Best Online Booking Platforms for Small Businesses

If you’re looking for an online booking system for your small business, discover the best platform for you with our guide. Learn more with Groupon Merchant.
Photo of a receptionist accepting bookings with a booking tool.

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Physical booking systems are a thing of the past. Meaning now is the time to explore the benefits of switching to an online booking system for small businesses.

If you run a small business in a service-oriented capacity, booking and managing appointments or reservations on a daily basis can feel like an arduous task for everyone involved. Throw out those spreadsheets for a booking platform that saves your business from missed opportunities, phone fatigue, or scheduling blunders.

Here at Groupon, we’ve partnered with some of the best online booking platforms for restaurants, salons, and other types of small businesses. Take a modern approach and start exploring the benefits of a streamlined and accessible booking system.

What is an Online Booking System?

Essentially, an online booking system is a one-stop shop for booking and managing all your business appointments and reservations. It can be accessed by both business employees and customers to create a seamless line of communication and get people through your doors as efficiently as possible.

What Does a Small Business Online Appointment Scheduler Do?

An online booking system for small businesses enables customers to book and pay for their appointments via a third-party platform connected to your website. It also allows you to manage these appointments and payments, as well as store customer and staff information. 

Overall, an effective booking system solution doesn’t just manage bookings, it’s an essential tool that helps you manage your business processes, all in one place.

Who Needs an Online Business Booking System?

An online booking system is best for a small business that operates in a customer-focused service capacity, for example, restaurants, hairdressers and salons, and ticketed events. If you provide any kind of service to customers that requires a bookable appointment, you’ll likely need an effective online booking platform to manage these.

From haircuts to manicures, and street tours to afternoon tea, your customers need an accessible and seamless platform where they know their booking (and money) is in safe hands.

The Best Online Booking Systems for Small Businesses

Whatever your business type, different online booking platforms work best for certain industries, so it’s worth doing your research beforehand. Whether you need a change or to start fresh, read our booking tool guide to find the best fit for your business.

Tours, activities, and ticketing

Ventrata

Ventrata is a versatile all-in-one platform for a variety of high-volume event types. Provide your customers with the freedom to book, pay, manage, and check-in, while you effectively keep track of ticket sales, profits, and customer data.

While their online platform is an amazing fit for online businesses, such as ticket retailers, Ventrata also offers a number of mobile devices equipped with their software. This allows you to sell directly to customers in person, whether you’re store-based or a mobile vendor.

Ventrata’s offerings include:

  • Online POS platform
  • Handheld, desktop, and kiosk POS devices
  • Ticket tracking and delivery
  • Sales, target, and business goals tracking.

Roller

One of the best online business booking systems for attractions, Roller prides itself on being an accessible and customer-friendly platform that allows people to book and pay for tickets online without any hitches. You can also keep track of all your Groupon sales via their platform, as well as reach into our expansive user base, which consists of more than 24 million active users,1 to attract a wealth of new customers.  

Roller is all about making things easy, automatic, and growth-friendly, no matter your industry. Whether you run an amusement park, museum, or zoo, manage ticket numbers and sales on one of the most business-friendly platforms out there.

Some of their key platform features include:

  • Ticketing and table management
  • An inclusive POS system
  • Mobile check-in
  • Reports and analytics
  • Staff and stock management software.

Xola

Grow your customer capacity with Xola, an exciting Groupon platform partner that allows you to push your experiences further than ever before. Whether you’re sending people down a zipline, across the ocean on a sailing tour, or for an interactive museum adventure, Xola is one of the best online booking platforms for businesses of all sizes.

Xola is one of the most flexible tools out there, whether you’re looking to grow your business online, manage sales, or keep track of important data, they have everything you need. 

Take a look at some of Xola’s features:

  • Online and phone booking tools
  • Extensive POS and scheduling system
  • Variety of marketing resources – including coupons, deal integration, and drip campaigns for abandoned bookings
  • Resource management tools.

Find out more about the other booking platforms for tours, activities and ticketing we’ve partnered with.

Beauty and wellness

Booksy

Booksy is one of our recommended partner platforms for beauty and wellness businesses who are looking to implement an easy booking and POS tool. They’re passionate about empowering small companies to be their best and keep operations running in all circumstances. With this in mind, they offer online, tablet, and mobile solutions so you can take bookings and payments wherever you’re based.

With over 13 million users,2 Booksy is one of the best online booking platforms if you’re looking to expand and retain your customer base with easy-to-navigate and business-owner friendly software.

Some examples of what Booksy offers include:

  • Online POS system
  • Tablet and mobile in-person sales devices
  • Calendar and appointment scheduling tools
  • Business management solutions – including payment, staff, and stock management systems
  • Marketing tools – such as social post creation and client invites.

