Service Bundling


Service Bundling

Service Bundling allows you to group related services together, creating a package deal that enhances both convenience and value for your customers. Think of it as a one-stop solution that caters to your customers’ diverse needs, saving them time and providing extra benefits.

Functionalities and Features From pet grooming services to home maintenance tasks, the applications of Service Bundling are broad. Here’s how it works:

  1. Creating Service Packages: OctopusPro’s user-friendly interface allows you to easily create new service packages. You can specify the number of bookings included, set recurrence intervals, and define package validity.

  2. Flexible Pricing: Setting pricing for your service packages is a breeze. You can choose to offer discounts for bundled services, encouraging your customers to try out more of what you have to offer.

  3. Booking Services: Your customers will find booking packages to be a smooth process. With the choice to book standalone packages or select packages within a service, they can easily find a solution that suits their needs.

  4. Streamlined Invoicing: The Service Bundling feature also simplifies invoicing. When customers book a package, all services within the bundle are automatically included in the invoice, ensuring transparency and accuracy.

Benefits and Use Cases Service Bundling benefits businesses and customers alike.

Business Benefits:

  1. Increased Sales: By offering packages that include more than one service, you can increase your initial sales.

  2. Upselling Opportunities: Bundled services can encourage customers to try out new services they haven’t considered before.

  3. Customer Retention: Providing more value for the money paid can boost customer satisfaction and retention.

Customer Benefits:

  1. More Options: Customers enjoy having a variety of choices. Different service bundles provide them with diverse options to choose from.

  2. Convenience: Booking multiple services in one go, rather than scheduling each separately, saves customers time and effort.

Use Cases:

  1. Pet Care Businesses: A package could comprise three pet grooming visits instead of just one.

  2. Home Maintenance: A homeowner could opt for a service package that includes cleaning, gardening, and minor repair work, scheduled at intervals throughout the year.

  3. Health and Wellness Services: A spa could offer a wellness package that includes massages, facials, and yoga sessions.

  4. Event Planning: An event planner could bundle services such as venue booking, catering, and decorations into one comprehensive package for clients.

We believe that the Service Bundling feature will be a game-changer in how you manage your services and interact with your customers. So, get ready to take your customer experience to a new level with OctopusPro!

Table of contents

What are packages?

Service packages refer to multiple instances of the same service grouped together. A common example can be seen in pet care businesses, where a package could constitute three pet grooming visits instead of just one. By opting for a package, customers can conveniently book a series of bundled services instead of scheduling each one separately.

How packages benefit your business 

Almost every business in various markets offers packaged services. While it looks like packages mainly benefit customers, there are multiple gains that businesses reap from those deals. From increasing sales to achieving a higher customer satisfaction rate, packages offer positive outcomes for any business. Some of these outcomes are:

  1. Packages increase the company’s initial sale
    Unlike standalone services, packages include more than one service in them. Thus, when a customer chooses to book a package, they pay for the services bundled inside, increasing the company’s initial sale. The key here is making packages and bundles that appeal to the target customer enough, convincing them to choose bundled services instead of standalone ones.
  2. Packages upsell customers without asking them to
    Bundled services, if done correctly, offer customers higher value for the money they pay. This way existing customers would try new services they have never booked before. So, instead of booking only the service they used to book, they would book one more service.

How packages benefit customers

Customers also benefit from package deals. Here are some of the benefits they get:

  1. With packages, customers have more options to choose from
    When services are bundled differently; with different numbers of occurrences or different types of services, they give customers different options to pick from.
  2. Solve many problems through a single booking
    Packages give customers the option to book only once for the different occurrences they need. This saves them from repeating the same process every time they want the service.

Setting up packages on OctopusPro

Standalone packages

To create a new standalone package, follow these steps:

1. From the sidebar menu, go to Settings > Service Settings > Services

2. In the service page, click on +Create New

3. Start by adding a service name, which would be related to the package you are creating. Then click on Create a new package+

A form will appear so you can fill in all the package information:

  1. Package Name: Input the name for this package as you’d like it to be displayed to your customers. This is a required field.
  2. Number of Bookings: Indicate the total number of bookings to be included within this package. Completion of this field is mandatory.
  3. Recur every: Specify the frequency at which the bookings should recur. You can either provide this information or opt to let the customer determine the interval themselves. This field is optional.
  4. Expires after: Enter the duration (in days) post which the package will no longer be valid. This is an optional field and it can be left blank if you wish to allow the customer to decide this.

You can create as many packages as you want. Just click on Create a new package+

After creating a package and adding its details, click on next to set the pricing of the service within this package. Choose how you want to charge your customers for this service. In this case, since it’s a saving package you can make the cost of the service less than the original cost of the actual service. So, if you usually charge $70 for an oil change service, you can instead charge them $60 for each oil change if they choose to book this package. 

Packages as an option within a service

You can also create packages within a service if you want to give your customers an option to either book a service once or book it multiple recurring times depending on the package you create. 

To do that, follow these steps:

1. From the sidebar menu, go to Settings > Service Settings > Services

2. In the service page, select the service you want to add a package for, and then click on edit. 

3. On the service edit page, click on Create a new package+

A form will appear so you can fill in all the package information:

  1. Package name: write the name of the package you want to be shown to the customers. This field is mandatory.
  2. Number of bookings: enter the number of bookings you want to include in the package. This field is mandatory.
  3. Recur every: enter the time intervals at which the booking is repeated. This field is optional; you can either fill it in or leave it to the customer to decide.
  4. Expires after: write the number of days after which the package is no longer valid. This field is optional; you can either fill it in or leave it to the customer to decide.

