The Full Slate Blog

As 2009 comes to a close, the Full Slate team would like to say “Thank you!” to our customers, partners and friends, and wish everyone a prosperous 2010. We are grateful for the support we received when Full Slate launched earlier this year, and we’re happy to see Full Slate fulfill the promise of saving you time, securing more appointments and increasing client satisfaction. We also appreciate all your feedback, which contributed to many new features, a few of which include:

• Robust Multi-Provider View;
• Online Payments with PayPal;
• Restrictions on Who Can Book an Appointment with You; and
• Ability for Clients to Search for the Best Appointment Times.

Our New Year’s resolution is to continue delivering high value to you and your business in 2010 with new features and great support. Here is just a sampling of what you’ll see next year:

• Ability for Clients to Change and Cancel Appointments;
• More Flexibility on Your Landing Pages; and
• Enhancements to the Schedule and Ways to Search for Available Time Slots.

We’re looking forward to a great 2010. Happy New Year!

Full Slate is attending the American Massage Therapy Association’s 2009 National Convention in Orlando, Florida, today through Sunday. The AMTA expects at least a thousand massage therapists to descend upon Orlando to obtain continuing education, network with industry colleagues, and learn about the latest in massage products and services. We’re very proud to be part of this event. If you are attending as well, please go see Chris Korol on the convention floor in booth 116 !

Full Slate is attending the Kelsey Group’s 2009 Directional Media Strategies (DMS) conference all week in Orlando, Florida. The Kelsey Group teamed up with the Yellow Pages Association (YPA) this year to bring together all the key players in the yellow pages and local search industry. We join an impressive list of attendees, including AT&T Yellowpages, Idearc Superpages, Yellowbook, RH Donnelley, ServiceMagic, Canpages, Yahoo, Google, AOL, Local.com, Marchex, Agendize, Clickable, WebVisible, MerchantCircle and Yodle, among many others. Full Slate plays a key role in the ‘directional media’ industry by enabling small advertisers–such as hair salons, massage therapists and pet groomers–to directly convert online visitors into booked appointments. If you’re attending as well, please seek out Bill Lange!

Please become a fan of Full Slate on Facebook…

and follow us on Twitter!

We are very excited to announce that we passed a major milestone this week.  After conducting a very successful beta program, we have decided to open up Full Slate to the rest of the world.  Now any service provider looking to offer online appointment scheduling can take advantage of our robust, web-based service.

Once again, we’d like to thank our awesome beta customers for working closely with us over the last few months.  We’ve learned a bunch and have made a number of enhancements to the product based on their feedback.  We could not have done it without them.

We want to make it as easy as possible for service providers to embrace online scheduling.  New customers may take advantage of our free trial; we’ll waive the monthly fee until at least 10 clients book appointments with you online.  It is quick and easy to get set-up – just click the ‘Try Now’ tab from our homepage.

Please try it out.  And, as always, we’d love to hear what you think.

Onward!

This is a (beta) test...

As we near the end of our private beta program, we wanted to say to our beta customers “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!”

The private beta was exceedingly valuable to us…but, first, a little background. After working on our product since earlier in the year, we kicked off the private beta in early November. Our objectives were simple: to obtain candid feedback from real, live local service providers on the features, usability and design of the product and to identify any bugs that may have slipped through our own testing.

But most importantly: we deliberately limited the number of beta customers in the program; we only looked for volunteers right here in Seattle; and we immediately addressed customer requests and then followed-up with them to ensure we had in fact met their needs.

As a result, we worked with our beta customers one-on-one and face-to-face. In most cases, we visited them at their business location and watched over their shoulders as they worked with Full Slate while meeting the continuous demands of their business. (On one occasion, I remained loyally at my beta customer’s side, valiantly fighting the urge to pet a curious shitzu watching us from a nearby grooming table!) The feedback each of our beta customers provided was invaluable.

We plan to end the private beta program within the next few weeks and launch Full Slate to everyone. So again, many thanks to our private beta customers…Full Slate is better because of you!