Tutorials

You've asked us for the ability to reward select groups of clients using referral (or promotion) codes, and, just in time for your spring marketing strategy, it's here!

I'll run through a quick tutorial on how to create and use referral codes, and this guide is also available as a Help Topic, or just search Help for "referral".

Here's how to create your first Referral Code:

1. Go into your Marketing tab and choose Events from the left sidebar.
2. Create a new Event, and select the brand-new type "referral code" from the drop-down list.

   

3. Type in a name, description, and the code you'd like to use.  That code is what you can give to your clients.  If you're sending via email or the web, a weblink is also created in the textbox below, ready to copy & paste.

   

4. Choose your date range by typing in the date, or using the pop-up calendar

   

5. Now, just select the type of special you'd like to extend to your clients - Featured Services, Buy One Get One, or Percentage Off - and just set those up like you normally would.

   In this case, we're taking the usual $75 massage and offering it for just $62, as you'll see:

   

6. Distribute the code in any number of ways - cards at your front desk, email marketing (through your SpaBoom account or your 3rd party solution - all you need is the link!), flyers you drop into purchase bags, your Twitter account - any way you'd like!  Be creative and have fun with the codes.  You could even link to it on your website, giving the perk to anyone who visits your site often.

IGC Purchases With Referral Codes

With the referral code link, when they click on the link it will send them directly to your IGC page with the type of GC you are promoting already up on the screen, ready for them to choose it:

With the code only, the purchaser will be prompted for their code on the 3rd screen in the checkout process:

Notes About Purchase Options

1. Tax, if you add tax to your GC purchases, will be calculated on the discounted price.
2. Gratuity, if you feature that option, will be calculated on the NON-discounted price.
3. Mail delivery option fees are assessed as normally configured.
4. The IGC after purchase - just like with any other special - shows only the full value or name of the service to the recipient.   If the promotion is a Buy One, Get One, your purchaser will receive their bonus GC just like normal.

Let us know what you think and how you plan to use your Referral Codes this holiday or all spring long!

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Marketing • Comment »

For those of you who were unable to attend Janell's fabulous webinar on November 17th (and on December 1st), we captured it on video.  Even if you did attend, you might find some areas to catch up on or review.

Janell covers everything from why email marketing is good business, to the ins-and-outs of managing campaigns.

From our earlier blog posts, you've learned why Talking to Your Clients is a must for your business, you've started gathering your clients' information, and you've decided how to reward them for their loyalty, it is time to send them some newsletters with your personal touch!

To follow along with the video, download the presentation [PDF]   

Posted in SpaBoom Webinars, Creating Customers, Tutorials • Comment »

Now that you've learned why Email Marketing is a must for your business, you've started gathering your clients' information, and you've decided how to reward them for their loyalty, it is time to send them some newsletters with your personal touch!

The easiest way to start is simply make sure that you have our automatic campaigns enabled:

Go to Setup Tab, click on "Basics," and scroll down to the Email Marketing Section.  If the first box is not checked, it will look like this:

Go ahead and click the box, which will give you a few more boxes:

I recommend enabling everything to get the ball rolling ASAP.  That's it!  You can now go into your Marketing Tab and see which campaigns will be sent on your behalf — just click on "Email Marketing" in the left column.

Don't see anything?  Click "Update Emails" to get a current list of the campaigns we've created for the next few months.

Any of those schedule campaigns can be customized, from the time and date sent, to the text that appears in them, to the color scheme!  Just click on "Edit" to go into the campaign and start customizing away.  We have great detailed help topics on how to edit your campaigns, but that step is totally optional — you can just let the emails go on their timetable to all of your opted in clients automatically — that's the simplicity of the system.

For live demonstration and discussion, you'll want to sign up for either of our two webinars:

• November 17th or December 1st (both at 1 p.m. EST)

Posted in SpaBoom Webinars, Tutorials, Spa Marketing • 2 Comments »

Now that you've learned how to get your client list started, you've printed out some lovely collateral forms for your front desk, and those email addresses are rolling in, what do you say to your clients?  You can send them a little "Greetings — thanks for being our fan!" email with some featured services or promotions just in time for their seasonal shopping.

