This means staff don’t have to hide behind a desk, but can interact with clients freely. The second innovation is a yield management tool which enables spas to attract clients with time-sensitive pricing and last minute deals on slower days.

What types of spas are your products targeted at?
Book4Time’s solution suite is highly scalable and has proven capable of accommodating the needs of a wide range of spas. Our primary market is hotel and resort spas, multi-location chains and global enterprises.

What makes Book4Time different or better?
In 2005, we launched the industry’s first cloud-based spa management software and processed the first online booking appointment.
Our solution is backed by live, 24/7 unlimited product support to all clients. Most clients benefit from added convenience and reduced IT expenditures when switching from on-premise systems to Book4Time’s cloud-based solution.

What’s the price range?
We offer fixed annual and monthly plans that vary depending on the size of the spa and the number of locations. The rate also depends on which modules are choosen. Pricing and agreements are bespoke and tailored to the needs of each individual client.

As a cult business, we compete on product fit versus price, so our clients choose us on that merit as much as we choose them.

For multi-location operators, Book4Time offers full functionality and customisation options to enhance overall revenue potential.

What’s your vision? 
Our vision for Book4Time is to continue to be an innovator and bring new capabilities to market that empower our clients to better serve their customers, grow their business and improve on operational efficiencies. In addition we plan to aggressively expand our international reach from 30 countries to 40 by the end of 2013.

How are you responding to tech trends?
There are four clear trends in the industry at the moment: the growing need for scalable solutions; migration to cloud-based infrastructure; shift to mobile devices for business management; and social media for marketing and lead generation. As an innovator, we focus on these areas and aim to be a step ahead in exploring the next generation of IT trends that will change the way consumers make purchasing decisions and conduct commerce.

What else would you like to share with our readers?
We’re excited to see a growing number of the world’s most prominent brands adopt the latest trends in technology from cloud, social and mobile. This is a solid indicator that these trends have matured and are now industry standard for any serious spa business.

Our new In-Facebook Booking App, RA Mobile App and our integration into Wellnessbooking.com enable our customers to promote and sell their products anywhere and at any time.

What types of spas are your products targeted at?
When we started to develop Reservation Assistant in 2001, our goal was to build software that’s adaptable to the spectrum of wellness. Today, we’ve achieved that goal.

Reservation Assistant, with its interlocking modules, provides individual solutions for customers, ranging from resort to medical spas and fitness clubs to golf clubs.

What makes Reservation Assistant different or better?
It’s an holistic solution that manages all the activities of a property and also takes marketing and sales tasks into consideration. This includes custom-tailored guest communication in any language. We also provide 120 interfaces to other systems, which guarantees flexibility and a seamless integration. Our customers often mention our exceptional support – our team is available 24/7 and response times are very fast.

What’s the price range?
The price depends on the number of required modules, treatment rooms and user licences needed.

Operators can choose between purchasing a licence for a one-time price or using our SaaS model and paying a monthly fee.

What’s your vision?
Creating state-of-the-art software while delighting customers with innovation, outstanding service and know-how. Also, achieving these aims through fairness, respectful partnerships and keeping the needs of users in mind.

How are you responding to tech trends?
We know operators are using technologies such as social media to communicate with guests. That’s why our In-Facebook Booking App and RA Mobile App came into being. In addition, we’re exploring possibilities for cloud-based services, as this is becoming increasingly important, especially in the US.

And we’re constantly improving the user experience and functionality of our software and mobile apps. Spa clients can now book and pay via their Facebook page using Mindbody’s new Appointment Booker App. These real-time bookings are instantly integrated with the Mindbody schedule.

What types of spas are your products targeted at?
Mindbody is customisable to spas of every type and size – from day and health spas to single-service providers and multi-location spas. Through personalised training, spa owners and managers can tailor the software to their unique needs, services and structures.

What makes Mindbody different or better?
Mindbody is fully web-based: business owners can track metrics, staff can access schedules and client accounts, and customers can book and pay – all via the web, at any time. This, combined with third-party integrations, makes Mindbody one of the most comprehensive systems available.

