StudioDock Help Center & Setup Guide

Step 1

Getting Started

After registration you get a 14-day trial of the Pro plan. A guided onboarding checklist walks you through each step — most studios are live within 5 minutes.

Spaces & Pricing

Each space has independent pricing and availability settings, letting you optimize revenue per room.

• Create each space with photos, descriptions, and display ordering.
• Set weekday vs. weekend hourly rates per space.
• Configure buffer times (e.g. 30 min) to avoid rushed transitions between bookings.
• Set minimum booking duration to prevent unprofitable short bookings.
• Set capacity per space for concurrent bookings (e.g. multi-chair makeup zones or coworking desks).
• Enable last-minute discounts per space with a minimum hourly floor to protect revenue.
• Add arrival instructions (access codes, parking, directions) — shown in confirmation emails.
• Plan limits: Solo allows up to 3 spaces, Pro up to 10, Scale is unlimited.

Embeds & CMS

StudioDock embeds stay iframe-first. For WordPress, use the official thin wrapper plugin. For Webflow, Wix, Framer, or WordPress.com, use the same iframe snippet in the platform's HTML/embed component.

• Copy the embed URL or iframe snippet from Spaces admin.
• Use the WordPress plugin when you want a shortcode or Gutenberg block instead of raw iframe HTML.
• Keep the iframe height generous; 1600px is a good starting point for most booking forms.
• Online checkout and success states can break out into the full browser window for a smoother payment flow.

Add-ons & Equipment

Add-ons are first-class booking resources — not just text fields. They support inventory tracking, capacity limits, and staff assignment.

• Create add-ons for equipment (cameras, lights) or services (makeup artist, assistant).
• Choose flat or per-hour pricing (per-hour requires Pro or Scale).
• Set quantity limits and option variants (e.g. backdrop color) — requires Pro or Scale.
• Link add-ons to specific spaces for inventory/availability dependencies.
• Assign staff members so the system prevents double-booking people.

Team Management

The recommended workflow for staff-based add-ons (e.g. Videographer, Lighting Assistant, Makeup Artist):

1. 1In the Team tab, invite a team member (Admin, Manager, or Freelancer), mark them as Bookable, and set their priority.
2. 2In the Add-ons tab, create the service add-on and assign that team member as a resource.
3. 3The system handles availability matching, validation, and conflict prevention automatically during booking.
4. 4On Pro and Scale, you can enable booking claims so new operational bookings are emailed to eligible bookable freelancers and the first teammate to accept becomes assigned.

Solo plan: 2 total seats including the owner. Pro: up to 5 total seats. Scale: expanded capacity.

Staff Schedule & Time-Off

A dedicated staff timeline calendar lets you see every team member's day at a glance and manage their availability.

• Per-staff columns show bookings, add-on assignments, and buffer times in one timeline.
• Optional claim rounds let rotating freelancers receive booking invites by email and self-assign the session before someone else takes it.
• Click "Time Off" to block a staff member for a specific date/time range with an optional reason.
• Time-off blocks are respected by the availability engine — clients can't book unavailable staff.
• Click any booking block to edit it inline — change space, time, duration, price, or add-ons.
• Mobile-optimized with sticky time column and floating action button for quick booking creation.

Staff schedule is available on Pro and Scale plans (requires team seats).

Payments & Invoicing

StudioDock supports multiple payment methods, all configurable per tenant.

Gift Cards & Prepaid Bundles

Sell code-based gift cards and prepaid hour packages from a public storefront. Clients purchase online via Stripe, receive delivery emails right away, and can use the code during checkout. On the Scale plan, customers can also save gift cards to the client portal for later.

• Gift vouchers (money-based) — buyers receive a unique redeemable code with purchaser and recipient delivery support. The same code can cover all or part of a booking and keeps its remaining balance until used up. Available on Pro and Scale.
• Hour bundles — prepaid packs of studio hours (e.g. 10h) that can be restricted to specific spaces. Available on Pro and Scale.
• Gift purchases — support separate purchaser and recipient emails, email-first delivery, and an optional printable PDF attachment controlled from a single tenant-level gift card design setting.
• Optional expiry — set validity periods per template; grants expire automatically after the configured window.
• Admin visibility — browse issued gift cards with code, purchaser, recipient, claimed email, remaining balance, purchase reference, and on-demand PDF download.
• Scale portal add-on — on the Scale plan, clients can add a gift card code to the portal, see claimed gift cards, remaining balance, expiry, and separate wallet history for prepaid hours.

