This was not a phone call with my PA, but it’s a bot conversing and scheduling an appointment for me. It checked my availability from the google calendar and informed me of the slot and then verified with the salon professional’s availability in the same slot. Confirmation was received once the appointment was booked. This all happened just over WhatsApp! In the meantime, what all I achieved was, I didn’t place any call or wait in any queue to get the reservation done at the salon. I didn’t bargain for a time slot. I booked the appointment at 11 pm. Two-way conversation, one human.
Who needs an appointment management system?????
Be it a marketer, or a medical professional, especially if you are a doctor, owing to any spa and salon or running a restaurant, this probably applies to you. Especially if you work in the medical field or practice it, then it DEFINITELY applies to you. Basically, whether you are scheduling appointments, visits, or meetings, you need it. Starting from booking your slot in a cult session, scheduling meetings or visiting a clinic for a check-up, an appointment management system in place makes a win-win situation for both the users and the organization. How convenient and cost-effective it is to get it done at the same cost as an application or website, but with no challenges of the same. One chatbot and you are already in touch with your client. Do you want your patients to switch their healthcare providers? ????????♀️
In a study by Cogsworth, the statistics say that online appointment scheduling is most preferred by users between 25 to 34 years old. Plus, there’s the fact that your competitors are probably already offering online appointment scheduling ????
Why does any business need it now?
Covid-19 has been the impetus to rapid digitization, changing consumer behaviours worldwide. To make operations smoother, faster and easier for employees, these mundane tasks of appointment management should be handled by a program. To manage the customer flow, and meet the expectations, try considering an intelligent online appointment scheduling system. Intelligent scheduling is one way of demonstrating how your brand is keeping its safety for customers a priority. And as customer preferences have shifted quickly, it’s a way to get insight into what your customer wants and needs before they even enter the store.
Not to forget, in the last few months, the workforce on a global level or be it the ones in retail has faced its own share of challenges. Giving employees more visibility into who they are meeting with & when helps a workforce in the transition to be best positioned to welcome the customers. Since you have reached till here, you would be interested in knowing how you can control and hold off the leaks also known as ‘No shows’?
Following are the most common reasons customers miss their bookings:
The customers simply forget about the booking they made. Majorly, forget to communicate the change in their plan for the booking date and fail to cancel it. The other possibilities are double bookings or a family emergency. We can cater to all these issues with the help of reminders!
Why am I stressing about no-shows?
Because a missed appointment is equal to all costs and no revenue for the business. How? Because a service professional is available but sitting idle. The strategies like queuing or overbooking for coping, mean that companies can’t efficiently allocate resources and no-shows hold companies and businesses from engaging with the customer, which is easier during an appointment. And finally, they can push other customers on a long waitlist because of the scarce available time.
Here are 7 reasons you should know about the benefits of having an appointment management system:
- 24/7, no queue and no waiting for longer on the calls
- Cost-effective
- Synchronized with Google Calendar
- Instant confirmation
- Eliminates multiple exchanges of human conversation with a hybrid of human-like conversation and the backend
- It will also help in addressing employees’ safety and crowd control concerns.
- Cloud-based storage of clinical history
An appointment manager can address the following pain-points
- Save your time for more important tasks.
- One-stop-shop: Manage all your appointment services online.
- Automate the repetitive tasks.
- Instant feedback mechanism
- It Reduces No-Shows
Booking appointments with NLP conversations
Appointment management:
Locating nearby stores/branches
In summary: Without any disagreement, ‘no shows’ are definitely harmful in any scenario, be it pandemic or no pandemic. With some basic fixes like having automated reminders, educating dear customers about the damages of missing an appointment or last-minute cancellations, and Optimizing the number of steps for scheduling an appointment businesses can. So, why not book like a boss?
