Aromatherapy facials, deep tissue massages, seaweed body wraps—all things R&R are on our radar this summer.

While your guests sip champagne and slip into jacuzzi tubs, we’re setting aside our cucumber slices. Why? Because dare-to-bare beach season is here! We’re revving up our waitlist and management app to help you handle the hustle and bustle of weekend trips, girls’ getaways, and long afternoons of head-to-toe pampering.

Here’s how Waitlist Me can help spas and salons crank up their customer service.

Balance walk-ins and reservations

There’s no need to fuss over the different types of clients you serve! Waitlist Me lets you handle them all with ease—and see where you can squeeze in a walk-in among a slew of reservations.

Keep tabs on multiple locations

Waitlist Me ensures that owners and managers of multiple locations don’t have to twiddle their thumbs wondering how business is going or tie up the phone lines. Our Multi-Location Management lets them check in 24/7/365 from wherever they are.

Let guests check themselves in

A line at your check-in desk can turn customers off. With Waitlist Me, though, you can quickly set up a Self Check-In Kiosk where guests can DIY instead of stand in line (and get to the R&R part of the visit way faster).

Offer accurate wait times

No more hazy estimates about how long it’ll take to finish up those French tips. Tracking actual waits next to estimates helps your staff learn to quote waits more accurately and know when things are running behind.

Ensure that every front desk attendant is in the loop

Forget about sharing a single reservation book with three hosts! Multi-Device Sync lets you put Waitlist Me on as many devices as you want, letting you ramp up staffing (and dial it down) whenever you need to.

Check availability at-a-glance

Waitlist Me is designed to be intuitive to use. That means your front-of-house staff can spend more time on customer service and less time scrolling through a zillion complicated screens.

Enable guests to wander while they wait

When a customer reaches the front of the line (or their masseuse becomes available), Waitlist Me lets you text them for free to let them know. And if they’re a few minutes away? No sweat. They can text back (and never have to worry about losing their spot).

Allow customers to make appointments on the fly

A spontaneous pedi? Why not! Our Add Yourself Web Widget is a second-tier feature that lets guests add themselves to your waitlist from wherever they are, no phone call necessary.

Offer a public waitlist

With Waitlist Me, there’s no need for toe-tapping impatience. Pop the public waitlist feature on a monitor or TV screen in your lobby, and guests can see for themselves where they are in line.

Track your ROI on-demand

Our app’s Pro-level analytics run in the background 24/7, making it easy to spot trends in the popularity of your services or employees.

Renting shoes and perfecting the art of bowling-without-bumpers is a favorite memory of Waitlist Me’s app developers, and we’re thrilled that our favorite outing of old is back in favor with everyone from teens to millennials to families with kids.

Seeing a surge in your clown shoe-clad customers? Waitlist Me is a waitlist and reservation app that can help you smoothly manage the increase in traffic—and turn new customers into loyal fans.

Here are 3 ways our app can help any bowling alley gain new business (and improve customer service) today.

Prevent walk-outs when there’s a wait

A line at the door can make any strike-happy group turn tail and hit up a pizza parlor or movie theater, instead. Waitlist Me helps you keep customers regardless of your wait time. How? By making that line disappear.

Thanks to unlimited text notifications for users in the U.S. (and pay-as-you-go texting for Waitlist Me’s international plans), you can add groups to your waitlist and then let them roam free until a lane becomes available. They could grab cheese fries and a pitcher of beer at your snack stand, shoot pool and play PAC-MAN in your arcade, or window-shop their way down the street. When they’re first in line, you can send them a heads-up via text.

Perfect for:

– Bowling alleys with limited staffing (or a small waiting area)

– Checking in large groups during peak business hours

– Bowling alleys facing lots of local competing attractions

Give large groups a great time

You brought in snacks and arcade games to serve your bowlers better. But those add-ons don’t have to be after thoughts. Now, with large groups looking for impromptu hang-out spaces, your bowling alley is primed to offer a variety of fun options for everyone, including the non-bowlers in the bunch.

