PetGroomBossPro Blog — Online Booking & Quotes

Should Existing Clients Use the Booking Page? Repeat Customers, Requests and the Customer App

The booking page is built for new customers. It asks for every pet's name, breed and size, which makes sense for someone you have never met. For a client whose Golden Retriever you have groomed for three years, it is a lot of questions you already know the answers to. So where should existing clients go when they want another visit?

Different Doors for Different Customers

Monthly accounts, covered in Quoting Monthly Grooming Accounts: Senior Living, Daycare and Apartment Pet Days, have their own path through estimates and monthly billing. Regular household clients have their own paths too.

In PetGroomBossPro, a client can reach you in three main ways:

• A repeat schedule, where they never need to book at all.
• The customer app, where they can request service.
• The booking page, which works but is really designed for new customers.

The Best Answer: A Repeat Schedule

The easiest client is one who never has to ask. A client on a repeat schedule is booked on the same weekday, time and van every 4, 6 or 8 weeks, monthly or on custom days. Every visit is written up front and waits on Pending Jobs with its planned day, time and van until you confirm it.

They get reminders the night before, a text when they're next and a text when the groomer arrives, depending on their alert preferences. They do not need the booking page, a phone call or a text to get groomed. That is why turning first-time bookings into repeat clients matters so much; see Turning a First Online Booking Into a Repeat Grooming Client.

For Occasional Clients: Request Service in the Customer App

Some clients are not on a schedule. They want a groom before the holidays, or when the dog starts to look shaggy. For them, the customer app is the natural place to ask. Clients can request service from the app, as well as see invoices, pay, update their card, leave a tip on a paid invoice and set their alert preferences.

The advantage over the booking page is that you already have everything. The pets are saved on the job with breed, size, coat, rabies due date and cut notes, and the van notes for the house are saved too. When the request comes in, you just need to pick a time. The next visit fills in from the last one.

The customer app is also where clients see today's route on a live map on grooming day, something like “You're stop 12 of 20 — the groomer is 5 stops away.”

When the Booking Page Still Makes Sense for Clients

There are times an existing client using the booking page is perfectly fine:

• A new pet. They adopted a second dog and want to know the price for both.
• A new service. A bath & brush client wants to see what a full groom would cost.
• A friend or family member. They are booking for someone else at a different address.
• They just prefer it. Some people like seeing the price before they ask.

If an existing client books through the page, the request lands in Leads like any other. When you see it, recognize them, and add it to their existing record rather than creating a new client. One client can have many addresses, so a second home or a parent's house does not need a separate record.

A new pet is the case worth the most attention. When a regular client adds a second dog through the booking page, the request tells you the new pet's name, breed and size. Add that pet to the existing job at their home, so the next visit shows both dogs and the price covers both.

Avoiding Duplicate Records

The most common mess with existing clients and booking pages is the duplicate: the same customer ends up as two clients, each with half the history. Before booking a request from Leads, check whether the name, phone number or address already exists. It takes a moment and saves confusion about which record has the right pets and the right card.

The same goes for the sign-up form. If an existing client fills it in, check before using one-click convert.

Tell Clients Where to Go

Clients follow the path you show them. A few habits help:

• After the first visit, mention the customer app and what it does.
• When a one-time client asks for another groom, offer a repeat schedule.
• Keep the booking page link for new customers in your marketing, and point existing clients to the app in your text replies.

For the rest of the booking and quoting tools, visit the pet grooming booking software page.