Personal, real-time customer support is free-of-charge, with tech support based both in the UK and US.

What’s the price range?
Price is determined by the number of staff that provide services, regardless of how much revenue a business generates – or how successful it becomes. The software starts at £55 ($86 €64) for one to five service providers. No installation or additional hardware is needed, and tech support is unlimited.

What’s your vision?
Our mission is ‘leveraging technology to improve the health and wellness of the world’. We’re creating the world’s first operating system for wellness – enabling these industries to connect with millions of consumers who use our clients’ services to improve their lives. By using the latest technologies, we’re enabling business owners to follow their passion, while improving the health and happiness of the people they serve.

How are you responding to tech trends?
Spa clients are using their mobile devices to search for services and read reviews before they set foot in a spa. We’ve partnered with services like SpaFinder Wellness® to maximise clients’ online visibility and have designed mobile versions of our software to enable spa management on the go.

Our mission is to create features and functionality that both run spa operations and increase business. Another feature of SpaSoft is our yield management tool – a powerful feature which enables businesses to price effectively or offer services based on patterns, such as day of the week/time of day.

What types of spas are your products targeted at?
SpaSoft can serve any type or size of spa and wellness operation. Twenty-two of the 30 spas on the Forbes Travel Guide 54th annual listing of five star spas utilise the SpaSoft Spa Management System.

What’s the price range?
SpaSoft offers three editions which are packaged and priced to meet the needs of different sized spa businesses.

What’s your vision?
Spas are realising that their competitiveness depends on using advanced solutions to increase their agility, so they can adapt quickly to new market requirements, while driving revenue and containing costs.

Our next-generation software, Atrio Spa, has been built on the Atrio® Hospitality Technology platform. The user experience has been designed to minimise training and maximise productivity by offering faster, more cost-effective delivery of new applications and functionality.

It’s been built for the cloud and has centralised data repositories that reduce the burden of PCI compliance and data back-up at individual properties.

How are you responding to tech trends?
One of the most prevalent trends has been the move to mobile. From guests booking appointments at any time from anywhere, to innovative spa design concepts that remove the front desk and improve guest flow, these mobile solutions enable higher levels of guest service and greater revenue potential.

We’ve addressed mobile with integrations utilising the HTNG GSS (Guest Self Service) specifications. SpaSoft customers enjoy multiple mobile technology options to maximise their business. In addition, the SpaSoft Mobile for iPad solution empowers staff to provide service via tablet.

So we’re making everything we do easier for all users. Easier may mean faster or more understandable.

The world is now mobile and we’re adding significant functionality to all our mobile applications.

And because all business is about data, we’re making sure clients can access data about their business to enable them to make decisions quickly.

So these are our three areas of focus: easy, mobile and big data.

What type of spas are your products targeted at?
Premier has a range of products for every level, ranging from the Salonlite product for single-person operations, to the ‘high street’ solution – Premier Spa – to the newly launched Core system for multisite operations. Premier has 7,000 users globally.

What makes Premier Software different or better?
A lot of software systems are very similar in their functionality of scheduling, stock and marketing. Our aim is to work closely with clients to provide a feature-rich application driven by their requirements and current advances in cloud technology.

What’s the price range?
We have a complete range of options, starting with our freemium model, extending via our Salonlite solution right up to the Core system, which has a bespoke pricing structure based on the exact needs and budgets of the business – be it hotel or spa.

In short, clients will typically pay between £0, £995 and £1,995 (US$1,548-US$3,103, €1,164-€2,335) for the initial system, depending on their needs. We also provide flexible leasing options.

What’s your vision?
With our product range and our 18 years’ experience in this sector – which has given us a high level of industry expertise – our aim is not only to maintain and grow our position within the UK as one of the leading spa software suppliers, but also to expand our client base outside the UK to become one of the leading software providers to the spa industry worldwide.
How are you responding to tech trends?

Major trends are mobile, cloud and social. Premier will have solutions available in the coming year to enable customers to remain both responsive and competitive in these areas.