You must first create Service, Product and Course Categories before creating the Services, Products and Courses that will be allocated to them.
Service Categories are the most important to create correctly - there are three important reasons:
Clients will see services grouped by category when booking online.
Rules can be applied to all services in a category to save time e.g. which consent forms are connected to them or which staff can perform them. Put similar services in the same category.
Some reports will group services together by category
Product categories and brands are useful when performing stock takes as you can choose to count the stock of a category of product.
Course categories are not currently so important in Collums but we would recommend that you choose the same category name as the services within them.
Applying category rules
Where there are groups of resources that will share certain rules, these rules can be applied at the category level. This will mean that you can apply rules (e.g. room, equipment, staff, consent & treatment forms) to the entire category saving you the time in applying the rules to each service one at a time.
Importance of categories in reporting
It is very useful to see the performance of groups of services. The category & type sales report is the most popular in reporting sales performance. This report shows the sales performance of each category e.g. Laser hair removal.
Ensure that you group your services into the categories that you'd like to see them reported in.
TIPS : 💡
Put all laser hair removal treatments into a category called "Laser hair removal". All these services are likely to require the same room, equipment, staff etc.
Put all dermal filler treatments into a category called "Dermal filler".
Consider splitting out collagen stimulators (Radiesse, Ellanse etc) into their own category as they are likely to use a different consent form to dermal fillers.
Consider splitting out skin boosters/Profhilo etc if you wish to see their sales performance separately from volumising dermal fillers.
Create a category called "Consultations" and create separate consultation services e.g. Toxin consultation, Filler consultation etc.
Create a category called "Reviews" and create separate review services e.g. Toxin consultation, Filler consultation etc.
Create a category called "Late cancellation" to house the service for charging late cancellation / no show service - you need this service to be able to create the invoice to charge the fee.
Put products of the same brand into the same category e.g. all ZO Skin Health products in a category called "ZO Skin Health"
Consider a category called "Medicines" or "POM" for your prescription items.