Price and duration questions
For a specific service rather than a price list link, including which services need a consultation first.
BEAUTY AND WELLNESS FRONT DESK
AI receptionist for salons, spas and beauty studios
In a salon the receptionist is usually whoever is nearest the phone, and they are holding a colour brush. An AI receptionist answers price and duration questions, offers real slots with the right stylist, books them, and hands over anything that needs a person's judgement.
Send your website. See Elily answer as your business.
The short version
- Most first messages are the same question: how much, how long, and when can you fit me in.
- Service duration and staff rules are what make an offered slot honest rather than optimistic.
- Deposits are common in this trade. Elily can explain your policy but cannot take a payment.
- Elily works on your salon's own WhatsApp number, so clients do not install anything.
The front desk that does not exist
Most salons, studios and spas do not have a receptionist. They have a phone on a shelf and a rule that whoever has clean hands answers it. That works until three people are in the chair and the fourth is asking whether a balayage takes two hours or four.
It also breaks at exactly the wrong time. Enquiries peak in the evening, when the shift has ended, and on Sunday, when nobody is in. The message sits until morning, by which point the client has booked wherever answered first.
An AI receptionist on WhatsApp is useful here because the question is nearly always the same shape: what does it cost, how long does it take, who does it, and when are you free. That is answerable from information the salon already publishes, if something is reading it.
What it handles in a salon or spa
Booking with the right person
Requests for a named stylist or therapist, honoured against that person's real availability rather than the salon's general opening hours.
Add-ons and packages
Explaining what is included, what can be combined, and how much longer a combined appointment takes.
Patch tests and preparation
The rules you already publish about tests before colour or lashes, and what a client should do before arriving.
Reschedules and cancellations
Moving Thursday to Friday in the same thread, with the calendar updated instead of duplicated.
Deposits and no-show policies
Explained clearly and identically to everyone. Elily cannot take or verify a payment, so the policy is stated and the payment stays with you.
Why messaging suits this trade better than voice
A client asking about hair colour will often send a photo. That is not a workaround, it is the actual best way to ask the question, and it only works in a messaging thread. When your colourist picks the conversation up, the photo is already there.
Messaging also survives interruption. A client can start booking, get pulled away, and finish twenty minutes later in the same thread. A phone call that gets interrupted is just a lost call.
And the thread persists. The quote, the booking, the change of plan and the reminder all sit in one conversation both sides can scroll back through, which settles most disagreements at the counter before they start.
Find your trade
The services, timings and booking rules differ by trade, so Elily is set up differently for each one.
Hair, barbering and nails
Colour and cut timings, skin fades and walk-ins, infills and removals: services where duration and the right pair of hands decide whether a slot is real.
Lashes, brows and aesthetics
Patch tests, consultations before treatment, and courses booked as a series rather than a single appointment.
Spas, wellness and movement
Two-therapist appointments, room availability, class capacity and packages that combine several bookings into one visit.
Tattoo and piercing
Consultation first, deposits, and custom work that cannot be priced from a list without seeing the design.
Test it with your own price list
Send Elily your salon website on WhatsApp. She reads your services, prices and hours and answers as your salon, so you can ask her the question your clients ask most.
QUESTIONS BEFORE YOU START
Common questions
Can an AI receptionist book a specific stylist?
Yes, where staff availability is in the connected calendar. Elily uses the service duration, the salon's hours and the requested team member's real availability to decide which slots can honestly be offered.
Can it take a deposit for the appointment?
Not yet. Elily can confirm the appointment and explain your deposit policy in the same conversation, but she cannot take or verify a payment herself. That step stays with your existing payment process.
Will clients know they are talking to software?
Elily answers as your business rather than pretending to be a named member of staff, and hands over to a real person when judgement is needed. Being straightforward about it costs nothing and avoids the awkward moment when someone realises.
Does it work for a single-chair studio?
That is often where it helps most, because there is nobody else to answer. The Free plan includes enough AI replies a month for a solo studio to cover evenings and days off without paying anything.
KEEP READING
Where this goes next
THE NEXT MESSAGE CAN BE HERS
The chair stays busy. The phone stops ruling the day.
Send Elily your salon website on WhatsApp. She quotes your prices, offers real slots and books them, on your own number.
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