Google’s internal startup incubator Area 120 pushes out some fun stuff from time to time. True, most of the the things brought to the fore by the incubator disappears from the center of public attention after a brief while, however, some of them have stayed around as well. A new application called Appointments was recently spotted under development.
The project page for Appointments is already live and you can visit it right here at salon.area120.com. However, the app is not available at any app stores yet so, it stands to reason that it is still being developed. As the address suggests, the app can help you book appointments with businesses. However, the services offered go well beyond merely allowing folks to book stuff and even lets them turn client texts into booking links.
Here is how the service describes itself:
Upgrade your schedule with a faster, smarter, and simpler booking app. Our free new phone line protects your privacy and automatically turns client-texts into booking links. Add in online booking and automated advertising – you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.
The service can work either via mobile or through its website. And once customers use it, they can see a week’s availability on their screens. You can also check out stuff like the location, directions, a gallery consisting of pictures, price list, and contact information all in a single place. it does appear that the app will be free however, it is far to early to tell.
The app could integrate well with Google’s other services. The company is all for allowing businesses to set up an online presence and offers them services like domains, e-mails, basic websites, and so on.
Google rival Microsoft is already well into the niche with an Office 365 service called Bookings. The company announced it last year and it has been seeing a fair bit of usage. A new app from Google could change the dynamics. I mean appointments are something you would like to be connected to your inbox, your smartphones and so on — and that is where Google excels.
Look at Google Assistant for example: The company allows it to pull things like appointments, tickets, journey dates from your gmail. So we could expect the company to go for something similar was it to launch a service for booking appointments with different businesses. However, all this is pure conjecture until Appointments gets publicly launched — if it ever does.
