Easily schedule consultations and sessions for clients with our online booking feature. Create multiple session types to offer your clients, each with their own availability, payment, and email settings. When clients book a session, it automatically adds them to your contacts and creates an invoice for their session.
Online booking is available as an add-on to your ShootProof subscription. Try it out with a 30-day trial and then add it as monthly plan or a yearly plan.
To use online booking, you need to have ShootProof Pay or Stripe for International Studios as your payment gateway.
Create a Session Type
To get started, go to:
- Studio > Booking > Session Types (top left tab) > Add Session Type
- Give the session type a name
- This is a client-facing name. You will have the option to edit it once you create the session type.
- This is a client-facing name. You will have the option to edit it once you create the session type.
- Click Next
On this page, there are 5 tabs: Information, Availability, Rules, Payments, and Email Notifications.
Information
In this first tab, add the basic information about this session type.
Choose up to 5 Banner Images to scroll across the top of the booking page, showcasing your work.
Text from the Description is shown at the top of the client booking page for the session. Use this space to highlight included deliverables (like digital files or prints) and the experience they can expect.
The Booking Site Link defaults to the name of your session type but can be changed on this page.
Under Set Session Location, you have the option to add an address, video call URL, or phone number where the session will take place. If there is no location for this type, select None.
You can select the color set that you want to apply to the session page from the Choose Color Set for Booking Site drop-down menu.
Availability
Set the session duration amount, either in minutes or hours.
Then choose how you would like to list your availability. You can set up weekly and date-specific availability or add specific days for mini-sessions.
With Weekly availability, you can add general days and times that you are available for this session type, such as all Wednesdays from 9 to 5.
With Date Specific Availability, you can pick a specific date and add times you are available that day, such as October 28th, you are available from 12-5. If a Date Specific day coincides with a day in your Weekly Availability, then the times blocked for the Date Specific day will be the ones available.
If you want a time buffer before or after sessions, you can add that using the Block Off Time drop-down menus. Once clients start booking sessions, your remaining availability on the booking page will adjust to accommodate those block-off times.
Choose the time increments you'd like to display with the Show time slots in increments of: drop-down menu.
Optionally put on a limit on the number of sessions per day in the Set maximum number of sessions per day text box.
You can also set up Mini Session Availability. Similar to the Date Specific Availability, mini-session times will show instead of any times added in the Weekly Availability times.
To set up a mini-session date, just pick a date, start time, the number of sessions, and the amount of time between sessions. Once you've added a date, you can add another by clicking the Add Date button in the top right.
If you have multiple session types available during the same time slots, that time will not show as available once it's been booked for another session. For example, if you have Portrait Sessions and Family Sessions that can both be booked at 2 PM on Tuesday, if a client books a Family Session at 2 PM, there will no longer be a Portrait session available at 2 PM on Tuesday.
Rules
Decide how far into the future you want to show availability and the minimum notice time you require.
To require that your clients sign a contract when booking, add a contract template here. Contract templates containing blanks and certain variables cannot able to be used here. If you choose one that has blanks or unavailable variables, you'll be prompted to edit the contract template.
Choose whether you want sessions to be manually confirmed by you or automatically confirmed. If you choose manual confirmation, you'll receive an email prompting your confirmation, and the client will not receive a session confirmation until you approve it.
Session types with a contract attached must have manual confirmation to allow for the countersignature of the contract.
Payments
Set the session price, decide the payment schedule, and set any necessary sales tax.
You need to have ShootProof Pay or Stripe for International Studios as your payment gateway. If you don’t have either of those gateways, you’ll be prompted to set it up before you can continue.
Under Payment Schedule, choose between the full amount at the time of booking, at the time of the session, or determine a partial payment flow. With the partial payment option, determine the percentage you want paid at the time of booking. Then, set whether you want the remainder paid at the time of the session or select Custom to set the number of days or weeks before the session that the remainder is due.
Regardless of whether you set the Payment Schedule for the time of the session or a partial payment, your client will always have the opportunity to pay for their session upfront.
Email Notifications
Choose to use automatic emails for different stages of the session. Your clients will not receive email confirmations for their sessions unless you set them up in this tab.
Click Create Email Template to be taken to the template type for each email. Use the verbiage and variables already included in the template default or edit the text to reflect your brand.
Share Booking Link with Client
Once your session type is set up and you're ready to share it with your client, click the back arrow above the session name, which brings you back to the Session Types page. On your new session type, you'll see a button that says Copy Link. You can use this link to preview the client experience.
Block Off Times
Use Block Off Times to set times when you are unavailable for any bookings. Go to Studio > Booking > Sessions (top left tab) > Block Off Times > Add Block Off Time (top right) to add a new block-off time.
First, optionally name your block-off time so you know what it's for (e.g. Spring Vacation). This name is internal, so your clients will not see it.
Then choose the start and end dates and if you want to block the whole day or just time slots on those days. Once you've added the dates or times you want blocked off, your session calendars will no longer show any availability during those times.