Have you finally decided to make the change from your traditional paper or Excel scheduling sheets but don’t know where to start? I was in your shoes too. The best small business scheduling software for you depends on your specific business needs and requirements. Take a few minutes to go through this article and learn how to choose the right software for your business.
There are so many businesses and entrepreneurs who want to start a business. And some of them may think about using scheduling software before they actually do it. Scheduling software can be useful for different kinds of businesses. You just need to determine how you can use scheduling software in the best way and for the specific needs of your business or organization.
Calendly
We admit it—we’re a little bit biased. We think that Calendly is the best appointment scheduling software available. But we think that because we’ve invested our time and resources making it the convenient, fully-featured and easy-to-use software that today’s small businesses need.
How it works
Calendly takes on the manual work of scheduling for you so you can focus on collaboration instead. You can embed the scheduling tool on your website or integrate it with other apps, like GoToMeeting or Salesforce, so wherever you are, you can set up a meeting.
Once the invitee has chosen a meeting time, it automatically goes onto your calendar. You’ve already told the platform that you’re available then, so there’s no need for prolonged discussion.
Features
Calendly blends simplicity with flexibility. In your Calendly account, you can set preferences that make sure your calendar works the way you want it to. You can:
- Set a cap on the number of meetings a team member has per day
- Add a time buffer before and after events
- Show correct availability for invitees’ time zones
- Disable last-minute meetings and require scheduling to happen a certain amount of time in advance
Calendly also provides metrics on invitee engagement and scheduling activity so that you can schedule even more efficiently.
Who’s it for?
Calendly works for all sizes of teams and all meeting types, from one-on-ones to large seminars. Admins can set up team pages so that each team member sees the relevant event and invitee types on their screens, and everyone gets automated confirmation and reminder notifications.
Calendly is also ideal for companies that run a lot of videoconferencing or webinar events. Thanks to
integrations with Zoom, GoToMeeting and Join.me, you can add your virtual meeting details to your Calendly events and avoid people being late because they couldn’t find their login information.
Pricing
Calendly has
three pricing tiers:
- Basic: Free, one calendar per user
- Essentials: $8 per user per month, 2 calendars per user
- Professional: $12 per user per month, 6 calendars per user
With annual billing, you can save 20% off of these fees. A 14-day free trial is available with no credit card required, and you can always upgrade if you need more features.
Appointment
Like any good scheduling tool, Appointment lets customers set appointments 24 hours a day, seven days a week, based on your specified availability. Appointment also supports encrypted and secure transactions via SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) technology so you can take payments at the time of scheduling.
Features
Appointment’s features give admins plenty of control. You can choose which staff members can view or edit which calendar. You can manage appointment books across multiple locations or service types, with no worries about double-booking.
Additionally, Appointment provides easy access to data analytics that help you understand appointment trends, customer spending patterns, and so on.
Pricing
Appointment lets users choose a
monthly booking plan or a small business plan. The monthly booking plan has four levels, each with a per-month charge ($29 to $74 per month) and a maximum number of bookings per month (300 to 1,500).
Small business plans let you choose to subscribe per year or pay as you go. The pay-as-you-go option offers unlimited bookings for $0.20 per booking.
AppointEze
AppointEze is geared specifically to small organizations. It lets customers view available appointments in real-time and schedule or reschedule their appointments independently so you can focus on the task of providing service.
Features
AppointEze lets you embed its appointment scheduling tool into your website. You can create user-friendly online forms to include so your customers can schedule meetings almost anywhere they find you online. On your end, you can have your bookings synced to Google Calendar to avoid double-bookings, and you get automated reminders so you don’t miss a meeting.
AppointEze accepts payments online and lets you customize the checkout process. You can:
- Make retail items available in the order
- Accept tips
- Add coupon codes or vouchers
- Allow customers to choose from different pricing tiers or membership levels
In addition, AppointEze provides you with analytics to help you manage your leads and client relationships.
Pricing
AppointEze has three pricing tiers:
- Basic (Free)
- Economy ($49 per user per month)
- Premium ($99 per user per month)
If you subscribe per year, you get 12 months for the price of 10.
Appointy
Appointy has a user-friendly interface that lets your customers book appointments, visits and services 24 hours a day from anywhere. The software supports multiple staff members and locations, but these options are only available at higher pricing tiers.
