How Customers Make Reservations on Your Website

This article shows what the reservation making process looks like on the customer's end.

WATCH: How to Activate & Start Managing Reservations

Reservations Overview

Reservations Page

1. Once a customer goes to your reservations page, they will be presented with a form where they are able to enter all the necessary details:

2. The customer is able to select:

How many people are in the reservation
Date and time of the reservation

Note: Customers will only be able to select dates and times that fall within your 'operational hours' and those times that aren't restricted by blocked off hours.

3. After entering the necessary information, the customer will click "Find a table". This will take them to the second step of the process, where they enter their details.

4. After filling all the fields, the customer will click "Confirm Reservation" to send the inquiry and confirm their table.

Reservation Inquiry Follow-Up

1. After inquiring, customers' contact info will be automatically entered into your SpotHopper email marketing system, so they can be emailed or texted after a few weeks and reminded to make another reservation, place on online order, or host a special event.

2. The guest will receive a status email to the email address that they used to book the reservation. The email contains the link to the reservations details page. Below is an example of the reservation details page.

If you are using "Auto Confirm" to save time managing incoming reservation inquiries, then your customer will see the following confirmation screen and email.

Confirmation screen example:

Email example:

If you are manually managing your reservations, then guests will see the following status screen after submitting their inquiry along with the accompanying email:

Status screen:

Email example:

3. Ensure more guests show up to your restaurant on time by enabling your 'Automatic Reservation Reminder.' After activating this from your Reservation settings, your customers will receive a reminder email at a set time prior to their reservation.

Email example:

Different Ways to Approve Your New Reservations

1. Manually Confirm

This is when you will need to respond to the customer letting them know that you can accommodate their reservation. You can do this from the platform via email or you can call the customer yourself.

2. Auto Confirm

This is when the customer will automatically receive a confirmation rather than you having to reach out to let them know.