For any service-based business, from consultants and coaches to local service providers, appointments are the lifeblood of revenue. Still, the traditional process of setting, confirming, and reminding customers about these appointments is often a big source of friction and financial loss. GHL’s calendar can help you to master your schedule and payments. 

Watch this quick walkthrough to enable payment collection in GHL Calendar and reduce booking friction.

The Mechanics of the GHL Calendar

The GHL Calendar is engineered to replace your entire external scheduling stack by offering superior integration across all critical business functions.

1. Unified Calendar Creation and Management

The foundation of the system is flexibility. GHL understands that a single calendar doesn't fit all business needs, so here’s what you get:   

• You can create multiple distinct calendar types (e.g., a short 15-Minute Discovery Call, a 60-Minute Paid Strategy Session, or internal Team Support Time) all within the same, centralized interface.
• This functionality features seamless two-way syncing with external calendars like Google and Outlook. If you accept a personal appointment in Google, GHL immediately marks that time as unavailable, ensuring users never face embarrassing or costly double-bookings. 

2. Integrated Payment Capture 

This is the most powerful feature for businesses that sell high-value services or need commitment. Here’s what it includes:

• The system has the inherent ability to mandate payment (deposits or full fees) directly at the time of booking, turning the calendar into a revenue engine.
• If a service requires payment, the customer is prompted for their credit card information through the integrated Stripe/GHL payment gateway. The customer cannot finalize the booking slot until the payment is processed, eliminating those annoying no-shows. 

3. Automated Communication Workflows 

The second-biggest cause of no-shows is simple forgetfulness, which GHL eliminates through its multi-channel automation. The Calendar is natively integrated with GHL's robust Workflow Builder (automation engine), allowing you to trigger a sequence of actions based on a booking event. Some of its mechanisms include:

• Confirmation: Immediate email/SMS confirmation upon booking, providing the client with all the needed details and links.
• Reminders: Scheduled reminders (e.g., 24 hours prior, 1 hour prior) sent via the client's preferred channel. SMS has a 98% open rate, making it one of the key channels you want to use.
• Follow-Up: Automatic surveys or re-booking prompts sent after the appointment is complete, ensuring continuous engagement and feedback collection.

4. Team-Based Scheduling and Round Robin

For growing agencies or businesses with multiple staff members handling sales or service delivery, GHL offers sophisticated load balancing. Some of this includes:

• Sophisticated options for managing team availability and ensuring you distribute the workload evenly.
• Allows for "Round Robin" scheduling, which is distributing incoming leads or meetings evenly among all available team members, or you can also do "Weighted Assignment.”

 

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