5 Criteria to Find the Right Answering Service for Your Spa or Salon

Running a salon or spa is a lot of work. Keeping clients happy means they will keep coming back. That starts with the moment that they reach out, and if that’s via phone, you’d better have someone there to answer the call. 

You certainly can’t field every call if you’re also rendering services to clients. And yet you don’t want to miss valuable opportunities to bring in new clients and reassure existing ones with someone on the other end of the line whenever they call. This is where an answering service can come in handy. In addition to fielding calls outside of business hours, they can even become your main line of communication, ensuring that no matter how busy you get, you never miss a beat. 

What’s more is that the modern answering service can do a lot for your salon or spa besides just answering the phones. They can handle new client intake, appointment scheduling (or rescheduling), and even offer support for your outreach campaigns and marketing efforts to bring in more leads in the first place. 

What is an answering service?

An answering service, also sometimes called a virtual receptionist service, is a company that answers calls and handles other administrative tasks on behalf of another company. These services come in all sizes and with a variety of different features. Their entire job is to deliver a professional, courteous experience for callers and to support your efforts while you’re busy running your salon and spa. 

The modern answering service does more than just answer calls. They can help with outreach and sales, offer support for payment collection, and even connect the right calls to you with warm transfers. All the while, you and your staff can focus on the clients in your salon at the time. 

Here are five things to look for when hiring your answering service. 

1. Professional experience 

Agents or receptionists are representing your business. Therefore, it’s important to find an answering service that has plenty of professional experience to offer. They don’t have to have specific experience in the spa and salon industry, but they should be good with appointments, questions, leads, and other relevant communications solutions. 

This includes streamlined training for all agents and a discussion of the strategy that is going to be implemented for your specific needs. The answering service should make it simple and they should help improve your professional reputation from day one. 

2. Available features and services

In addition to fielding calls, answering services can handle plenty of other business communication and admin needs. You will find things like 24/7 answering solutions along with support for live chat on your website, overflow answering, custom greetings and voicemail messages, warm transfer options, and so much more. Take the time to explore all the features available from top services and choose the one that best suits your needs. 

One of the biggest benefits of an answering service is having access to so much more for a single price. Outsourcing can get you a lot more for your money compared to hiring a receptionist or investing in your own after-hours calling solutions. 

3. Scalability and customization 

Along with those features, you will want to make sure that you can scale and customize your strategy to cover what you need. The best answering services offer plans that are flexible so that they can grow and change with the needs of your business. Having a spring special on tanning at your salon? Scale up to a few more agents to make sure all the incoming appointment calls are handled. Looking to add a second location or a new technician to your team? Put an answering service to work to get the word out about the new spot (or specialist) and take advantage of letting them field the calls. 

4. 24/7 availability 

It might not seem like a spa and salon needs to be available 24 hours a day. However, what about all those clients that call in the evening, long after closing time, or those who have a question about services while you’re closed on a holiday weekend? Spas and salons typically have more availability than other businesses, but they don’t work around the clock. And even if they did, they’d likely be busy with other tasks and not have time to field a bunch of incoming phone calls. 

That’s where having a 24/7 answering service comes in handy. You can choose when you need them available or just let them field all the calls and loop you in when it’s required. Plus, even if you’re still open and taking appointments, you could be busy with those people and unable to reach the phone. That’s where an answering service really comes in handy. 

5. Easy setup

Of course, there is no benefit to be had from an answering service unless it’s easy to set up and get started with. Make sure that the company has a strategy for integrating its services and that its tools work well with your tech stack. It shouldn’t be more difficult to work with an answering service, so if it is, you might want to consider another service. 

The phrase “easy setup” means something different to everyone. However, when you choose a reputable answering service, it means that they’ll take care of the hard work and let you focus on your business. 

Contact Smith.ai for 24/7 virtual receptionists and more

In the business of salon and spa services, your focus needs to be dedicated to the clients that are in your business, not on answering all the phone calls and lead inquiries that you get in a day. Fortunately, you can partner with the virtual receptionists at Smith.ai for a 24/7 answering service, as well as assistance with appointment scheduling, new client intake, and even live website chat. 

Plus, it all comes with a custom strategy to manage every last detail. Ready to learn more? Schedule a consultation or drop us a line at hello@smith.ai.

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