schedulicity

Online appointment booking startup Schedulicity on Tuesday announced it will now offer a service called “Pop-Up Offers” that lets businesses post last-minute time slots with a discount in hopes of attracting more customers.

“The worst thing in the service industry is to suddenly have an empty slot at 3 p.m.,” Schedulicity CEO Jerry Nettuno told VentureBeat. “Regardless if it’s a massage therapist or a C.P.A., you want as many time slots filled as you can and we can help with that.”

Launched in 2009, Bozeman, Mont.-based Schedulicity is online service with the stated goal of helping small businesses save time and money with appointment booking. It also gives them the advantage against their peers by letting people book appointments 24 hours a day.

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Nettuno originally started the company based on the idea that booking a hair cut should not take more time than booking a flight or a hotel room. He said was struggling to get an appointment booked with a hairdresser, but it only took him minutes to book a flight to Paris.

Pop-Up Offers, while not the most memorable name, seems like a smart additional service to attract more businesses to the company’s online software. Pop-Up Offers can be posted on the company’s website as well as pushed out on social networks, including Twitter and Facebook.

“In a few clicks, businesses can assign a discount at any level they want and get an appointment re-booked pretty quickly,” Nettuno said.

Schedulicity charges $19 per month for single-user accounts and $39 per month for multi-user accounts. The 20-employee company said it is picking up traction, and its growth averages 10 to 15 percent per month. More than six million appointments have been booked to date, with one appointment booked every four seconds. It serves clients in more than 1,900 cities across the U.S. and Canada.

Schedulicity is privately funded company and declined to disclose its financial details. However, the company said it is in the process of closing its first major round and will reveal the amount raised once the round has closed.

A screenshot of the new Pop-Up Offers can be found below:

Schedulicity_PopUp_OffersSchedulicity is one of 80 companies chosen by VentureBeat to launch at the DEMO Fall 2011 event taking place this week in Silicon Valley. After our selection, the companies pay a fee to present. Our coverage of them remains objective.

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