Booker

Grow and scale a salon or spa enterprise with Booker, the professional-grade online business scheduling and booking system for companies looking to manage everything from booking to payment. Provide your staff with everything they need to run the business in a single, readily-accessible platform, helping them to easily keep track of every step of the sales process while seamlessly tracking inventory.

Attract new customers and make it easy for them to find you by advertising open appointments with major network partners like Bing, Yahoo, or BeautyNow by Groupon. Booker also provides seamless integration with your existing website so customers can book appointments and schedule services via a platform they are already familiar with.

Booker also includes:

  • A variety of sales options – including POS, eCommerce, and gift cards
  • Accessible appointment scheduling tools
  • Easy-to-access staff and customer data reports
  • Exclusive industry research and insights
  • Desktop and app-based platforms – so you can manage your business wherever you are.

Mindbody

Focused on bringing your fitness and beauty experiences to the people that need them most, MindBody is a wellness-oriented POS and online business booking platform. Whether you’re a yoga instructor, a Pilates master, or a bootcamp boss, this platform is the perfect place to organize, market, and manage your appointments.

The MindBody reach stretches across the US and is empowered by a passion to ‘connect the world to wellness’ and to build community across the industry. Whether that’s through marketing your online deals, acquiring funding to boost your business further, or simply keeping track of some of the 3.7m monthly classes3 booked on their platform, every little helps on this sleek all-in-one system.

MindBody offers:

  • Online and app-based business management systems
  • Training and support for companies and staff
  • Custom and automated marketing tools – including Google SEO, deals, and social post creation
  • An extensive online community where experts and businesses can connect and collaborate.

Payments and financial services

Square

From an extensive POS system to web design tools and innovative appointment platforms – Square really does have it all. Capable of managing staff, stock, and bookings all in one place, Square is a great fit for businesses of all kinds, but is especially adept at handling payments and finances.

From processing payments and payroll to business loans and banking accounts, Square allows you to run your business with confidence that your money is taken care of. Overall, this is a great all-round online booking and management system for a small business.

Here are just a few of Square’s features:

  • Square Appointments allows you to schedule bookings with ease
  • Extensive POS system helps you manage staff, stock, and customer data all in one place
  • Physical handheld and till point terminals mean you can sell in person
  • Payroll and banking solutions
  • Marketing and social tools.

For restaurants

OpenTable

For the discerning restaurateur, it’s easier than ever to prevent long waiting periods and the loss of diners to competitors with OpenTable. Give customers the option to reserve tables in advance and eliminate the need to take reservations manually. The app takes care of every detail, including booking modifications in the event of customers changing plans.

This online business booking system is renowned for bringing small eateries into the light, supporting over 50,000 worldwide businesses.4 It allows you to promote your business with deals and offers, as well as making it as easy as possible to get customers through your doors.

Some OpenTable features include:

  • Accessible booking and table management system
  • Marketing tools – including bonus schemes and deals
  • Industry expert advice
  • Analytics and reports – accessible online and via their app
  • Staff and front-of-house management system.

For all business types

You Can Book Me

Instantly control availability with You Can Book Me. Design and customize your booking page and seamlessly integrate it with existing time management and scheduling calendars like Google and Microsoft. This brilliant online business booking system also allows you to set up padding between appointments, adjust appointment duration and send automated notifications to reduce no-shows.

This platform is focused on ensuring everyone is on the same page when it comes to time with automatic time zone detection. Their platform is created so the entire team can get involved in everyday business processes so, as a business owner, you have more time to manage your company and keep things moving.

You Can Book Me offers:

  • An interactive calendar that allows customers to book straight in
  • Helpful notifications and reminders to reduce no-shows
  • Whole-team scheduling tools
  • Complete customization of your platform.

Setmore

From contractor consulting to educational services, Setmore helps service providers book appointments and organize clients 24/7. Manage multiple calendars, keep everyone in the loop, and take payments directly through a streamlined online booking platform.

Find easy and effective ways to interact with clients on social media, popular apps, and various CRMs. You can also use the customizable booking page to display reviews and watch your business flourish.

Setmore includes:

  • Instant SMS notifications so nobody misses out
  • Marketing tools so you can increase your reach
  • Payment software that allows you to accept instant online payments
  • Fully customizable calendar and appointment platforms.

Sign up to Groupon Merchant and discover more ways to streamline your business. From the customer journey to marketing tips and tricks, find out more on our business resources page and learn about how Groupon can work for your business.

  1. https://www.statista.com/statistics/273245/cumulative-active-customers-of-groupon/
  2. https://booksy.com/biz/en-us
  3. https://www.mindbodyonline.com/business
  4. https://restaurant.opentable.com/
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