How to offer online booking to your customers
Today, one in two customers prefers to book their equipment online rather than call. If you don't offer this option, you're losing rentals to your competitors.
Here is a concrete, step-by-step guide to setting up online booking for your rental business.
Step 1: Prepare your online inventory
First, your inventory needs to be clear and photographed. Every rentable item needs: a precise name, a category, 2 to 5 quality photos, a short specifications description, and a rate per duration (hour, day, week).
In Rentix, you can do this in bulk via a CSV or Excel file, or one item at a time. Plan for about 5 to 10 minutes per well-filled record. It's an investment that pays off in conversion.
Step 2: Configure the booking engine
Set your booking rules: minimum duration, maximum duration, lead time (e.g., no same-hour bookings), available time slots, holidays.
You can also configure advanced rules: required deposit above a certain amount, license verification for certain equipment, requirement for a verified customer account.
Step 3: Embed booking on your website
Rentix provides an embeddable widget that drops directly into your current website (WordPress, Wix, Shopify, Astro, anything). You copy a snippet, and the booking engine appears wherever you want.
If you don't have a site, we offer a hosted booking page, ready to use, to which you can point your domain. Mobile-friendly by default.
Step 4: Enable online payment
To reduce cancellations and secure bookings, we recommend requiring payment (deposit or full) at booking time. Rentix connects to Stripe in minutes to accept credit cards.
You can also choose a deposit policy (e.g., 30% at booking, 70% at pickup) or a pre-authorized hold released at return.
Step 5: Automatic confirmation and reminders
As soon as the booking is confirmed, the customer gets a detailed email with their confirmation number, terms, and pickup address. An SMS reminder the day before drastically reduces no-shows.
Your team is also notified in real time on the dashboard and can prepare the equipment in advance. No more surprises or last-minute scrambles.
Best practices to maximize conversions
A few golden rules: ask for no more than 5 fields at account creation, show the total price including tax before payment, offer at least 2 payment methods, and guarantee a refund for cancellations within 24h.
Quality photos increase bookings by 30% to 50% according to our clients. Invest in a good photoshoot once, it's worth it.
Launch your online booking today
We help you configure your booking engine in under a day. Free 14-day trial.