After that, click on Create a new package+

As for the second package form, add the name of the package as a one-off service, so you can give your customers the option to either book that service once or choose the previous package and book an annual subscription. 

  1. Package name: This will be shown to your customers, and will help them which package to choose. 
  2. Number of bookings: write the number of bookings for this package, in this case, you only want it to occur once. 
  3. Leave the Reccur every and expiry date empty.  

After that, click on Next and save your service, and packages included. 

Booking packages through the portal

Booking a standalone package

When booking a standalone package, customers should navigate to your services page, and pick the package that they need. In this case, we will be picking the “Oil Change Saving Package”

On the service details page, customers will be able to see the package details of this service. To schedule the service including the package, click on “Schedule an appointment”.

First, add in the location, then select the required quantity for the service, and click on “Continue”. 

After that, select the appropriate date and time for the package, and click “Next”. 

Since this package consists of 3 bookings, you will be able to see the scheduled dates for each, if you wish to edit any of the time or date, click on edit. Click on “Next” to finalize the booking process and confirm the booking. 

Booking a package as an option within a service

When booking a package within a service, customers should navigate to your services page, and pick the service that they need. In this case, we will be picking the “Oil Change” 

On the service details page, customers will be able to see the package details of this service. To schedule the service including the package, click on “Schedule an appointment”.

First, add in the location, then select the required package. Customers can either schedule an annual subscription, or they can schedule a one-off service which will only take place once. The details are included for them to decide what they need. 

If available, customers can then add/select the required custom fields, they should then click on “Continue to checkout” to select the date and time of the package selected. 

Since this package consists of 3 bookings, you will be able to see the scheduled dates for each, if you wish to edit any of the time or date, click on edit. Click on “Next” to finalize the booking process and confirm the booking. 

Package invoicing

OctopusPro gives you multiple ways to invoice your packages. You can decide how you would like to invoice the customers. The options are as follows:

1. Generate an individual invoice for each booking within the package booked

If you choose this invoicing option, the system will give you two other choices:

  • Generate all individual invoices at once when the bookings are created.

This option allows the system to generate all the invoices for the service occurrences included in the booking once the booking is created.

  • Generate the first booking invoice only when the bookings are created.

When selecting this option, invoices will be generated per service. To make it clearer, the system will generate a single invoice each time one of the package services is booked.

2. Generate one invoice that combines all bookings within the package

This option will let the system generate only one invoice for all the services included in the package.

3. Don’t generate any invoices when the bookings are created

In the case of selecting this option, no invoices would be generated automatically when packages are booked. Rather, you would manually create the invoices whenever wanted.

Packages | Use cases

When services are bundled differently, they give customers different options to pick from.
Here are some use cases that highlight how different industries can benefit from the Packages feature. These are some of the best suggestions that business owners can get ideas from or even replicate when setting up their own Packages. Next is a step-by-step guide on how to create different Packages for different industries.

Animal Care

The industry of Animal Care has many different service categories such as Dog Grooming, Vet services, Dog Training, and Dog walking.
Admin users have the option to create a package that is a bundle of the same service by scheduling the same service a specific number of times.
To create a package, please follow the below steps:

  • Login to your Admin user account then navigate to Settings> Service Settings
  • Click on Services then click on Create new
  • Fill-in the required info then click “Next
  • Scroll down after selecting how to invoice your customer to the part where you can select where to provide the service.
  • Complete required info and upload service images or videos “optional” to help customers understand how the service works.
  • Click on Next
  • The system will then redirect you to the cost and payrate page where you’ll need to update the below:
    • Fill in the package cost information
    • Choose whether your service is paid or free 
    • Set-up payment options as per your business
    • Set up the payrates of your fieldworkers by selecting the payment structure then add its required options
  • After filling in all the information required, click on “Next”.
  • The system will then redirect you to the Custom fields page. Add any custom fields you want then click on “Save”.
Home Maintenance

The industry of Home Maintenance has many different service categories such as Pool Cleaning, Gardening & Lawn Mowing, Irrigation & Reticulation, Drainage, Landscaping, Furniture Assembly, and so on.

As an Admin user, you have the option to create a package with more than one service or to create a package with same service, provided that it would be available multiple times at a discounted price, this helps in selling services with low or none demands.

As an example, you may create a package that contains the service of Pool Cleaning and Gardening.

To create the advised package, you may follow the below steps:

  • Go to Settings > Service Settings > Services
  • Click on Services then click on Create new

  • Add service title and select | add category then click on Create a new package
  • Fill-in the required info then click “Next
  • Scroll down after selecting how to invoice your customer to the part where you can select where to provide the service.
  • Complete the required info and upload service images or videos “optional” to help customers understand how the service works.
  • Click on Next
  • The system will then redirect you to the cost and pay rate page where you’ll need to update the below:
    • Fill in the package cost information
    • Choose whether your service is paid or free 
    • Set up payment options as per your business
    • Set up the pay rates of your fieldworkers by selecting the payment structure and then add its required options
  • After filling in all the information required, click on “Next”.
  • The system will then redirect you to the Custom fields page. Add any custom fields you want then click on “Save”.

For more information please visit Octopuspro user guide, and subscribe to our youtube channel.

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