Two actions, two pages
A parent who has seen the rooms and read the fees wants to do one of two things: come and look, or get their child's name down for a place that does not exist yet. Most childcare sites offer a phone number and a generic contact form for both. The parent leaves a voicemail, the manager rings back at four, the parent is in a meeting. Viewings and waitlist by voicemail is one of the three pains on every childcare site we replace.
The setup is two dedicated pages, Book a viewing and Join the waitlist, each doing one job, linked from the header and from the foot of every room and fees page.
Book a viewing
A viewing is an appointment, and it should be booked like one: a calendar of real slots the manager has made available, picked and confirmed online, with a reminder the day before.
Fields. Parent name, phone, email, child's name and date of birth (or due date), the sessions they are interested in, the start date they have in mind, and a free box. Seven fields. Everything else can be asked at the viewing.
Tools. If your nursery software offers viewing booking, use it, so the enquiry lands where you manage it. Famly and Blossom both take enquiries and manage prospective families; a booking tool such as Acuity or Bookeo handles the slot picking where the nursery software does not. Either way the parent sees a calendar, picks a time, gets a confirmation and a reminder, and the manager sees it in the diary.
Slots. Two or three viewing times a week that you can honour, set in the tool. A parent booking one is choosing you over a nursery that made them phone.
The page. One line of reassurance ("Viewings take about forty minutes; bring your child if you like"), the calendar, the phone number for anyone who prefers to call. Nothing else.
Join the waitlist
A waitlist registration is a form, not a booking, and it needs the details that let you place the child later.
Fields. Parent name, phone, email; child's name and date of birth or due date; sessions wanted (tick the ones from your Fees page); preferred start date; whether they have a sibling with you; how they heard about you. Nine fields, and the sessions list should be the same records the fees page uses.
Where it goes. Into the waitlist in your nursery software. Famly, Blossom and Kinderly all hold prospective families and waitlists; the form either embeds from the software or posts into it. For a setting without nursery software, the form lands in a spreadsheet or CRM with an email to the manager. What matters is that it is one list, in order, with the details needed to fill a place when one opens.
The page. Explain how the list works in three sentences: how places are offered, whether there is a registration fee, how long a parent has to accept. Parents put their names on lists without knowing any of this and then feel ambushed.
After the form
Both pages end in a thank-you message that says what happens next and when. "We will confirm your viewing by text today" or "We review the waitlist each term and will contact you when a place matches". A parent who knows the timeline does not phone to check.
Variations by setting
Clubs. A holiday club rarely runs viewings, but it does run waitlists for oversubscribed weeks. ClassForKids, Sawyer, iPAL and Bookeo all handle the waitlist for a full session and offer the place automatically when someone drops out.
Baby classes. A baby class business replaces the viewing with a trial class, booked online by age band, then term enrolment with a waitlist for full terms. Same two-page logic, different words.
Nanny agencies. A nanny agency replaces both with a detailed family enquiry form (children, hours, location, start date, budget) into its CRM, and a consultation call booked through Calendly or Acuity.
Babysitting. A babysitting service is closer to a straight booking: date, time, number of children, location and needs, with the rate shown.
Testing it
Book a viewing from a phone and time how long the confirmation takes. Submit a waitlist registration and check it appears in the software, in order, with the sessions ticked. Do both monthly; embeds and integrations break quietly, and the parent who hits the broken one does not tell you.
Common mistakes
- One contact form for viewings, waitlist, jobs and everything else.
- A viewing form with no calendar, so the manager still has to phone to agree a time.
- A waitlist form that asks for sessions in a free text box.
- Registrations in an inbox, not a list.
- No statement of how the waitlist works.
- The booking tool's page as the Instagram link, with no way back to the rooms and the fees.
Where this sits
Book a viewing and Join the waitlist are two of the nine pages on every childcare website we build, wired into Famly, Blossom or the booking tool the setting already uses. The site has spent its effort convincing a parent to visit; these two pages are where it stops making them leave a voicemail.