Zoho Bookings is an appointment scheduling software that offers multiple appointment types, team management, and extensive customizations so your business can enjoy a seamless booking experience. Unlike Microsoft Bookings, Zoho Bookings offers free and paid plans and can easily fit into your existing tech stack.
Microsoft Bookings is a scheduling software with limited functionalities and customizations that works well if your business has a Microsoft 365 subscription. It isn’t possible to subscribe to Microsoft Bookings separately and make it work along with your existing tech stack.
Features available in both Zoho Bookings and Microsoft Bookings
- Set up different appointment types.
- Schedule and manage appointments as a team.
- Send email or SMS notifications and reminders.
- Collect appointment-related information with booking forms.
- Set up different availabilities for different appointment types.
- Sync with Office 365 calendar and MS Teams.
- Create different shared booking pages for different teams or departments.
Key differences between Microsoft Bookings and Zoho Bookings
Appointment types
Create one-on-one, group, collective, and recurring meetings. With resource bookings, you can also rent out rooms, equipment, and more.
Create one-on-one, group, and collective meetings.
Bookings page customization
It offers extensive customization with multiple themes and color palettes to choose from. You can also add background images, contact info, and social links.
It offers minimal customization with colors or themes. Apart from your logo, you cannot add other business branding.
Booking domain
Zoho Bookings allows you to host booking pages in your domain.
MS Bookings offers a booking page which cannot be customized.
Workspaces
Zoho Bookings offers workspaces to have a separate booking setup for different departments/locations, and each workspace can have its own staff members, appointment types, workflows, and other booking customizations.
Offers shared booking page to have multiple appointments in a single link.
Appointment notification template
You can completely customizable email template to match your branding. You can add logos, change colors, and change the content of your email.
The email template cannot be customized at all. However, you can add additional information to the template if necessary.
Appointment dashboard
Appointments can be viewed and managed in calendar or list views. Admins can centrally access all appointments across different departments/teams in their dashboard.
MS Bookings offers only a calendar dashboard for viewing and managing appointments. As an admin, you cannot simultaneously view appointments across different booking pages/teams.
Integrations
Zoho Bookings natively integrates with external calendars, video conferencing, and payment apps. Other third-party apps can also be connected via APIs, Zapier, or Zoho Flow.
MS Bookings integrates with Power Automate to help connect with other Microsoft or external apps.
Workflows
Zoho Bookings allows you to create email, SMS, and custom function workflows that can be attributed to various appointment types. You can choose from various appointment triggers and set a custom time interval for initiating workflows.
Apart from configuring basic notifications, MS Bookings doesn’t allow you to create extensive workflows for appointments.
Advanced functionalities offered by Zoho Bookings
AI-powered setup
With our contextual AI, you can get started with Zoho Bookings in no time. Based on your industry and scheduling needs, Zoho Bookings' AI customizes your labels for staff, resources, and meeting types in your appointment booking dashboard. Customize this content as needed for a booking setup that works the way you need it to.
Recurring appointments
If you offer recurring workshops, classes, or meetings for a fixed duration, Zoho Bookings simplifies the process by adding a recurring schedule to your one-on-one or group appointments. When invitees schedule an appointment, they automatically get booked for all appointments in that schedule.
One-time booking links
A one-time booking link can be generated and shared with your clients or customers for each appointment type. Once an appointment is scheduled, the link becomes invalid. With one-time booking links, you can avoid spam bookings and keep your booking pages private if necessary.
Browser extension
Zoho Bookings' browser extension will be helpful if you're surfing through multiple tabs at work while meeting people. You can easily grab your booking links, share preferred time slots to your email, check your schedule, and quickly access your appointments without switching between tabs.
Calendar dashboard
With Zoho Bookings calendar dashboard, you can see your team members' appointments across different workspaces in a single dashboard, and manage multiple team members' appointments together in the week view as well. Microsoft Bookings, on the other hand, allows you to view appointments in the calendar dashboard specific to each workspace and doesn’t offer a centralized view.
White-labeled booking pages
Unlike Microsoft Bookings, Zoho Bookings offers various customizations to brand your booking pages. Each of your departments, teams, and staff can have booking pages with varying themes, colors, and background images. You can also host booking pages in your domain to customize the booking links shared with customers.
Mobile apps
Zoho Bookings' mobile app extends scheduling automation on the go. You can easily change your available times, view and manage your upcoming appointments, add new customer appointments, and share your booking links. Push notifications ensure you are updated on the status of your appointments.
Learn more
Zoho Bookings integrates with Microsoft apps
Zoho Bookings integrates natively with the following Microsoft apps:
Outlook/Office 365 Calendars
A two-way sync is established to update real-time schedules and avoid double bookings.
Microsoft Edge browser extension
Share booking links and keep a tab open for your appointments from the browser extension.
Who can use Zoho Bookings?
- Organizations that have customer-facing teams (sales, recruiters, IT, customer support, HR, and more).
- Healthcare providers who offer appointments from various locations.
- Educational institutions that offer offline classes or meetings with students.
- Service-based businesses that collect appointments from customers.
- Consultants and solopreneurs who schedule meetings with their clients.
- Finance and law professionals who provide consultations.
- And any other businesses that are looking to automate their appointment scheduling process.
Choosing the right scheduling software for your business
If you rarely schedule appointments, then Microsoft Bookings can be a good pick if you are looking for the most basic scheduling software.
If you schedule appointments frequently and want more control and better functionalities, Zoho Bookings would be the best choice for your business. Regarding scheduling automation, Zoho Bookings' versatile features and customizations offer great value for your money.
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