Bookly–Square–Google Calendar Integration Call — 2026-04-05
Overview
Weekly project call with the La Marie Beauty team to review progress on the Bookly + Square integration. Roxana was unable to attend. The call surfaced a key technical blocker — Zapier cannot establish a return connection from Square back to Bookly — and landed on Google Calendar as the centralized sync hub to resolve it. The team also aligned on a revised UX flow for service variation selection.
Attendees:
- Katie Schueller (La Marie Beauty) — client lead
- Lisa Frommelt (La Marie Beauty) — not present; note referenced
- Roxana Lopez (La Marie Beauty) — absent
- Chris Ostergaard (Asymmetric) — lead developer
- Melissa Cusumano (Asymmetric) — project manager
- Mark Hope (Asymmetric)
Key Decisions
1. Google Calendar as Centralized Sync Hub
Zapier cannot establish a two-way connection directly between Bookly and Square. The approved solution is to route all calendar events through a shared Google Calendar: both Bookly and Square sync to it independently, achieving effective two-way awareness without a direct Bookly↔Square pipe. Because La Marie Beauty already uses G Suite (managed by Katie), no new Gmail account is needed — existing Google Workspace accounts are compatible.
2. Service Variation UX — Away from Individual Tiles
The team confirmed the direction to consolidate service variations onto single product pages rather than displaying each variation as its own tile. The revised flow:
- User lands on a service category page
- Selects a specific service (e.g., "Anything But Basic Facial")
- Chooses a variation from options on that product page
- Clicks a CTA button → enters the Bookly booking flow for that specific service/variation
Chris has all variations already entered in Bookly with pricing. The remaining work is connecting the product-page selection to the correct Bookly event (to be done with Eshaq).
3. "Book Now" Button Text Needs Revision
The current "Book Now" CTA on service tiles goes directly to booking. Under the new flow, clicking it first lands users on the variation-selection page — creating a confusing double "Book Now" experience. The button text needs to change (suggestion: "View Now" or similar). Final wording to be confirmed; Lisa's preference should be considered.
Technical Notes
Zapier Two-Way Sync Limitation
- Chris can push data Bookly → Square via Zapier successfully.
- The reverse direction (Square → Bookly) cannot be established through Zapier.
- Root cause: Bookly relies on a paid Zapier add-on for all external communication; it does not expose a native inbound connection from Square.
- Additional issue: timestamp format mismatch between Bookly and Square is causing appointment creation failures in Square. Chris is using an AI-assisted Zapier step to normalize the timestamps and is optimistic about resolving it.
Duplicate Customer Prevention
Chris has implemented a lookup step: before creating a new customer record in Square, Zapier checks for an existing customer by email and phone number. Duplicates will not be created.
Google Calendar Integration Path
- La Marie Beauty uses G Suite; Katie administers all accounts.
- All team emails are on the Google domain — no new account setup required.
- Chris needs calendar access granted to configure the Bookly↔Google Calendar and Square↔Google Calendar syncs.
- Roxana uses Google Calendar most actively and should be included in the setup meeting.
Action Items
| Owner | Action | Target |
|---|---|---|
| Katie | Schedule a meeting with Chris (and optionally Melissa) + Roxana to configure Google Calendar access and sync | Before next Tuesday; email Chris with times, prioritizing Thursday morning |
| Chris | Continue resolving timestamp mismatch between Bookly and Square in Zapier | Ongoing |
| Chris | Work with Eshaq to connect product-page variation selections to corresponding Bookly events | Before next Tuesday |
| Chris / Melissa | Revisit "Book Now" button text and update CTA copy across service pages | TBD |
| Chris | Provide full integration update at next Tuesday's standing meeting | Next Tuesday |
| Melissa | Hold on responding to Lisa's email re: variations until Katie reviews internally | Immediate |
Context & Background
Katie noted that the complexity of this integration feels greater than what was originally communicated — earlier conversations (primarily with Lisa) made it seem more straightforward. Chris clarified that Zapier was always the intended bridge for Bookly's external communication, and that the unexpected complexity is specifically the lack of a return path from Square. He expressed confidence that once configured, the end-user experience will be seamless, and noted that Bookly's booking UX is superior to Square's native scheduling. Moving away from Square entirely was not considered viable given La Marie Beauty's existing infrastructure investment there.
Related
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