The call nobody answered
When a call to the shop's number goes unanswered, the caller gets a text with the booking link and the staff get a push, app closed or not.
The phone rings while the dog is on the table. Both hands are busy. The phone sits on a shelf in the back and the caller hangs up before anyone gets to it, then dials the next shop on the list.
Slickerbook took that minute apart this month. One feature answers the caller. The other taps the staff.
The caller gets a text
Missed-call text-back answers on the shop’s behalf. Someone rings the Slickerbook number, nobody picks up, and the caller gets a text: the company’s name, a reason, and the booking link. The conversation the shop never had starts anyway, on the channel every phone owner reads.
The call shows up in the staff inbox as a row marked Missed call with the time. A number nobody has seen before becomes a new customer named after it, so the groomer can open the thread, reply by text, and rename them later. The row stays on the customer’s thread even when the text out fails.
Some shops want a person to try first. Set a forwarding number and calls ring it for 20 seconds; the text goes only if nobody picked up. Leave the field empty and the caller hears a short message, then the text follows without waiting on anyone.
The message is editable in Settings → Features. The default names the company, says why nobody answered, and hands over the intake link. It sends as a transactional message, so no marketing consent is needed to receive it, and STOP, the outbound pause and the company’s SMS setup still control it like any other text.
One switch runs all of it. The Missed-Call Text-Back toggle in Settings → Features arms the caller’s text, the inbox row and the staff alert together. With it off, the caller hears the short message and nothing follows: no text, no inbox row, no alert. A customer who calls again within four hours gets a logged call and no second text.
The staff get told
The inbox helps once someone opens it. Push notifications close the gap in between. The same event that texted the caller fires at the staff: admins and managers see Missed call, the customer’s name and the words got no answer, on every device registered under their account. Inbound texts and booking requests ride the same channel. A tap on the alert opens where the event lives: the inbox for calls and texts, the calendar for bookings.
Devices register per person. Android phones use Firebase, iPhones use Apple’s notification service over the staff apps, and any desktop browser can register through Web Push with the platform keys already generated. Switch notifications on in one browser under Settings → Team → Notifications, press Send a test notification, and that browser alone receives alerts from then on. iPhone Safari wants the site on the Home Screen first.
Registrations that die get dropped. When Firebase, Apple or the browser’s push service says a token has no device behind it, the app retires that token instead of sending alerts into the dark.
The next ring
Before this month the unanswered call left no record and nothing to act on. The caller moved on; the shop never knew. Now the same ring hands the caller a link they can act on and hands the staff a nudge they can reply to, both kept on the same customer record.
Turn on the text-back under Settings → Features, register the phones and browsers under Settings → Team → Notifications, and the next call at the tub gets handled even when both hands are holding a dog.
Filed under Running the business calls, notifications, texting