-based appointment scheduling is crucial. 

Small and midsize businesses

Small and medium businesses are businesses operating with up to 100 employees. It’s important for these businesses that they can utilize their labor force to do essential tasks and Free them up from time-consuming tasks by using appointment scheduling software. Your staff no need to schedule, call and remind customers' appointments manually because this idea solution will have everything you need. 

Large enterprises

For large enterprise businesses, automating scheduling appointments is not enough, they focus on how they can interact proactively with customers and how to maintain retention rate. So, this type of business may need a complete solution such as an integrated online payment interface, helping you ensure your appointments are paid in advance or receiving a deposit and allowing customers to pay for the bookings without leaving the website. Click here for more important features of a complete appointment scheduling software.

5. 5 Best Appointment Scheduling Software Reviews

5.1 Appointlet

Appointlet is a cloud-based appointment scheduling solution that helps organizations connect with their prospects through email, landing page and sales funnel. 

This software allows businesses to customize their emails with their logo and colors, which automatically sends confirmations and reminders to customers to reduce no-shows. Besides, you have complete control of your schedule. Users can personalize their appointment schedule by setting the available hours and days. These features also let you set breaks between bookings, prevent last-minute appointments, approve meeting requests, etc.

Besides, Appointlet seamlessly integrates with various third-party sources such as Google Calendar and Office 365 Calendar that make sure you have never double-booked. In addition, this software accepts payment from your customer using Stripe.

Key features of this software:

  • Seamless Calendar Sync
  • Integration Throughout the Sales Funnel
  • Create Workflows With Your Other Tools
  • Works on Any Device
  • Robust Timezone Support
  • Supports Your Entire Team
  • Reminders & Confirmations
  • Take Control of Your Schedule
  • Collect Payments

Pricing: $8 a month per member

5.2 GigaBook

GigaBook is a completely-service appointment scheduling software that is flexible and scalable for almost all types of businesses, from small to large size enterprises. 

Make it simple to connect with more prospects by using an online booking page. Easily list your available hours and days of your services or meetings online and accept appointments 24/7. Keep your customers up-to-date with automatic appointment reminders and get real-time updates on any type of your devices and browsers. 

Moreover, understanding how to use this tool by using video tutorials documentation.  

Having said that, GigaBook will help boost your business to the next level thanks to its powerful features. Let’s check out some of the powerful features on the list below.

Key features:

  • Appointment Scheduling
  • Business Dashboard
  • Payments, Invoicing And Deposits
  • Open API
  • Client Management
  • Automated Reminders
  • Free Booking Page
  • Third-Party Calendar Sync
  • Dynamic Pricing
  • SMS Notifications
  • Video Tutorials

Pricing: Starting at $12 per month. There is also a 14-day free trial available.

5.3 ScheduleOnce

ScheduleOnce is another cloud-based appointment scheduling solution that helps businesses to schedule and manage online interactions with their customers. This appointment scheduling software helps eliminate communication barriers between business owners and their customers. They can contact each other by using Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, GoToMeeting and Skype. 

Easily to create a premium customer experience with advanced branding and customization options. Connect with PayPal to charge meetings or cancel meetings for your clients. Save time with automated invoices, refund policies, and more.

Moreover, ScheduleOnce integrates with a third party such as Salesforce, Infusionsoft, GoToMeeting, WebEx, Paypal and more. This tool also provides users APIs for website integration. With all these in mind, it can be said that This software creates the most convenient for customers to use by integrating the most needed features into one solution package.

Key features:

  • Booking pages
  • Meeting types
  • Time management
  • Workload rules
  • Cancellations and rescheduling
  • Meeting notifications
  • Meeting approvals
  • Meeting reports

Pricing: $9/month per user license

5.4 SimplyBook.me

SimpleBook.me is one of the best appointment scheduling software designed for appointment-based businesses in multiple industries such as salons and spas, health & wellness, fitness, etc. 

It provides a booking website where users can accept online bookings, and send emails and appointment reminder messages to both service providers and customers, helping to deliver a great customer experience and drive revenue.

This appointment scheduling software also gives users the ability to send out promotions, set up recurring services and allows users to customize options for the appointment booking site. Users can add the booking system as an iFrame or add a booking button to a website or Facebook page.

This tool is also optimized for different devices so users can make an appointment wherever they want. Besides, accepting payments and deposits through a wide range of payment processors such as PayPal and Stripe is also an indispensable feature for appointment scheduling software. For more information about these features, let’s access the DEMO

Key features: 

  • Accept online bookings
  • Notifications via SMS/Email
  • Client & Admin App
  • Accept Payments
  • Integration & API
  • Custom features

5.5 Appointer

Appointer is high-rated as one of the best appointment scheduling software which is suitable for a variety of business sizes and industries.

Types of businesses will love appointment scheduling software

Appointer is suitable for appointment-based businesses such as training and tutoring centers, coaching and consulting, video and photography companies, gyms, beauty salons and spa centers, and other services.

This scheduling booking solution allows businesses to manage their booking routines, record and track sales, manage staff, payments, strengthen customer relationships, and retain them for a lifetime.

Once installed Appointer, this software enables you to receive unlimited bookings directly delivered to your inbox. Besides, the administrators can add holidays so the customers looking for appointments can schedule appointments for working/business days. WP Appointment Booking Pro will support your business when you expand to multiple business locations. 

Besides, there are no more missed appointments thanks to the SMS and email notifications. SMS and email notifications will be sent automatically to the customer when new appointments are created, rescheduled, canceled, or the status of the appointment is changed. Appointer supports 2 of the popular gateway including SMTP and WP mail gateways.

Furthermore, Appointer comes with different types of integrated payment methods like Paypal and Stripe, making sure you will receive a deposit or are paid in advance that helps reduce no-shows and drive more revenue.

To find more information about this software’ features, let’s visit DEMO here or check out some of the outstanding features below.

Key features:

  • Unlimited number of staff
  • Unlimited services and clients
  • Set prices for different services
  • Recurring appointments
  • Add to Google Calendar” buttons for your customers.
  • Customizable emails sent to you and your customers.
  • Google Calendar API
  • Online Payment – Paypal integrated
  • Appointment Feedback’s
  • Email notifications

Pricing: $39

In Conclusion

The business world is characterized by the constant flow of events and the scheduling of appointments. This is an indispensable activity for any business. So, having an appointment scheduling software is a must-have for any appointment-based business. Appointment scheduling software is like a digital secretary that has improved business efficiency. After reading this post, now you know more detailed information about this software. However, what is the best software for your business? 

Appointer by Netbase team is trusted by many companies from worldwide regardless of size or industry. Thanks to unrivaled features that you can see at this demo, it helps your business operate more efficiently, saves time and effort, and focuses on the core values of the business. Get started today and see whether Appointer is the best appointment scheduling software for your business.

If you have any questions when choosing the best appointment scheduling software and need further consultancy, don't hesitate to contact us or leave comments in the section below and our support team will reply to you within 24 hours.

Thank you for reading.