You can use Waitlist Me to give everyone a chance to do whatever it is that floats their boat…without making ‘em stand around in long lines by themselves. How? Waitlist Me is flexible enough to be used for people waiting for lanes, your in-house food area, or even popular games like air hockey.  Text ‘em when it’s their turn, ensuring that they’re never sacrificing quality time with friends and family to hold their place in line.  You can manage lines for different activities with status colors or even set up a separate waitlist for areas that have regular waits.

Perfect for:

– Booking birthday parties, office outings, and other celebrations

– Special events, like trivia nights and karaoke

– Attracting big crowds for bowling league competitions

Make it easy for customers to choose your bowling alley

Who wants a hassle for what should be a fun happy hour outing? Not your guests! That’s why it’s essential to make it a cinch for your customers to decide to shoot the breeze at your business rather than another spot down the block. A parking lot and food specials are a great way to get ‘em coming in your door. Another tool to have in your back pocket: Waitlist Me.

The app is built to handle waitlists and reservations side-by-side, so you can forget about that mess of sticky notes cluttering up your front counter. Customers can call before they come, walk right in, or even add themselves to your waitlist or make a reservation online. And, thanks to the public waitlist feature, they can check your ETA from wherever they are, whether that’s the water cooler, the bar next door, or the parking lot.

Perfect for:

– Catering to the after-work crowd

– Offering pop-up events

– Handling holidays and rainy summer afternoons

Muslims around the world are entering Ramadan, the holiest time in the Islamic calendar. No matter what type of business you run—a big-box retailer or boutique, a restaurant or bar, a gym or studio, a salon, a spa, or a resort— you may see changes in your business traffic during this time.  Here are some tips for using Waitlist Me to improve customer service during the month of Ramadan.

Take walk-ins and reservations

Ramadan observants fast during daylight hours, but once the sun sets, they’re all about big family dinners packed with delicacies. If you run a restaurant that doesn’t usually take reservations, Waitlist Me makes it easy to start—or to take them when you need them, like when a large party is ready to dig in.

Bonus! Our Free-level version lets you take same-day reservations, and our Premium-level app offers more robust reservation features, like a calendar view and a web widget.

Use waitlists to accommodate every client, every time

From haircuts to yoga classes, urgent care visits to mani-pedis, if your business is in a Muslim community, you’ll probably see more foot traffic after dinner. Waitlists can help you keep up with the changing traffic patterns and ensure that you keep all of your customers happy, day-in and day-out.

Bonus! The Premium-level Add Yourself Web Widget lets customers join a waitlist for a particular service or piece of equipment from wherever they are, whether that’s the office, a restaurant, or the next block over.

Post special offers, events, and changes to your hours where everyone can see them

Whether you’re offering celebratory 2-for-1 appetizers or are starting trivia a little later this month to accommodate your Muslim guests’ daylight restrictions, Waitlist Me’s public waitlist view lets you keep all your guests in the know on how busy you are.

Bonus! With Waitlist Me Pro, your public waitlist is completely customizable. Add your brand colors, your logo, even a silly video. It’s up to you!

Manage multiple locations from one account

There’s no need to sign in and out of different accounts, or to check up with your store managers to ensure they’re on the ball. Our Multi-Location Management feature lets you make whatever changes you want to your public waitlist, feedback surveys, and business hours.

Bonus! Curious to see if your changes are making an impact? Multi-Location Management lets you see how your businesses are fairing in real time and check each location’s traffic analytics.

Get feedback in a snap

Are your customers loving your changes? Is there something you could be doing better? Waitlist Me Pro lets you send a link straight to your guests’ smartphones after their visits so they can leave a rating and tell you how much you rock (and what you can do better in the future).

Mother’s Day is coming up this weekend in the US, so it is a great time for restaurants to use Waitlist Me to manage the surge in families hoping to treat mom to a special meal.  With the recent launch of Waitlist Me in over 60 countries, it is now being used for different holidays at different times.

Interestingly, over 150 countries that celebrate Mother’s Day and the holiday has the deepest roots in the UK, where it is called Mothering Sunday.  Since the 1500s, young apprentices and domestics would walk home on Mothering Sunday, carrying special cakes and picking wildflowers for their mums before going to church.  This year people in the UK already celebrated Mothering Sunday on March 11, and here are some of the ways Waitlist Me is helping businesses in the UK.

