How to take bookings from Instagram

If you cut hair, take photographs, train people, do nails or run a treatment room, Instagram is where people find you and your bio link is where they decide. A page that answers their questions and hands them a booking button turns a browse into an appointment.

Here is what that page looks like, and how to set it up.

The three questions to answer

Almost everybody arrives with the same three, in this order.

1. Do you do the thing I need?
2. What does it cost?
3. When can I come, and where are you?

Answer those in the first three screens and the booking takes care of itself. Leave one unanswered and people go back to Instagram to ask, which most of them never do.

The card order that works

Intro. A photograph of you or your work, your name, what you do and the town you do it in. Somebody who found you through a repost needs to know where you are before anything else matters.

Book. One button, straight into whatever takes your appointments. This is the reason the page exists, so it goes second and never lower.

Prices. Say them. A page that lists prices is answering the question everybody is about to ask, and it brings you enquiries from people who are ready rather than people who are checking. If your work varies, give a starting price and say what moves it.

Find us. Hours, address, and the small practical things: parking, the buzzer, which door. This is the card people come back to on the day.

Make the booking button open properly

Most people reach your page inside Instagram's own browser, and some booking systems behave differently there. Test yours the way a customer will: open Instagram, tap your own link, and go all the way through to the confirmation screen. If your calendar struggles inside the in-app browser, most systems offer a direct booking address that opens cleanly, and that is the one to link.

Collect enquiries as well as bookings

Some people want to ask before they commit, and DMs are easy to lose. A short form on the page gives you their name, their email address and what they want, all in one place, and it means you can reply properly when you are between clients rather than mid appointment.

Five fields is plenty: name, email, what they are after, when suits them, and anything you should know. Every extra field costs you enquiries.

Take a deposit

A deposit turns a booking into a commitment, and it is the single most effective thing against an empty chair. Set it at a value that would cover the gap, say clearly what happens to it if they cancel, and put that sentence on the same card as the button.

Then put it in your bio

One address, straight to the page. Here is where the link field is in the app, and it works the same on TikTok, in your email signature and printed on a card in your window.