Appointment link on your Google Business Profile
Many clients look up your salon in Google first. If an appointment link appears next to your business details, they book an appointment right away instead of calling or looking further.
What visitors see
When someone looks up your salon in Google Search or Google Maps, your Business Profile appears: name, opening hours, photos and reviews. An appointment link is added to that.
The link leads to your own booking page in Salonnare. There the client picks a service, a staff member and a time, exactly as they would from your website. You pay no commission per booking -- Google only sends the visitor your way.
The prominent blue Book online button you see on some salons is reserved for Google's booking partners. That button, too, simply forwards the visitor to that provider's booking page -- nothing is booked inside Google itself. The difference is in the styling, not in what the client can do.
Connecting from Salonnare
You set up the connection in one place: Settings > Google Business Profile.
- Go to Settings and open the Google Business Profile section.
- Click Connect with Google. You are taken to a Google sign-in screen.
- Sign in with the Google account that manages your Business Profile. That is usually the account you created the profile with, or the one you use to manage it in Google Business Profile.
- Grant permission. You then return to Salonnare.
- Pick your location from the list. If you manage several locations under the same account, they all appear here.
- Turn on Appointment link on my Business Profile.
That's it. Salonnare places the link and then checks every day that it is still there and still points to the right page.
Can't connect, for instance because you manage the profile with a different account? You can always add the link manually, as described below.
What else the connection does
The connection does more than the appointment link. Once it is active, this happens too.
Your Google reviews are imported. Salonnare fetches the reviews of the selected location from Google every hour. If a review disappears at Google, it disappears here too. You find them under Settings > Google reviews, where you can read them and have a draft reply generated for them. That reply is kept in Salonnare; posting your response is something you do at Google yourself.
You can show your Google rating on your salon page. Switch on the Your Google score on your salon page toggle under Settings > Google reviews. One line then appears at the top of your reviews on your public salon page in the marketplace, with your rating on Google, the number of reviews there and a Read them on Google link. The review texts themselves do not appear: Google's terms do not allow us to show their review texts on our own site, while a rating is a fact about your salon and is allowed. When you connect your business profile the toggle is switched on right away: if you connect, you usually want to show the rating too. If you switch it off it stays off, even if you have to grant permission again later. As long as Salonnare has not yet retrieved a rating from Google, nothing changes on your salon page anyway.
Your own average stays yours. Google reviews do not count towards the rating over the reviews clients leave through Salonnare. The Google rating sits beside it as a separate second number, exactly as Google reports it. See Client Reviews.
A low rating gets you a notification. When a 1 or 2 star review comes in, you get a notification in the app so you can respond quickly.
The review link and the location id are filled in. When you pick your location, Salonnare fetches the review link and the place id of that location from Google and puts them in the Google review link and Google Business place ID fields under Settings > Google reviews. Only if they were still empty: a value you entered yourself stays put. If you later pick a different location they are replaced, because by then they belong to the wrong location.
If there is a Google review link in your settings, the button in the review request email sends your client to Google. The button first passes through Salonnare's review page - which awards the loyalty points and forwards to Google after a few seconds - but the review itself ends up on Google and not in Salonnare: no review of your own is added, your average on your salon page does not move, and there is no notification about a new review. Those reviews come in through the hourly retrieval round instead. If you want clients to review in your own form, clear the Google review link field. If you disconnect the Business Profile, Salonnare clears that link itself. See Client Reviews.
Setting it up manually
Would you rather not connect, or is it not available yet? Then add the link to your Business Profile yourself.
- Open your Business Profile in Google, through Google Search, Google Maps or the Google Business Profile app.
- Go to Edit and find the section for bookings or appointments.
- Choose the transaction type Appointment.
- Paste the link to your own booking page. You will find it in Salonnare under Settings > Booking link & widget.
- Save.
If there are several links, you can mark one as the preferred link. That one takes priority in the display.
A manually added link works just as well for your client. The difference is that you have to update it yourself when the address of your booking page changes. With a connection, Salonnare does that for you.
There is already a booking link from another provider
If you used a different booking system before, the booking link on your profile is often still registered to that provider.
Google cannot remove that link on your behalf, and neither can we. Only the provider who placed it can do so, or you through your Business Profile. In your Business Profile, go to Bookings and choose Remove provider. The provider then has five days to process it. Only once the old link is gone can we place the new link.
If you try to switch the link on while another link is still there, Salonnare tells you and does nothing further. So you lose nothing.
Google does not allow the button for every business category
Whether you may place an appointment button on your profile is decided by Google based on your profile's business category. If that category does not allow it, Google refuses the button, no matter how well the rest of your connection is set up.
We measured this on real profiles:
| Primary category | Appointment button allowed |
|---|---|
| Beautician | no |
| Beauty salon | yes |
The pattern: pick a category that describes the business, not the profession. Beauty salon, Hair salon or Nail salon describe a business; Beautician, Hairdresser or Nail technician describe what you do. Google treats those two differently.
Google does not publish a list of categories that allow the button, so we cannot give you a complete one. The two above are measured; the rest is a pattern, not a guarantee.
Google also sets these requirements regardless of your category: your business must be verified, the link must point to a page where the visitor can actually complete the booking, that page must be reachable by Google, and you may have at most 20 links of the same type on your profile. In some countries the feature is not available at all.
Changing the category
Open your Business Profile at Google, go to Business information > About > Business category and set the primary category to a salon type. You may keep additional categories alongside it.
Google needs time after such a change, and gives inconsistent answers in the meantime: one moment the button is allowed, the next it is not. We measured that within a single minute. If turning it on does not work straight away, try again later instead of doubting your settings.
If the button really is not possible, Salonnare places a link
If Google refuses the button for your category, Salonnare does not give up. We then ask Google which link fields your profile does allow, and put your booking link in the first one that fits: Appointment links, otherwise Link to menu or services.
What this means for your customer: it is not a "Book" button in Google Maps, but a link on your business profile. It still takes them to your booking page.
You do not have to do anything; it happens automatically when you turn the connection on. If you do want the real button, set your primary category to a salon type and turn the connection on again.
Frequently asked questions
Salonnare says my category does not allow the button. Now what? That message now only appears when Google allows neither a button nor a link field on your profile. In that case, set your primary category to one that describes your business, for example Beauty salon or Hair salon, instead of your profession. See Google does not allow the button for every business category above. Then give Google some time.
The link isn't there yet, even though I set everything up. Google does not always process changes to a Business Profile immediately. Give it a day. If it stays away, check that you picked the right location and that there is no link from another provider left on your profile.
The address of my booking page is changing. Do I need to change the link? No. (Connecting your own domain isn't possible yet, by the way; that feature is marked Soon.) With a connection, Salonnare checks every day that the link still points to the right address and updates it if needed. If you added the link manually, you have to change it yourself.
What happens if I disconnect? The appointment link disappears from your Business Profile and we remove our access to your Google account. The imported Google reviews are deleted as well and the Your Google score on your salon page toggle goes off, because without a connection we can no longer keep them up to date. Your profile at Google stays unchanged: the reviews are still there. Your own reviews in Salonnare also stay. You can connect again later; the reviews are then fetched once more.
The Google review link field is cleared as well. From then on the review request email sends clients back to Salonnare's own review form, so your own reviews start coming in again. If you would rather keep sending clients to Google, fill that field in again yourself under Settings > Google reviews.
Can a staff member set this up? Only staff with edit rights on this settings section. You set rights per staff member, see Staff.