First, we recommend that you enter your services into your SpaBoom account.  Why go through the trouble?  There are two very important reasons, one is good for you and one is good for your clients:

1. Service-based Gift Certificates are on average 10% larger compared to dollar IGCs.   If your average dollar IGC is $100, it is normal for your average service-based IGC to be $110 or more.
2. Services are personalized to the recipient, giving them a warm fuzzy they'll keep when they visit you for their appointment.

Featured Services Event — Let's use this for our example:  discounted services for a short 3 day window after Thanksgiving.

• Click the Marketing tab, then click "Events" on the left side of the page.
• Click "Add Event" under Tasks, on the left side of the page.  Make sure the Type is set to "Special," and fill in your Headline and Narrative fields to describe your promotion.
• Choose start and end dates for the special, in this case November 27th and November 29th, and optionally choose a GC Category.  This lets you highlight a group of IGC designs on your Gift Certificate page for the duration of this Event.
• Now choose Featured Services.   It can be your most popular service, or an underdog you'd like to promote — go ahead and enter a special price, which will only apply during the date range for the special.  If you enter an offer description, it will be shown in your menu of services in Instant GCs and Online Booking.

If you'd like some other options for Specials in your Events, choose these from the "Special" drop-down list:

• Percentage Discount — Sell all of your Instant Gift Certificates for a limited time at any percentage discount you choose!
• Buy One, Get One  (or as we like to call it, "BOGO")  I like this kind of promotion — it will get your purchaser back into your business for themselves!  You can give the purchaser an additional GC when they buy an IGC at a certain dollar threshold.  You have complete control of the details of the offer, and we've even set up some default ones to get you started.  Read our help file on "Buy One, Get One".

Stay tuned for Step Three on Friday — Email Campaigns, Automatic and Customized

And don't forget our live demonstration and discussion. Sign up for either of our two webinars:

• November 17th or December 1st (both at 1 p.m. EST)

Posted in SpaBoom Webinars, Tutorials, Spa Marketing • Comment »

We started our series on starting Email Marketing last Thursday by discussing why it is so important for your business — both your clients' satisfaction and your bottom line.  Now we're getting started with your THREE easy steps to begin.

What are the reasons that you sign up for online newsletters? If you're like me, there are two: you adore the business and want to know everything that is going on, OR you like the business and they are offering a nifty promotion.  Both situations are opportunities for a rewarding customer-business relationship.

Signing up for a newsletter could be thought of as a transaction — your client is giving up personal information to you with the expectation that they will receive value for it, and you as the business are receiving the gift of attention from them — a valuable gift indeed. SpaBoom lets you give your clients a gift back automatically, just to show them that their information and their attention is taken seriously.

Let's talk client list.  "Client list," you say?  Take a look at your Clients tab in SpaBoom and see who's in there.  Just a few GC purchasers?  Read on…

Your front desk is key.  Every time a client walks through the door, checks in for services, or is escorted to their appointment, you and your staff have the chance to build that relationship.  You have tools to make it happen using your SpaBoom account:

1. Sign-in sheets
   • Use our handy sign up pads, or customize your own design in our Collateral (comment cards) tool.  Read our Collateral Help for easy setup!
   • Provide space for their email address, with the enticement of a gift offer when they confirm their email — show them you value their information
   • Guide your staff on what to say. When walking the client back to the front desk to check out, they might say this, "I'm so glad you came in today — we'd love to see you again.  Don't forget to put your email on our guest sign-in pad so we can let you know when we have specials just for our client list."  Use your own spa's voice and customize the words to suit the mood, the client, even the weather!
2. Reward confirmed emails
   • Go to the Marketing Tab in your SpaBoom account, click "Turn On" email signup offers and then customize your message to make it really stand out.  There's a wide range of built-in ideas — great stuff like "10% Off Next Visit," "$5 Off Services," even "Complimentary Product" — use our Offers Help Topic for detailed information.
3. Add Client Info to SpaBoom
   • For every email collected, just add it in SpaBoom on the Clients tab: click on "add client" to get going.  Or, edit existing clients with new details by searching their name first.
   • Each client added will be verified through email, and this is how they collect their gift from you!

