Less than two weeks after Facebook's F8 Conference—an annual gathering where developers come together to learn the latest updates in the social sphere—another big update is making headlines, and it's especially relevant to our industry.
According to Facebook Newsroom, Facebook recently announced that it’s expanding several of its small business-focused tools in an effort to save companies time and resources, including the ability to book and manage appointments directly on Instagram and Facebook. Although the "Book" option has been available on Instagram for over a year, it's previously diverted users off of the Instagram platform to an external landing page to complete the process.
With the new in-app booking feature, Facebook hopes to eliminate the extra step, allowing service-based businesses on Facebook and Instagram to accept and manage appointments, customer information, and send appointment reminders all from their phone—and all without ever leaving the platform.
For more information on how to utilize the new feature, check out this step-by-step article.