Asking clients for feedback after their visit

Feedback forms ask your clients how their visit went, a few hours after they leave. They're built like your consultation forms, with star ratings and a 0 to 10 question too, and a thank-you page you write yourself: a button to your Google reviews, say, or to book their next visit. Answers land on the appointment and the client's profile, and Reports → Feedback adds them up.

#Feedback forms and consultation forms: before or after the visit

Every form in Settings → Forms is one or the other, chosen under When it’s asked in the form:

• Before the visit: a consultation or consent form. Its link goes with the booking confirmation and reminder (sending consultation forms).
• After the visit: a feedback form. It's asked for once the visit is done, with the After the visit message, or when you send it yourself.

Once any client has been sent a form, even if it was withdrawn since, it stays before or after the visit: the form says "Clients have been sent this form, so this can’t change." Make a new form instead.

Feedback forms stay out of getting ready for a visit. They're never in confirmations or reminders, never show the clipboard on the calendar, and aren't on day sheets.

#Making a feedback form

1. Open Settings → Forms. Feedback forms are listed under After the visit.
2. Press New form and choose Blank feedback form, or the ready-made How was your visit?. (Before you have any feedback forms, the ready-made one shows as a card under After the visit, with Or start from scratch underneath.)
3. Type a Form name and an Introduction. Clients see both.
4. Choose Who’s asked and How often (who's asked for feedback), and How long the link works (when a feedback link closes).
5. Add your questions with Add question, and anything you'd like on the thank-you page under After they send it.
6. Press Create form.

A blank feedback form starts out asked after every visit. Questions, flags, follow-ups and the preview work as they do on any form: see building forms. Building and changing forms needs "Edit consultation and feedback forms" (owners and managers to start with).

#The ready-made "How was your visit?" feedback form

How was your visit? asks every client, at most every 6 months:

• "How happy are you with your hair?": one to five stars, required. One or two stars are flagged for your team.
• "What could we have done better?": shows only for one, two or three stars, and any answer is flagged.
• "How likely are you to recommend us to a friend?": 0 to 10.
• "Anything else you’d like to tell us?"

Its thank-you page, for everyone, says "If you have a minute, a Google review helps other people find us." with a Leave us a Google review button, and has a Book your next visit button. Change every word to suit your salon.

#Rating questions: stars or 0 to 10

A Rating question can go on any form. Open it and choose its Scale:

• One to five stars: your client taps a star. Answers read "4 out of 5".
• 0 to 10: a row of numbers, as in "How likely are you to recommend us?". Answers read "8 out of 10".

Under Flag for staff if they give, tap the ratings your team should notice, like 1 star and 2 stars. A rating can also show a follow-up question: press Only show if… on the follow-up, choose the rating question, and tap the ratings that show it. Changing the scale drops any flags the other scale doesn't have.

Reports → Feedback shows each rating question's average, and for a 0 to 10 question its Net Promoter Score (the Feedback report).

#Thank-you pages: text and buttons after a form is sent

Clients always see a thank-you when they send a form. Under After they send it, any form (feedback or consultation) can add your own words and buttons below it:

1. Press Add text or a button.
2. Type the Text (optional). {first_name} and {business} are filled in, and web addresses become links.
3. Press Add a button for a button. Type its Wording, and choose what it Opens: Your Google review link, Your booking page, Your Instagram, Your Facebook page, or Another web address (one starting with https://).
4. To show it only for certain answers, press Only show if… and choose the question and the answers. Any yes/no, single choice, checkboxes, rating or agreement question on the form can be used.

A page holds up to 10 parts; the arrows put them in order and the bin removes one. A part that needs fixing ("Give the button some wording", say) stops the form being saved until it's fixed. Preview shows what a client would see for the answers you try.

• Your Google review link comes from Settings → Business (business details), and Instagram and Facebook from Links in Settings → Online booking (branding). Until one is set, its button doesn't show.
• Buttons open in a new tab. If your client opens the link again later, the thank-you page shows again.
• Filled in on the salon iPad in kiosk mode, the client sees "All done. Please hand the device back." instead.

What goes on the page, and who sees each part, is up to you: a Book your next visit button for everyone, or a line just for low ratings.

#Who’s asked for a feedback form, and how often

Under Who’s asked:

Under How often:

"Asked" means sent, answered or not, including a form you sent by hand. One you withdrew doesn't count. Only visits that went ahead and were completed are asked about, and never visits brought across from your old booking system. The forms list sums up each rule, such as "Every client · at most every 6 months" or "First visits · once".

#How feedback forms go out with the After the visit message

Feedback forms go out by themselves with the After the visit message in Messages → Automations, once its wording has {form_link}. Its timing, channel and wording are set there: see automatic marketing.

With {form_link} in its wording, the After the visit message:

• Only goes after visits a feedback form is due for, by each form's Who’s asked and How often. The message's own Ask each client at most once every doesn't apply.
• Links to that visit's form. When more than one is due, it links to the first in your list, and the page offers the next once that's sent.
• Is a feedback request, not marketing. It goes to every client who hasn't said no to feedback requests, and carries a way to say no. Its texts still count with marketing for your SMS credits (automatic messages).
• Has no other links. Saving refuses {review_link}, {book_link} or a web address in its wording or subject: put your Google review link on the form's thank-you page instead.
• Asks first visits too. With Welcome new clients on as well, a new client gets both, on different days.

A form is only counted as asked when the message actually goes, so a client the message can't reach isn't marked as asked. Forms set to Only when sent never go with it.