Other ways to gather clients' information into one place:

• Export your email client list and then import it into SpaBoom — Importing Your Text Client List.
• Put a link on your website to your newsletter subscribe page — Adding Your Subscribe Link.

For live demonstration and discussion, you'll want to sign up for either of our two webinars:

• November 17th or December 1st (both at 1 p.m. EST)

Posted in SpaBoom Webinars, Tutorials, Spa Marketing • Comment »

Do you know about the new features you have available at your fingertips? SpaBoom's newest additions make successful online marketing a nearly effortless extension of your in-house efforts!

Join Seth & Janell on June 2nd, 1-2 EDT, as they provide a tour of the latest features & functions available to help you to further increase your online revenue potential and keep in close touch with your existing clients.

The webinar will cover:

Online Booking — w/Confirmation and

Online Booking — Automatic (coming out next month)

Blissful Marketing

• Offers — create loyalty and add additional value to your services
• Collateral — create comment cards and email sign up cards
• Twitter — tweet your latest events & specials right from SpaBoom

Joy of Spa — National online magazine for women who love to spa, and a website with online directory

We will plan about 30 minutes to present these features, 15 minutes for questions, and another 15 minutes for general questions.

This webinar is FREE to all SpaBoom clients, so be sure to join in and learn!

How do I join?

Reserve your Webinar Seat NOW!

Space is limited.

After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Marketing, General • Comment »

Most of the time when you are on the Clients tab in a SpaBoom account, you might be searching for a particular client.  That's all well and good, but many times you also want easy access to lots of other information about those clients as a whole.  We have the really cool client reports on the Reports tab, but having to do a couple of extra clicks just didn't seem logical to me as a user and as a techie kind of gal.

So… we changed it.  Now, when you are on the Clients tab, you have one-click access to both the Client Detail Report and the Client Journal Report, from the left hand tasks column.

A minor change, yes, but there are dozens of other places in our system that could be more intuitive or just flow from one step to another more gracefully.  Watching some of our clients use the software to identify those trouble points is part of what we all do, but if I haven't paid a visit to your business personally, you'll have to help me out.  Tell me the things that you'd love to see streamlined and it just might get changed lickety-split.

With your input, SpaBoom just keeps getting better, week by week.  Thank you!

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features • 4 Comments »

That's right, we are once again producing new Instant Gift Certificate designs for you and your wonderful clients to enjoy as the year all-too-quickly winds down.

One of our excellent blog commenters, Christine of Great Lakes Relaxation Center, has agreed to demonstrate how you can find and show off the new designs in your account.  I'm using her account to create the screenshots below, so you'll know what it will look like for you — nothing complicated or staged about it.

First, we wanted to make sure that your current "Most Popular" designs are not abruptly yanked from your website, so we have not forced into your list the new designs — you'll need to go get them.   You can do one of two things to begin showcasing those new designs — apply our default "most popular" in one fell swoop, or choose your own favorites for display.  I'll describe both options below.

1) The first option is quick and easy.   Go into your Setup Tab, then click on GC Designs on the left side of the screen. You'll see your already selected list of thumbnails:

 
On the left, look for the "Restore Defaults" link, and click on that.  

Click OK on the next screen, and you'll be all set.  You will now have six (6) new and snazzy Most Popular designs, which gives your IGC page enough room for the seasonal designs that we feature before major holidays (4 at a time).

2) Here's how to do the second option — pick your own designs:

Go into your Setup Tab, then click on GC Designs on the left side of the screen.  You'll see your already selected list of thumbnails.

To download the brand new designs, click on the link on the left of the screen called "Update Designs". They will come in as "Hidden" by default.  To show all of our new designs, click on "show hidden designs" and they will appear in your list:

Let's say you'd like to start by removing one of your current Most Popular designs — Celebrate Life.  All you need to do is click on the handy (and new!) "Remove from popular" button.

