What a Day Spa Website Needs

What the site is actually for

A day spa website has two kinds of visitor, arriving in different moods.

One is booking for themselves and wants to know what each treatment involves, its length and price, and whether Saturday has a free time.

The other is buying a gift, often late in the evening, often for someone in another town, and needs it delivered on time with a message.

A site that serves both without making either one phone during opening hours is doing its job.

What a first-time client needs to know

• What each treatment is, in words a newcomer understands.
• How long it lasts, and how long to allow for the visit.
• What it costs, with tax and the gratuity policy stated.
• Whether there is a time on the day they want.
• What happens if plans change, before they pay anything.
• What to expect from the moment they walk in.

The second is the one most menus get half right. They give a sixty-minute massage but not the time to allow for changing, a robe and tea afterwards.

A treatment menu people can read

Many spas put their printed brochure online as a PDF. It is hard to read on a phone, cannot link to a booking and keeps last season's prices.

Build the menu as web pages instead, grouped the way clients think: massage, facials, body treatments, hands and feet, packages.

Give each treatment the same facts in the same order: a plain description, who it suits, the time, the price and a button that books it.

Packages need what each includes, the total time and the price, and any saving shown should be against prices the spa genuinely charges.

If massages are given by registered massage therapists, say so, since many clients check their extended health benefits first.

Online booking that matches the menu

Booking software usually runs separately from the website, with its own list of services typed in by hand, and the two drift apart.

Use exactly the same names, times and prices in both, so a treatment chosen on the menu can be found on the booking screen.

Show real availability, let clients choose a therapist or the first one free, and send a confirmation and a reminder.

Add-ons such as a scalp massage belong in the booking itself, with their own price and time. Couples and groups, such as a wedding party, need a short enquiry form of their own.

Gift certificates bought online

Gift buyers decide quickly and often after hours. A page saying certificates are sold at the front desk sends them elsewhere.

Let buyers choose an amount or a named treatment, write a message and pick a delivery date, with the certificate sent by email to them or straight to the person receiving it.

Give each certificate a code the online booking accepts as well as the desk, so it is as easy to use as it was to buy.

Provincial rules limit expiry dates and fees on gift certificates, especially those sold for a dollar amount, so check them before printing a date.

A worked example

A day spa with five treatment rooms in a heritage building near a town's main street had its menu online as a PDF of its printed brochure.

The brochure used signature names, such as Coastal Calm, with poetic descriptions, no treatment times and last season's prices.

The online booking, run by separate software, listed the same treatments as Swedish 60 or Hydrating Facial 75.

Clients on phones could not match one list to the other. Some phoned to ask; others booked the wrong length and found out at the desk.

The menu was rebuilt as web pages using the booking system's names, with the signature name beneath. Each treatment shows its time, the time to allow, the price and a book button.

The printed brochure is now produced from the website each season, not the other way around.

Cancellation and late arrival

A missed appointment leaves a room and a therapist idle. Most spas have a policy; fewer show it before the client commits.

State the notice needed to cancel or change, what is charged without it, and whether a card is held at booking.

Say what happens when a client arrives late: usually a shorter treatment at the full price, because the next client is booked.

Put the policy in the booking screen, the confirmation and the reminder. Rules first seen in a dispute feel unfair even when they are reasonable.

The first visit

A first spa visit makes many people slightly anxious. A short page answering the questions they feel silly asking helps more than any photograph.

Give an arrival time. Say whether there is a health form, and whether it can be completed beforehand on a secure page.

Explain what to wear and what is provided, and how to tell the therapist about pressure or areas to avoid.

Mention gratuities and parking, and say whether there are stairs. In an older building there usually are.

Real photographs of real rooms

Atmosphere is much of what a day spa sells, and stock photographs of stones and orchids look like every other spa.

Photograph your own rooms, the relaxation area, the entrance and the products you use, in the light clients see. A professional with a wide lens and a tripod is worth the day.

Include the front door from the street, so people recognise it when they arrive.

Photographs of clients need their written permission. Named photographs of the team make a first visit feel less like a step into the unknown.

The counter-case

A small spa with one or two practitioners can manage for some time with phone bookings, a single menu page and gift certificates sold at the desk.

Online booking carries a monthly fee and needs someone to keep availability accurate. A spa that cannot manage that does better with a clear phone number than with a calendar that is wrong.

The sequence can change to suit the spa. The aim does not: a menu people can read, booking that works and gifts that can be bought at midnight.

What to build first

1. Turn the PDF menu into web pages.
2. Show time and price for every treatment.
3. Use the same names in the menu and the booking.
4. Sell gift certificates online, delivered by email.
5. Show the cancellation policy before anyone pays.
6. Write a first visit page with an arrival time.
7. Replace stock photographs with your own rooms.

Step three costs nothing and prevents most of the confusion, since a client who cannot match the menu to the booking screen either phones or books the wrong thing.

Writing for visitors who compare carefully before they ever walk in is also the subject of what a retirement residence website needs.

Frequently asked questions

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