How to Create and Manage Appointment Booking

CreamSoda's Appointment Booking functionality allows visitors to schedule meetings  seamlessly with you while offering robust customization options. Below, we explain how to create, manage, and optimize appointment booking types, ensuring a smooth experience for you and your clients.

CreamSoda's appointment booking functionality requires three components to be set up:

1. Your time zone.
2. An appointment booking type, where you specify your availability.
3. A Lead Form that a visitor will fill out to complete the appointment booking process.

Creating an Appointment Booking Type

1. Navigate to the left menu bar and select More Options.
2. Scroll down to Appointment Booking and click on Manage Appointment Booking.
3. Click Create Appointment Booking Type to get started.

Key Fields to Configure:

• Active: Activate or deactivate the appointment booking type.
• User: Assign the person with whom the appointment will be scheduled.
• Calendar: Select between CreamSoda's native calendar or an external calendar (Google Workspace or Microsoft). Ensure you sync your external account with CreamSoda first.
• Location: Choose from:
1. Web Conference – If you have selected an external calendar in the Calendar field, then the default options available to you are Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, or Skype, based on your external account’s configuration. Alternatively, paste a custom meeting link from any service in the Location Details field to override this functionality or to use with CreamSoda’s native calendar.
2. Phone – Specify a contact number in the Location Details field.
3. In Person – Provide a physical address in the Location Details field.
• Contact to Book: Enable this to show availability but require the invitee to contact you to book a meeting. Once enabled, type in your custom instruction to contact you in the Message field.
• Event Name: Define a clear name for the appointment type.
• URL: Create a unique, memorable URL for the booking page. This URL can be shared to book appointments.

Additional Customization:

• Design: Opt for a Condensed Design to hide detailed information, like your bio.
• Branding Colors: Set primary and secondary colors to match your company's branding.
• Duration: Define the appointment duration in minutes.
• Event Color: Choose a color that will be assigned to any event created from this appointment booking page for easy categorization.

Notifications and Reminders

• Configure First Email Reminder and Second Email Reminder to notify invitees of upcoming meetings. These can be disabled if preferred by choosing ‘No Reminder’.

Availability Settings

Efficiently manage your scheduling preferences with these flexible options:

• Daily Availability: Define specific time ranges for each day of the week when you're open to appointments. For example, you might set Monday to Friday, 9 AM to 5 PM.
• Availability Intervals: Control when meetings can start within your availability window. For instance, you can allow new meetings to start every 15, 30, or 60 minutes, depending on your preference.
• Padding Time: Add buffer periods before or after meetings to allow time for preparation or follow-ups. CreamSoda will automatically block this time and create tasks for you to ensure you stay organized and stress-free.
• Minimum Notice Period: Specify how much advance notice is required for booking. For example, set a 24-hour notice to avoid same-day bookings.
• Future Booking Window: Limit how far into the future appointments can be scheduled. For instance, you might only accept bookings up to 30 days in advance.

Lead Form Integration

After creating an appointment booking type, CreamSoda prompts you to create a Lead Form. This allows you to:

1. Collect invitee details (e.g., name, email).
2. Gather payments.
3. Obtain consent for communications or marketing.
4. Ask custom questions or gather data via custom fields.

Managing Appointment Booking Types

Follow these steps to efficiently manage your appointment booking types:

1. Copy Link:
• From the left menu bar, click on More Options.
• Scroll down to Appointment Booking section.
• Click on Manage Appointment Booking to navigate to the Appointment Booking section.
• Locate the appointment booking type you wish to share.
• Click on the Copy Link button to generate a shareable URL.
• Use this URL to allow clients to access your booking page directly.
2. Edit Booking Type:
• From the left menu bar, click on More Options.
• Scroll down to Appointment Booking section.
• Click on Manage Appointment Booking
• Identify the booking type you wish to modify.
• Click Edit to open the customization page.
• Make the necessary changes, such as updating the event name, URL, or availability settings.
• Save the changes to ensure your updates are reflected immediately.
3. Delete Booking Type:
• In order to delete a Booking Type, you have to delete:
1. Appointment Booking Type
2. The associated Lead Form
• First, choose More Options from the left menu bar.
• Navigate to the Appointment Booking section and click on Manage Appointment Booking.
• Scroll down to the Appointment Booking type you want to delete.
• Note the Lead Form associated with the Appointment Booking Type.
• Click on the Delete button.
• Confirm the action when prompted to remove the booking type from your system.
• You have now successfully deleted the Appointment Booking Type. However, the complete the deletion process, you will have to delete the associated Lead Form.
• To achieve this, click on More Options from the left menu bar.
• Scroll down to the Lead Forms section.
• Click on Manage Lead Forms.
• Choose the Lead Form that you want to delete.
• Click on the Delete button and confirm your selection to remove the desired Lead Form.
• Select the booking type and click Delete.