Next, we'll be making the new design "Lavender" visible and Most Popular.  Click on the "Show" button below the name Lavender to un-hide the design, then click on "Make popular" and you've just given super-cool in-crowd status to the lovely Lavender design.

Perfect!  Christine at our demo spa decided to go ahead and do the same thing for two more designs, hiding old ones and revealing two new designs, "Waves" from All Occasions and "Sincere" in the brand new Sorry category. Her GC page just was transformed from this:

To this:

When we decide to go all the way with her page to leave some room for seasonal designs and use the "Restore Defaults" link, her Instant Gift Certificate page will now end up like this, all nice and clean:

This was a long tutorial, but it should make all of the steps clear and give you a boost of confidence in customizing your offering to your clients — now go out there and have fun!

Posted in Holiday Promotion Brief, Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Gift Certificates • 3 Comments »

We rolled out the ability for your clients to review both their experience with the Instant Gift Certificate process as well as your business as a whole. You can add those reviews to your website, show them off for all the world to see and even choose to not display the ones that might be inappropriate.

There is a long way between "showing" and "doing," however. What can the reviews give you to make your business better? Negative feedback!

When you log in to your SpaBoom account, we have been showing you a notice on your Today tab when you've recently received reviews. Now, we have added an extra head's-up if any of those reviews are either 1 or 2-star, ending the notification with, "and one of them needs your attention!"

It looks like this:

When you receive a less than stellar comment, it might be instinctive to flinch and just brush it aside. However, little can help your reputation and the happiness of your clients more than a quick and effective response to complaints that could indicate real problems with your business.

For example, when we check on the link to the reviews report from the example above, we see the following:

Uh-oh. It looks like Maggie is going to need a phone call to ensure she feels taken care of — otherwise it could be hard to convince her (or her friends, since the word will probably circulate at her next social gathering) that visiting your spa again would be an enjoyable experience. Luckily, because she signed in with her client account, you know how to get a hold of her, via email or phone.

What might happen if you got a negative review that was left anonymously? That depends on the review. Let's say it just says, "Your lobby is horribly smelly." Even if you don't know who left the review, you can still do a spot-check of the lobby and see if anything is a problem. If not, get a second opinion and then move on. Any negative review, anonymous or not, should at least garner a quick investigation to see if something can be improved.

In the business world, focus groups are created for the purpose of getting consumers to tell companies what they really think. Focus groups cost money, time, and are not easy to do for a small business — and with reviews, you have the opportunity to get the same kind of valuable information, while at the same time building your relationships with your customers and the local community.

Now, go forth and create some happy customers!

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Business Management • 1 Comment »

If you are a SpaBoom client who also uses Harms Millennium, you might be missing a key tool that will make your business run more efficiently:

Harms Millennium Integration with SpaBoom!

We've had an integration tool for a little over a year now, and when Millennium 2008 was released, a new and much simpler installation process was also launched.  If you're already integrating, you know that you can avoid having to enter your SpaBoom gift certificates into your Millennium system — they are sent over automatically, into a special drawer that you designate.

If this tool is completely news to your ears — start by downloading the integration guide that Harms developed with us to walk you through the initial steps.

Then, give us a call and we'll help get the final steps taken care of for you.  Soon you'll be in Millennium bliss, only needing to log in to your SpaBoom account when you need to change administrative details or do things like set up email marketing campaigns.

Harms Millennium SpaBoom Integration Guide [PDF]   

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features • 3 Comments »

That may seem like a strange thing to say, but hear me out.

When YOU are looking at online reviews of a business you'd like to visit or a book you want to buy, doesn't it give you just a smidgen of doubt if every single entry is a 5-star glowing testimonial that sounds like their best friend… or their spouse… or their mother wrote it?  You find a dose of comforting reality in the business that has a 4 star average — from lots of 5s but a few 4s and 3s now and then.  Now you know exactly what I mean.

You might get reviews that are mixed, or less than perfect.  Embrace them.

As a business any amount of feedback you get from clients is pure gold, even if it does not appear shiny at first glance.