Features
With Appointy, you have the freedom to customize your available slots: when they are, how long an appointment can be and even how many people can sign up for each one. This feature is particularly useful if you have state or local laws limiting event capacity.
It’s also possible to set up conditional availability, restricting sign-ups to slots of your choice. When those slots fill, Appointy will open more slots for sign-up.
You can embed Appointy’s scheduler into your company website or create a booking tab on your Facebook page. According to Appointy, adding the option to book through Facebook can get you
three times more appointments. You can market your service through Facebook, Twitter or email.
Pricing
Appointy has a free tier suitable for a service provider. There are also three paid plans available for providers who need more features or have multiple staff members. Plans range from $29.99 per month for growth companies to $99.99 per month for enterprises. Savings are available for annual subscribers.
Appointy offers a 14-day free trial for all new users. The free trial is fully featured and does not require a credit card.
HubSpot Sales Hub
Supercharge your sales process with Sales Hub, a powerful and easy-to-use sales CRM that includes sales engagement tools, configure-price-quote (CPQ) functionality, and robust sales analytics for growing teams. Sales Hub is built on the HubSpot CRM platform where customer data, tools, and teams come together to create a single source-of-truth for unprecedented sales rep efficiency. When using the full CRM platform, reps can get richer insights, warmer leads, and aligned enablement materials to help them operate at max efficiency. Plus, tap into our expansive ecosystem of app and solutions partners to craft an exceptional end-to-end customer experience. Whether it’s strategies, services, or software — HubSpot allows you to scale your company, not complexity. HubSpot has everything you need to grow better.
YouCanBook.me
Scheduling can be easy, customizable, scalable, connected AND secure. With YouCanBook.me, you get: Fast implementation – Be bookable in minutes. Customization – Personalized emails & SMS can send to anyone, at any time during the booking process – and booking pages can match your design and international language needs. Scalability – A booking system that works with teams large and small. Integrations – Directly connect Zoom and Gmail, take payments with Stripe, and use Zapier to connect to thousands of apps you already use. Security – A PEN tested and GDPR-ready booking system helps you stay compliant. Affordability – When you outgrow our forever-free plan, you can get all of our premium features for as low as $8/month (using our 24-month discount).
Thryv
Thryv is an end-to-end client experience platform built for small businesses. Software that helps you get the job, manage the job, get paid and get credit, all from a single screen. Helping small business owners meet today’s customer expectations, from one simple platform. Includes best-in-class support, available anytime – unlimited 24/7, with business specialists who understand the goals and unique needs of small business owners. Thryv automates tasks and puts customers at the center of your business, with one easy-to-use software, making it easy to reach more customers, stay organized, get paid faster and automatically generate reviews. Thryv makes it easy for customers to: • Find you online through ratings and reviews, social presence and accurate search results. • Interact easily and instantly, receive reminders, send texts and emails and schedule appointments. • Pay you effortlessly, receive receipts instantly, know it’s safe and secure and choose how to pay. • Stay engaged with automated messages that ask them back, stay in touch and request reviews. Thryv’s award-winning software is helping over 45,000 businesses transform how they do business and manage their customers.
Vendasta
Vendasta provides an end-to-end ecommerce platform to 60,000+ partners who sell digital products and services to more than 5.5 million small and medium businesses (SMBs) worldwide. These partners include marketing agencies, independent software vendors (ISVs), and media companies. The Vendasta Platform allows these groups to easily adopt new solutions from a marketplace of cloud-based technologies that they can sell under their own brand to their SMB customers. The platform provides AI-driven marketing automation, sales tools, and an integrated CRM to facilitate go-to-market. It also includes project, orders, and billing management systems to help scale through robotic process automation. SMBs are provided one login for all solutions purchased under a Vendasta customer’s brand. They enjoy a single integrated dashboard with prescription, context, and tracking. Using the Business App dashboard, SMBs are able to manage the information and solutions that make their businesses successful online.
Conclusion:
Running a business takes a lot of work. One area that may be easily forgotten is scheduling – ensuring that your staff have the appropriate shifts and days off to give them time to rest, as well as leaving room for growth. But with so many scheduling software options on the market, it can be difficult to decide which best suits your needs.