Let patrons relax rather than queue

Brits may take pride in their queueing capabilities, but that doesn’t mean they enjoy waiting in queues, especially on holiday outings. Waitlist Me takes the queue out of the equation. Whether customers make a reservation or walk in on the big day, they can drop their name at your hostess stand and get back to enjoying time with their loved ones without fretting about losing their place.

Bonus! One of Waitlist Me’s core features is the public queue list, which lets your guests see for themselves exactly where they are in the queue and how much more time they have kill before it’s brunch time. You can set it up to display on a monitor or telly in your vestibule.

Easily accommodate walk-ins and reservations

Every holiday has its planners and its skivers. Waitlist Me makes it easy to welcome everyone without any fuss or frustration. The app integrates a standard queue with made-in-advance reservations, all on the same screen. There’s no need to panic over squeezing somebody in, and your guests will never see your hosts sweat. Plus you can toss your grease pens, sticky notes, and messy reservation books in the bin. Ta, clutter!

Bonus! Waitlist Me is all about making work easy for you and your staff. The app’s interface was designed to be intuitive and user-friendly. That makes training time minimal for your hosts and helps them stay calm and professional during busy periods.

Set your queuers free

If your restaurant is in an area stuffed with shops or historic landmarks, giving customers the option to wander while they wait is a happy surprise. In the UK, Waitlist Me text notifications are completely optional. It’s a feature that lets you—or your guests—decide when to use it. An example: When you add a customer to your queue, you can let them know they can wait in your lobby or you can text them when their table is ready if they’d prefer to walk around.

Bonus! International text notifications are offered as a prepaid, pay-as-you-go system. Sending a text is as easy as tapping a button on the app, but it’s always your choice to send. Or not—whatever works best for your restaurant.

Impress customers with accurate wait estimates

Sure, your guests might not tell you they’re annoyed by a long queue or a poorly judged queue time, but one bad experience waiting for their turn can keep them from coming back. Waitlist Me shows average wait stats and real time waits next to quoted times, so it is easy for your staff to give more accurate estimates and make guests happier.

Bonus! Waitlist Me’s public waitlist feature makes it easy for guests to check their place in line from their phone, so they worry less about how much longer they must wait.  It also cuts down on repeated questions to your hostess on the remaining wait.

Remember special requests

Birthdays or anniversaries? Food allergies? A highchair? Wheelchair accommodation? A preference for patio seating? Waitlist Me offers a simple Notes feature to help you, your hosts, and your servers keep track of whatever it is your customers want and need to make their meals enjoyable. Input these details when they walk through your door, and you’re set.

Bonus! Waitlist Me offers real-time sync across multiple iOS, Android, and web-enabled devices. That means everyone on your front-of-house staff and your management team can be clued in 24/7.

Waitlist Me makes it easy for your customers to let you know with a quick text response whether they are cancelling or on their way, so you know whether to expect them or not and can plan accordingly.  We are now combining that simplicity with more flexibility for handling other types of text responses, so you have more visibility into what your customers are thinking and can make smarter decisions faster.

Customers can send two pre-defined responses to text messages to let you know whether they are coming or not. If a customer texts back a “2”, you will see a “coming soon” message in the notes area of the waitlist view. If they text back a “3” the message will say “not joining” and the row will flash. The default notification that is sent to customers when you press to notify them explains these options and looks like this (you can always edit):

If people text back something other than a 2 or a 3, you’ll see “text reply” in their row on their waitlist.

Tapping on their row will open up the Edit Party screen, which will show their text. You can see things like if they mentioned how long they would be, if they had a quick question, or didn’t understand whether to use a 2 or a 3 and just replied back with something like “Cancel”. You can also see other important details in the Customer Visit section, such as when you notified them it was their turn, how long they were quoted, and how long they have been waiting.

Pro users have the additional feature to send custom text responses to texts received, up to three times per customer visit. The point is to keep things simple for you and your customers rather than get into a long chat with them that could be time consuming.

If a customer tries to call the assigned phone number in response to the text or call coming from that number, they will hear a message explaining that the number is only used for notifications and it will provide them your regular business number to call. Pro users have the option to create a custom text-to-speech message for handling these inbound calls.

Here is more on customizing notifications.