If you know the client who left the review, give them a call and thank them for their feedback.  Don't even mention the content.  If you don't know the client, consider the review — are there any nuggets of truth that could be addressed?  Perhaps they found the services wonderful but the wait time a little long.  If you were busy that day, of course that could have happened if bookings were going over their time frames.  Use the feedback to make your business better for the next client, and the next…

If the review is truly awful, the same followup procedures apply.  However, if you have ample reason to believe that the review was mean spirited without substance, you can choose to suppress it in your showcase reviews in SpaBoom –  just go to your Reviews Report, click on the date of the review in question, and use the checkbox "Hide this review."  You are only allowed to hide a few reviews, which gives you control over the quality of what appears on your site, while also allowing for your clients to express their opinions.

Enjoy this feature, but act as if each review is a gift from your clients and you'll continue to improve.

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Business Management • 4 Comments »

Last time, I showed you how to easily add your Reviews to your SpaBoom Dynamic website — its incredibly fast and most of the work is done for you, thanks to the design of our templates.

However, if you already have SpaBoom Instant Gift Certificates linked to your existing website, you can still join the party — we love for everyone to collect and show off their customers' comments, so here's part 2: how to add reviews to your existing website.

Wonder if you already have reviews out there?  Get a glimpse by logging into your SpaBoom account, and go to the Reports tab, then take a peek at the Reviews report.  You'll see any reviews you've collected so far, for a glimpse into what your customers think and how much they appreciate your services to them.

Ready?  You're all set to add the link to your website.  We have a great tutorial on the details in our Help section, titled "Reviews for Linked Websites".

Essentially you or your web designer will be adding a link to your website, just like you did when you added your Instant Gift Certificate link when you first signed up with us.   Easy, huh?  Promote this new and neat way to connect with your customers, and your business will surely keep booming!

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Business Management • Comment »

When running a business, getting feedback from your customers on how they perceive your company is critical. Do they appreciate the value you provide? Is buying from you a fun experience? You can always ask people directly, but that can be awkward or time-consuming.

SpaBoom has now added a new feature that allows you to collect this kind of information about your clients' Instant Gift Certificate purchase experience, and by extension, their opinion of how well they were able to use your website overall.

Any time someone buys an Instant Gift Certificate from you, they will see this extra section on the post-purchase screen:

Submitting a review is completely optional - they can end their transaction immediately, or click on a button to purchase another Instant Gift Certificate. If choosing to provide a review, they can select a rating of one star through five stars, and also leave a comment detailing their experience. Once submitting , they are again taken to a screen thanking them and allowing any additional purchases.

For your business, a new SpaBoom account report has been added to list all of your clients' reviews so you can see how things are going, and also to address any problems that the might have encountered. When you login to your account, you'll see a new item in the Today screen mentioning that you have new Reviews. You can view them by clicking on that link, or through the main Reports screen.
From the Reports tab, click on "Reviews" on the left side of the screen, to see this view:

You can sort by any of the columns, see the average rating at the bottom, and even click on the client's name to view their record.

We hope this will be a useful tool for you to keep in touch with your customers' attitudes and feedback for the services you offer, both through SpaBoom as well as your overall website design and functionality. Please let us know if you have questions about Reviews, or any other suggestions for great new features we can add in the future.

Posted in Tutorials, SpaBoom New Features, Spa Business Management • 3 Comments »

Okay, so you're starting to read about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) everywhere, including on the SpaBoom Blog. You have a sense that it's important, but it's still very confusing. Worse, the information you read about SEO seems to be either conflicting or unhelpful.

What exactly is SEO and how can it help you? Let me suggest this definition for SEO:

When someone goes to Google, Yahoo!, MSN, AOL or the other search engines, and they want a spa or salon, they find and click to your website. Your website and online marketing practices should be tuned such that this opportunity is maximized - and more people see your business listed in those search results.

At the end of the day, people go to search engines to find the websites (and businesses) they desire and might not already know about. SEO involves everything that is necessary to get those people to go to your website.

