How to automate telephone bookings of your business

Pick it up, point it, confirm it. Each booking comes through the phone passes these three hands —someone on your team— and the system works well... until you stop doing it. Until the volume grows, match three calls at once, or the person who managed pound just the weekend with more movement.

There is where comes the idea of automating the telephone bookings. And it is worth to clarify from the beginning, because of misunderstanding: no means to remove the phone or push the client to reserve for a website. It means that a IA answer the callto understand what is asked for and leave the reservation is made, without which all rely on someone free in that moment.

In this guide you will see what means of truth to automate them, why, the manual method is little sooner than you think, and the concrete steps to do so well, with errors that make you go wrong.

What it means to automate the reservations made by phone (and what not)

Automate is not to put a voice mail with numbered options. That "press 1 for reservations, press 2 to schedule" is an IVR classic, and most of the people hates: it is hard, slow, and doesn't solve anything out of the script.

It is also not divert the call to another number, or replace the phone for a form on your web site. A form serves to those who are already sailing; the phone uses it who wants to solve already, talking. Automate the reservations made by phone is to cover precisely that channel: an AI conversational answering the phone, maintaining a natural dialogue and manages the booking from beginning to end, leading to a person only when needed.

Why the manual method falls short

The problem of the "already we take us," it is not that it doesn't work, is that it has a cost which you don't see reflected in any part:

• Calls which are lost. In rush hour, with everyone busy, the phone rings in vain. Each one of those calls could be a reserve.
• Errors to the point. A misspelled name, a changed time, the number of guests does not match. Small flaws that are paid at the door.
• Double bookings. When two people deal with the same agenda, without looking at it in real time, it is a matter of time that two clients book the same hole.
• Time of the computer. Each call that is interrupted by another task. Together, they are hours per month.
• Zero data. Without registration, you don't know how many calls you receive, how many you lose or what time. You can't improve what you don't measure.

And it is not a detail operating less: how to manage the calls of the customers have a direct economic impact and measurable in any business that depends on the phone to engage with customers.

How to automate the reservations made by phone, step-by-step

To do this well is not a "plug a IA and now." These are the steps that mark the difference between an automation that helps and that generates new problems:

• 1. You Decide what stocks to automate (and what not). The standard —date, time, number of people— they are perfect for the AI. The complex or special conditions, a better person. Start dimensioning.
• 2. Choose the appropriate technology. An IVR is rigid; a form does not cover the phone. For the voice channel, its agent, conversational AI is the only thing that keeps a real conversation and you close the book without friction.
• 3. Connect it to your calendar or booking system. This is the step that almost everyone underestimates and which prevents double bookings. If the AI does not see your real-time availability, you're not automating it: you are creating another site where to point things.
• 4. Defines and limits the transfer to a person. What situations are derived, how, and to whom. Well done, the customer is never left in a cul-de-sac: or solves the AI, or pass it on to someone of your team.
• 5. Closes the circle with confirmations and reminders. Once the reservation is made, a message by SMS or WhatsApp confirms and remember. Is the lever simpler to reduce absences.
• 6. Measures and fits. How many bookings closes alone, how many stems, at which point it gets stuck. With these data afinas the system in weeks, not months.

The errors that make you go wrong

Most of the automations that disappoint fail for the same. If you avoid these five, you're half way done:

• Automate everything without output-to-person. There always has to be a way to speak to someone. The AI solves the common, not exceptional.
• Do not connect the agenda. The error is more expensive: without the real-time availability, get the double reservations and distrust.
• To comply with a robotic voice. If this sounds like a menu automatically before the customer hangs up. The natural is not a fad, it is what makes it work.
• Launch and forget. Without measure, or adjust, the system is half. The first few weeks are tuning.
• Copy the flow of another business. What serves a barber is not a workshop. The script adapts to your operations, not the other way around.

Frequently asked questions

How to automate the reservations made by phone is the same as an IVR or voice mail?

No. An IVR offers options numbered and closed-ended questions. An AI conversational maintains a real dialogue, understands what it calls the client with their words and manages the entire reservation. The experience has nothing to do with it.

Do I have to change my number or my booking system?

No. Integrates with your current line by forwarding of calls and connects to your calendar or booking software existing. Your customers are still calling the number provided.

What if the client asks for something that the AI can't solve?

Is derived. Before a request is complex or out-of-plan, the call goes to a person on the team or to take a message. The customer is never left without an answer.

Does it work for any type of business?

Yes. Any business that receives bookings or appointments by phone —restaurants, clinics, hotels, workshops, centers of aesthetics— you can automate that channel. What changes is the script and the limits, which are adapted to each case.

How long does it take to get started?

This mainly depends on the integration with your schedule and how many responses you want to tune, which is where the bulk of the work. It is best to review your case to give you a realistic time frame.

Where to start

Needless to automate it all of a sudden. In fact, it is best not to do so. It starts at the point that you hurt: the calls that you lose in the rush hour, or the ones that come when you have already closed. Automates that stretch, connect it to your calendar and look at the numbers for a couple of weeks. From there, go large, with a criterion.

Because in the end, to automate the reservations made by phone are not going to replace anyone. Will that any reserve depends on the phone getting caught by anyone with a free hand.