Looking to boost your service bookings? Check out these 10 powerful tactics for generating more service bookings and filling up your calendar. From optimizing your website to leveraging social media and referral marketing, we've got you covered. Start generating more service bookings today!
Sales reps make unlimited calls daily, hoping that one of their prospects will answer the phone. And when finally someone does, what do they say?
“I am busy at the moment.”
“Can you mail me all this information?” Or even worse,
“Is this a sales call?” Hang up!
You don’t even get the chance to pull out your well-prepared attention-grabbing content to get service bookings. We all have faced these inefficiencies in the process of generating more service bookings. Consequently, accelerating digital adoption has resulted in customers expecting innovative and personalized services. Due to the impact of the pandemic, even day-to-day tasks are now being switched to the online format increasing the demand for online appointment booking.
The global appointment scheduling market is forecast to grow $205.88 million from 2022 to 2027, accelerating at a rate of 9.24%. With such significant growth anticipated, staying on top of the latest updates in the online booking industry is crucial.
As the world started to open up appointments as a service it showed us that time is precious for everyone. Businesses find it increasingly challenging to attract and retain new clients with competition in almost every industry. Whether you’re trying to confirm a time or place, getting a prospect to commit to a meeting can be tricky. There’s always another deal, discount, or competitor offering something new to customers, increasing the competition in the online appointment scheduling industry.
How to Get Your Calendar Full
Of course, there’s no silver bullet to get your booking service business on top, but many organizations make obvious mistakes and easy wins can be grabbed at the right time. However, scheduling more meetings can be complex. There are three steps to follow to secure an appointment with a prospect.
Get their guard down, tell them why you’re calling, and end with a specific question to accomplish your purpose. Break the ice, humanize the connection, and keep it short. Avoid including your organization's history, and always give your prospects a choice of time for the meeting. Giving them options means they'll have to decide, which will likely lead to an appointment. Allowing your clients to book online will increase your sales, reduce no-shows, and increase customer lifetime value.
According to research conducted by GetApp in 2021, more than 50 percent of people prefer online appointment booking over other methods.
Let’s dive into a few tips and tricks to generate more service bookings.
Your Website Should Promote You 24/7
Creating a website for your business is one of the first steps to building an online presence and attracting more clients. The website should have crisp content and clear navigation. The design should be engaging to help you draw more conversions. In addition, there are other specific factors to remember for growing online service bookings through your website. While implementing all this, you should have certain aspects clear in mind for generating more service bookings:
- After redirecting clients to the website, there should be a clear call to action. A “Book Now” widget or sign up for a newsletter.
- The website should be device friendly.
- You must add your contact details so clients can contact you on the first visit.
- Add easily customizable booking forms to get some information about the visitors.
Make Sure Google Knows you Exist
Whether looking for foot or web traffic, Google is your ultimate weapon. By adding your business to Google, you can ensure that people find you right when looking for the products and services you offer. Make sure to be listed on Google My Business and add the link to your website so that users can set up direct online bookings. A Google Business profile can also help in improving your local SEO.
Use Social Media Platforms Effectively
Around 4.26 billion people are using social media worldwide, which is projected to increase to almost 6 billion by 2027. Which gives you a great way to connect with your prospective clients. Promote your business on your Facebook profile, showcase your Instagram posts, and encourage customers to share your business reviews - the good things! When generating more service bookings there are two main ways to grow your social media reach - grow your organic reach or start a marketing campaign. If you don't have enough time, consider hiring help to handle the booking service tasks.
Make It Easy For Customers to Schedule Appointments
It is common for organizations to focus on building great call lists. They invest a hefty sum in marketing strategies to warm up their leads. With Picktime, you never have to worry about huge investments or losses. It’s a free web-based appointment booking software tailored to every business need. Missed appointments, team management, recurring bookings, resources, payment & invoices, or equipment Picktime will handle everything. Users can book an appointment with a few clicks and will get automated SMS & email updates. It will ease the booking process for your clients and reduce the burden on your team members by handling administrative tasks. Use Picktime to get an enhanced booking experience with 24/7 chat support.
Email Marketing Still Works
The email marketing strategy still needs to budge. It’s the best marketing channel for increasing your sales and booking service. According to a study conducted in 2020, the average email open rate across all domains is 21.08%, with the average click-through rate being 2.78%. Which is a good number to help you reach a vast customer base. A few ideas for email campaigns to generate more service bookings
- Welcome email series
- Emails creating urgent offers
- Reminder emails
- Discounts and offer emails
- Regular newsletters
- Post-purchase plop
- The re-engagement campaigns
Offer Self Booking to Clients
The self-booking feature offers your clients 24/7 access with real-time slot availability and releases you from the necessity of back-and-forth calls and emails. Use Picktime to generate more service bookings for your business. Using Picktime, your customers can choose the most convenient date and time for a meeting at their leisure from multiple locations. Self-booking with Picktime and real-time slot availability reduces the risk of inconsistencies by keeping your calendar up to date. Also, its Round Robin booking distribution feature can help your business by distributing bookings evenly among all the employees. Ensuring every team member gets a fair number of bookings, reduces the risk of overbooking for one member.
A Follow-up to Prevent No-Shows
There needs to be a more balanced line between being assured with customers and coming across as too strong. But how do you ensure you’re not being too pushy or salesy?
The solution is to research customer behavior. Endless guides are available to help you learn how to follow up without pushing your customers’ button. Whether offering custom-branded freebies to sweeten the deal or sending more meeting requests, research what works best for you. On the other hand, sending follow-up and reminder emails encourages clients to return their next service booking.
Make it Easy to Pay Online
Whether an established enterprise or a startup, an online payment feature is essential for businesses provided by booking service tools. Multiple payment methods can help you reach a wider clientele and keep the customer experience running without hiccups. With the rise of the digital age, use Picktime, a simplified online appointment scheduling software, for simple and easy payment options. Using Picktime, you can integrate with any of your favorite business tools (PayPal/Stripe/Square). Regardless of your industry, you can offer secure and quick payments to your clients anytime and anywhere.
Loyalty Programs are Evergreen
It’s normal to fear seeing conglomerates like Amazon or Starbucks and believing that customer loyalty programs are far-reaching. To become a successful business, you must focus on creating a customer loyalty program that will help you reap great returns from your investments. Exclusive discount offers, offering subscriptions, deals, or free delivery are all tactics to lure customers into making a deal with your business.
Design Booking Forms for a Shorter Attention Span
Solving their queries is the best way to build customer trust and attract them to your business. With Picktime booking forms, you can get to know your customers in advance. You can smartly promote your offerings while generating more service bookings. And there will be no need to hire other help to gather that information, all you need to do is share the booking form link via SMS or email. Picktime booking forms allow users to enter digits, special characters, checkboxes, dates, and dropdowns.
Never try to sell your services overtly. Trying that can make you look pushy or desperate. And no one, no one likes that. As the famous dialogue goes from the movie Finding Nemo - “Just keep swimming!” It can help you get through a hard day and serve as a motto of every B2B organization out there. Building a successful business is hard-fought and short-lived. No matter how well-established you’re in the market, the only way to keep growing and prospering are by swimming.