There are many diverse opinions on SEO, and what makes this as much art as science, is the search engines themselves are constantly "fine tuning" the way they rank websites. They appear to do this for two primary reasons: first, to ostensibly provide better search results to their users and second, to prevent websites from "gaming the system."

Despite the varying opinions on SEO, there are some basic ground-rules. We are beginning a series of blog posts that will discuss how you can evaluate the effectiveness of your SEO, and give you practical suggestions on how you can improve your SEO. To not miss a thing, add our blog to your RSS feeder, or keep watching for new posts in the "Spa Search Engine Optimization (SEO)" category.

Posted in Tutorials, Spa Search Engine Optimization (SEO) • 1 Comment »

Email marketing can be powerful stuff for your spa. It's no cost marketing for SpaBoomers to the very people most important to you: your clients and prospective clients that have asked for you to talk to them.

That power comes from email marketing being permission based. To begin, you should confirm that everyone that is on your client list is appropriately marked as a "yea" or a "nay" on the "Send Email Marketing?" checkbox. Make sure your list is updated, and you'll know that those who receive your marketing emails are only the people who are already receptive to communications from your business.

Second, even if you have sent out your own Email Marketing campaigns before, you'll need to go into the Settings and adjust all of the colors to make them your own.

Some default marketing colors are shown on the screen (which could differ from those below):

…but they are just there to demonstrate a basic color palette. Until you adjust each of the five colors and save them, you will get the system's default colors and they might not be what you are expecting, which brings us to the final, crucial tip:

Use the "Send Test Email" link early and often as you craft the message. You might find that the colors need more tweaking, or the text could be refined.

Once everything looks great, you'll be ready to send off to your list of clients with confidence!

[As to what happens after you send the email, see our other post about email delivery.]

Posted in Creating Customers, Tutorials, Spa Marketing • Comment »

You likely receive emails from SpaBoom from time to time. Sometimes we are notifying you of your account settings and status, others are our newsletters about new features or seasonal heads-up reminders.

In some of those emails we will include logos or graphics to illustrate and decorate the message, but Outlook is often very proactive when it comes to blocking things of this nature. If something is not shown, the message will display a bar near the top that says, "Click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy…" et cetera:

In order to see all of the embedded graphics and logos that we might use in those emails, there is an easy task that will make everything pretty from now on. Just right-click on that bar and select "Add the domain @spaboom.com to Safe Senders List":

That means that in the future, any email from an @spaboom.com address will be deemed safe from Outlook's perspective, and it means the messages will be stylish as they ought to be from your perspective.

Posted in Tutorials, General • 1 Comment »

We've been adding new GC designs left and right, and now might be a good time to put away some of your Instant Gift Certificate designs that you've been using for awhile, and show off the new options, just to keep things interesting and fun.

Here's how to customize your customer's GC experience on your site.

When your customer loads your IGC page, they see, by default, the designs that have been marked as "Most Popular". This setting is a drop-down item in the Gift Certificate details view, shown here (just under the name of the GC):
 

Currently there are six (6) designs that are globally marked Most Popular, and those will show in addition to any that you have marked. So, if you have chosen 3 Most Popular that are different from ours, your customers will see 9 in total. Keeping it to an even number (six or eight) is visually more appealing, so keep that in mind when selecting those Most Popular items.

To only show the defaults we have selected (resetting all of the global GCs to the current defaults), both for Most Popular as well as Hidden/Not-Hidden, simply click the link on the lower left corner that says "Restore Defaults."

Again, that will undo ANY changes you have made to the settings of our original GC Designs. Your Custom GCs that you have uploaded (if any) are safe.

Posted in Tutorials, Spa Gift Certificates • Comment »

Are you? Will you admit to your obsession with all things SpaBoom, just like we'll admit that we're crazy about having you on board?

If you're one of our amazing businesses that have jumped up your sales by using Instant Gift Certificates and you're looking for ways to enhance what you provide to your customers, you probably read this very blog for tips and updates.

Whether you check in a few times a week or daily, you should know about a quick and easy way to make sure you never miss a new post - the RSS reader.