#When a feedback form says "Not going out"

In Settings → Forms, a feedback form that's asked for automatically shows Not going out instead of Active when the After the visit message won't carry it, with the reason and a fix:

• "Not going out: the After the visit message is switched off." Press Switch it on.
• "Not going out: the After the visit message doesn’t include {form_link}." Press Add it.

Either way you see the message's wording before anything changes. Wording that already has {form_link} is kept; otherwise it becomes "Thanks for visiting {business}, {first_name}! We'd love to hear how it went: {form_link}", in place of what was there. Press Switch it on or Add it again to confirm, and you're told "Feedback is going out now".

The fix needs "Send campaigns, set up automatic marketing, and make promo codes". Without it, the form says someone who can set up automatic marketing can do it in Messages → Automations.

#Sending a feedback form by hand, or on the salon iPad

Any feedback form can be sent by hand, whatever its rule:

• From an appointment: on its Forms card, press Add and choose the form under After the visit. Then use Fill in now, or the ⋯ menu's Text the link, Email the link or Copy link.
• From a client's profile: on the Forms tab, press Send a form, choose the form (feedback forms have a Feedback badge), and press Send link, or Fill in now to hand them the iPad.

A feedback form sent by hand uses the Feedback request wording in Settings → Reminders & SMS, not the consultation Form request (message wording). It counts as asked, so the After the visit message won't ask about the same visit again.

A feedback form sent by hand is a feedback request, as the After the visit message is: it carries a way to say no, and replying STOP to it turns off Feedback requests only. It can't be sent to a client who has said no to feedback requests: Send a form says "Sarah has said no to feedback requests, so the link can’t be sent. You can still fill it in here with them.", and Fill in now still works. Handing over the iPad works as for any form: see kiosk mode.

#When a feedback form's link closes

A feedback form's link takes answers for the days set in How long the link works: 1 to 90, 14 to start with, counted from when its link is first sent (or, for one added by hand and never sent, from when it was added). After that:

• Your client's page says "This feedback form has closed – thanks anyway!"
• The appointment shows it as "Not answered · the link has closed", and the client's Forms tab lists it under Not answered.
• It can't be sent again ("This form’s link has closed. Send the form again to ask once more."). To ask once more, send the form again from the client's profile.

Consultation forms' links don't close.

#What your client sees on a feedback form

• The link opens the form on your booking page, in your branding: its name, "About your visit on" the date with the services, then "Hi Sarah!" and your introduction. Web addresses in the introduction and help text are links.
• They answer and press Submit. They see "Thank you, Sarah!" and "Your feedback has been sent to" your salon, then your thank-you page.
• If another feedback form is waiting, they're offered Next: and its name.
• Opening the link again shows "Already done – thanks!" and the thank-you page.
• If you've turned on the client area, a feedback form waiting to be answered is listed there while its link is open (the client area).

#Clients who'd rather not be asked for feedback

Feedback requests, from the After the visit message or a feedback form sent by hand, aren't marketing, so they're on for every client until they say no. A client says no by:

• replying STOP to one (that stops feedback requests only, not marketing);
• the link at the end of one ("Stop feedback requests?");
• unticking "Ask me how my visit went" in the client area.

STOP to an appointment text, or to a consultation form link you sent by hand, stops feedback requests too. Your team can turn Feedback requests off or on in the client's details, and their Details card shows Feedback requests as On or Said no. See contact details and privacy.

#Who can see clients' feedback

Feedback often names the team, so it has its own permission: "See clients’ feedback (feedback forms sent in, and alerts about them)". Owners and managers have it to start with; staff don't (roles and permissions).

• Without it, feedback forms aren't listed on appointments or client profiles, their answers and photos can't be opened, there's no Feedback tab in Reports, and no feedback alerts.
• On a Front desk device, feedback is held back from PIN sign-ins: it isn't listed on appointments or profiles, and Reports → Feedback asks for the person's password first (shared devices).
• Sending a feedback form by hand is open to the whole team. Without "See clients’ feedback", Send a form says "You won’t see the answers: they’re for whoever can see clients’ feedback."

#Alerts when feedback comes in

A feedback form with flagged answers alerts the team ("Feedback to check"). Turn on Alert the team about every response in the form to hear about every one ("New feedback").

Feedback alerts only go to people with "See clients’ feedback". Each chooses Feedback in Settings → My account → Notifications: Off, My appointments (visits they were on) or The whole salon (for people with "Book and change other team members’ appointments"). It starts on The whole salon, or My appointments for people without that permission. A shared device set to Full access can have Feedback alerts of its own, off to start with. See team alerts.

#Where feedback answers show

• On the appointment: its Forms card lists the visit's feedback form, with where it's up to. Press View to read it.
• On the client's profile: the Forms tab, with a Feedback badge on each one sent in.
• In Reports → Feedback: every response in a period, each question's answers added up, and the latest responses (the Feedback report).

A filled-in feedback form reads, prints and flags like any form: see reviewing answers.

#Common questions

#Why isn't my feedback form going out?

Check it says Active in Settings → Forms, not Not going out or Manual. Then check its Who’s asked and How often (a client asked recently isn't due), that the visit was completed, and that the client has a mobile or email and hasn't said no to feedback requests.

#Can the After the visit message ask for a Google review and feedback at once?

Not in the message: with {form_link} it can't have other links. Add a Your Google review link button to the feedback form's thank-you page instead.

#Do clients who've said no to marketing get feedback forms?

Yes, unless they've said no to feedback requests. A feedback request isn't marketing.

#Can I turn a consultation form into a feedback form?

Only while no client has been sent it. After that, make a new feedback form.

#Can a feedback form have a signature or photos?

Yes. Every question type works on a feedback form, as on a consultation form.