Are you using online booking for your business? Nowadays, it is common to do almost anything online. In fact, you’re doing it now, and this convenience has become second nature and expected. You book your hair appointments online and make online reservations at restaurants, so utilizing a photography booking app for easy online booking for portrait sessions is almost expected by clients. It’s certainly much easier and gives you a way to grow your business. Clients prefer to book online because it is convenient and faster than having the back and forth emails about availability.
Check out some reasons why online booking can be a game changer for your business!
24/7 Access
Having business hours and setting boundaries with clients is important for your sanity, but we all know we get potential clients who inquire at all hours about booking. Sometimes you miss the opportunity to convert that client. They’re ready to book, but you don’t have a way for them to easily book you at their own convenience. Online booking gives you a way to give your clients access to book with you at any time, anywhere. Have you ever lost a potential booking because the client was ready to book and needed to book quickly but maybe you weren’t available when they called you to book? They end up moving on and booking with another photographer – all because that photographer had a way for them to book a session online. Booking calendars can be published to your website, social media, or incorpated into your lead page to automatically send your clients the link when they fill out your leads page form.
Easier Payments and Get Paid Faster
Online booking makes it easier for you to get paid faster. You can require your clients to pay a retainer or in full in order to secure a time with you – which means you don’t have to track them own for payment before/after the session when it has already been taken care of. Online booking allows your clients to easily pay through our integration with Square. Once they have paid, that money is sent to your bank in 1-2 business days. Collecting your retainer or payment up front will reduce the amount of no-shows and cancellations you have with clients.
Saves Time
This is definitely the biggest game changer for those that utilize online booking. Without an online booking system, you are likely making a post on social media or sending an email blast to your clients when you have mini sessions. You likely list the times and then have clients message you to book. This means you are getting inudated with messages – spending time to check and respond to each message, get invoices and contracts sent out, and updating your post or emails to clients to let them know what is still available.
All of that can be exhausting and consumes a lot of your time. Continuing this approach is one thing that leads to burn out – especially for newer photographers. Shifting to an online system is much simplier and less time consuming – giving you back time to other tasks. You just set up your calendar with contract and invoice, then add your available and get a booking link to share. Clients can access that link to view what times you have, book their session, sign their contract, and pay their invoice all without ever really needing to contact you.
And to maximize the amount of time saved – you can set up a workflow to kick off once they book which will automate sending your confirmation email, prep guides and questionnaires, reminders, and post session follow ups.
Through workflows, Iris has saved me HOURS of back-end work! Instead of having to send out personal invoices and contracts, I now just throw up my calendar link and that’s the last I have to do on the computer until it’s time to edit their photos! I book 200+ families a year, so you can imagine how many hours of computer work Iris saves me!
Tell us how online booking has changed your business!
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