Think of all of the magazines, catalogs, and newspapers that you love to read, and the mailman that delivers them to your mailbox every day, saving you the hassle of going to stores to buy them in person. The blogs you read online are like those print publications and the RSS reader is both the mailman and the mailbox rolled into one - no need to bounce around on the web to get caught up on your reading.

If you already use a reader, just point it to our RSS Feed (also linked on the left side of the screen) and you're good to go.

If you are new to RSS, there are many web-based services available, from Bloglines to Google Reader, and they are as easy to use as web-based email. Dive in and enjoy your SpaBoom Blog addiction!

Posted in The Company, Resources and Development, Tutorials • 1 Comment »

Get more mileage out of your printed newsletters by posting them on your website using SpaBoom Events.

The first step is to get a PDF version of your newsletter. If you use an advertising agency or graphics designer, just ask them to send you a PDF whenever they create something for you. If you design your newsletters in-house, see if your software has a "Save to PDF" option, or check out free tools like PrimoPDF or PDFOnline.

Once you've got a PDF, it's easy to post it on your website:

1. Go to Setup, Events and Add Event.
2. Make up a Headline and some Narrative to describe your newsletter.
3. Change the type to "News".
4. For Link to PDF File, select "New file", then click on the Browse button and select your PDF file.
5. Enter an appropriate name in Link text for your PDF, like "March Newsletter".
6. Enter the Start date for when you'd like the PDF to first appear on your website.
7. If you'd like it to automatically disappear, enter an End date. Otherwise, leave it blank — Events automatically shows your latest three News items.

For Dynamic Spa Websites, your News item will automatically appear in the sidebar of your website. For linked-in sites, it will appear on your Specials and Events page (see Help to add the link to your website).

Fliers

The same approach works great for fliers, too. Just use an "Announcement" or "Occasion" type for the event instead, and enter an End date for when the flier is no longer relevant.

News Page

You can also add a "News" page to Dynamic Websites to show the history of all of your News items. This is particularly useful if you're using News for newsletters or other timely pieces like press releases:

1. Go to Setup, Website and Add Page, calling it something clever like "News".
2. Click on the edit main content icon, and change "Your Headline" to something like "News", and "your text" to "{news}". It's that little tag, with the funny curly braces around it, that causes your news events to appear on the page.
3. Add a link to your new page in main navigation and/or the main content of your home page.

Posted in Tutorials, Spa Marketing • Comment »

Of Instant Gift Certificates, that is. But first, let's step back and talk about what happens when you sell an Instant Gift Certificate.

Selling Instant Gift Certificates

Every time you sell an Instant Gift Certificate, you'll receive an email copy of the receipt sent to your client (and a copy of the emailed GC, if your client choose to email it).

1. If you're using automatic credit card processing, then you've already been paid. If you're doing manual processing, then you need to login to your account at SpaBoom and click on the GCs tab; any GCs you need to process have a cute little credit card icon next to them. Just click on it to bring up the credit card information.
2. Process the credit card like you would a phone order. For tracking purposes, enter the approval code and invoice # from the credit card transaction, and then change the status to "Processed". You can make any notes that you'd like to see for future reference.
3. If you're unable to successfully process the credit card, then contact the client for additional information. If you're unable to resolve, then mark the credit card has "All attempts failed", and then click on the GC and Void it.

Redeeming Instant Gift Certificates

Now, let's get to the redemption part. The lucky recipient has arrived on the scene:

1. When the recipient schedules their appointment, go to the GCs tab and search for the GC by the To, From, date or ID.
2. Verify that the GC is valid and check the remaining balance.
3. Depending on your policy, you may still want to collect credit card information to hold the appointment.
4. When the GC is redeemed, bring it back up in GCs. Click on the ID for the GC to see the history of activity.
5. Click Redeem and record the amount of the GC that has been used.
6. You don't need to issue a replacement GC for any unused portion. You can simply track the unused amount in SpaBoom. Some spas note the unused amount on the GC, and hand it back to the client, or use a rubber stamp with a blank to fill in the unused amount.

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