Promo Codes & Wallet Credits

StudioDock supports both manual promotions and wallet-based retention flows, while keeping gift card redemption inside the same lightweight checkout experience.

• Create percent or fixed-amount promo codes for campaigns, partnerships, or seasonal offers.
• Set max-use limits and expiry dates to keep discounts controlled.
• Guests use one shared code field during booking checkout for promo codes and gift cards, so there is no separate or confusing redemption UI.
• On the Scale plan, eligible client-portal cancellations are refunded back to the customer wallet automatically, keeping the value inside your ecosystem.
• Wallet credits encourage rebooking without forcing clients to manage one-off coupon strings.

Admin Bookings & CRM

Your admin dashboard is designed for daily studio operations — from managing today's schedule to tracking long-term customer relationships.

• Admin Schedule Calendar — visual timeline starting at 06:00 with buffer indicators and click-to-book on empty slots.
• Claims inbox — track open booking claims, resend invites, close claim rounds, or manually assign a freelancer from one place.
• Fully editable bookings — change space, date, start time, duration, end time, and price directly in the booking details modal.
• Historical price breakdown — bookings keep a price snapshot so admins can always see the original rate, discounts, add-ons, and manual overrides later.
• Customer autocomplete — start typing a client name and the system suggests existing customers, auto-filling email and phone.
• Customer CRM page — aggregated table with name, email, phone, total bookings, total spent, and last appointment date.
• Smart filters — filter by date range, status, space, and sort by upcoming or recently booked. Defaults to today's view.
• Duration picker — dropdown from 30 min to 12 h that auto-adjusts end time when you change start time or duration.
• Google Calendar sync — Pro and Scale studios can connect one Google Calendar in Settings and mirror future confirmed bookings to the connected account's primary calendar. This is a one-way operational sync, not a two-way calendar import.

Customer Portal

Customers access the portal using secure Magic Links — no passwords to remember or reset.

• Clients enter their email and receive a one-time login link.
• View upcoming and past bookings, status, and payment method in one dashboard.
• Stripe-paid bookings can expose invoice download links directly inside the booking cards.
• Self-service cancellation within your configured policy window.
• Eligible cancellations are refunded back to the customer wallet automatically.
• Gift cards can be saved to the portal, claimed to the customer email, and tracked by remaining balance.
• Wallet balances — clients see active gift card and hour bundle balances with full ledger history.

Customer Portal is available on the Scale plan.

Analytics Dashboard

Track your studio's performance with real-time KPIs and insights built directly into your admin panel.

Automated Emails

StudioDock sends all transactional emails automatically. On Pro and Scale plans, emails can be sent from your own domain.

Additional emails: cancellation notices, wallet refund confirmations, team invites, magic-link portal login, and onboarding welcome.

Booking Migration

Switching from Peerspace, Bookly, or another booking system? Use the admin data hub to import history, review normalized times, and export clean booking data whenever needed.

• Peerspace header detection can auto-apply a preset mapping, while custom CSV and Bookly imports still support manual field mapping.
• Preview raw source times next to normalized StudioDock local times before importing, so timezone mistakes are easy to catch.
• Duration parsing from human-readable formats ("2 h", "30 min", "1 h 30 min").
• Status normalization maps Bookly statuses (Approved, Rejected) to StudioDock equivalents.
• External imports are duplicate-safe through source IDs and import fingerprints, so re-importing the same file skips already-known bookings.
• Peerspace-style masked emails stay out of your first-party CRM while imported revenue still appears in bookings and analytics.
• From the same hub, admins can export either an accounting CSV or a portable bookings CSV for migration or finance work.

Languages & Currencies

StudioDock supports multilingual booking journeys and displays customer-facing prices in your configured tenant currency.

Booking Rules & Calendar

Fine-tune how your calendar behaves with business rules that match your studio's workflow.

• Working hours — define when your studio is open for bookings.
• Peak hours — set time windows with automatic surcharge pricing.
• Overtime — configure a start hour and premium rate for late sessions.
• Duration discounts — automatic discounts at 2h, 4h, and 8h tiers.
• Last-minute auto-discounts — fill empty slots with configurable 24h / 12h / 3h discount tiers. Enable per space with a minimum hourly floor to protect margins.
• Closures — block full days or specific time ranges for holidays, private events, or early closing.
• Cancellation window — set the deadline for client self-cancellation.