The interactive self-service kiosks are gaining popularity in Dubai and all around the UAE. The self-service kiosks are popping up everywhere from airports to clinics, and from banks to government office, businesses and organizations are utilizing the interactive self-service kiosks to transform the customer experience. The interactive self-service kiosks has features of a traditional vending machine and a powerful modern communication tool. This fusion makes them more effective and impactful. The customers are also embracing the technology, in fact in Dubai and all around the UAE the technology have become an integral part of our daily lives. The digitalization have become more common since past two years, people are now much more familiar and adoptive towards the technology. The customer experience have also become the first priority of the businesses, the market trends, tougher competition and demanding customers literally compelled the businesses to focus more on customer experience.
Actually a good customer experience is extremely crucial for a business’s growth and success. The good customer experience and customer journey makes more loyal customers, the customer loyalty plays an important role in growth and sustainability. It is nine to twelve time more expensive to acquire new customer comparing to the cost of selling to the existing customers. That is why for growth and profitability the customer retention and customer loyalty is very important. Moreover the loyal customers are tend to be a good brand advocate and help promoting a positive brand image. Brands with positive brand identity tend to do well with their marketing and get higher ROIs. Which also impact the profitability and growth. That is why customer experience is very important and the interactive self-service kiosks are a great tool to provide ultimate customer experience to your customers.
Why an interactive self-service kiosk is a great tool to transform customer experience? Here are some reasons:
Reason No. 1: Interactive Self-Service Kiosks Offer 24/7 Service Delivery without any Wait Time
The wait time is one of the most critical factor for making or breaking customer experience. The studies have shown that a customer could wait for only 13 minutes without getting anxious or worried, any time after that will add to their anxiety, stress and negative emotions. If a customer will have to wait for a long time let say, an hour, they will end up reaching the counter already annoyed, depressed and anxious, it will ruin their customer journey and experience. Moreover it will be extremely harder for the agents/servers to make such customers happy and satisfied. So, long wait time can completely ruin the customer experience. Usually for the offices and organizations who operate during day times, most of the customers came from work, some came for the task only, some took half day off or whatsoever the case is, waiting is something no one likes. No one wants to stand in long queues, or wait in the waiting areas, everyone want to get the server instantly as they arrive at the business.
These days every customer wants easy access to the business, instant service delivery and 24/7 availability. Businesses and organizations cannot keep their offices and branches open for 24/7, that is simply too expensive. However the interactive self-service kiosk can remain in service for 24/7. The system if fully automated, doesn’t require a staff or attendant, can remain open for 24/7, doesn’t need weekends or holidays, and doesn’t get any impact of work load, keep running smooth and active all the time. Doesn’t have any effect on the customer journey and customer experience under high work load conditions.The consistency in the customer experience and high availability and access to the services enhances the customer experience and results in higher customer satisfaction.
Reason No. 2: The Interactive User Interface (UI) Simplify Customer Journey
The interactive self-service kiosks have a digital user interface which can be customized to meet the needs of the customers. All the services offered through the interactive user interface can be configured and optimized for exclusive and unique customer experience. The user interface of any application is crucial for its success. When it comes to interactive self-service kiosks the user interface plays the same role. The user interface should be able to provide easy navigation and simpler customer journey. If the customer journey is too complex or too long then the customers might quit half-way through. This will discourage customers to approach the self-service kiosk instead they will prefer to avail service through customer service center. However, with the interactive self-service kiosk, the user interface is usually based on a touch screen, which not only simplify the interaction but also help businesses to make it more engaging and interactive.
The interactive self-service kiosk can provide awesome user experience with ability to interact using a touch screen. The businesses can also offer a lot of information, step-by-step instructions and even multimedia content such as videos and animations. Which is a great way to educate your customers. Most of the time since the services are already digitalized and the process is automated so a lot of service delivery steps are being removed, most of the work is done by the interactive kiosk application, and the customer will only asked to input simple information. That over simplification of the customer journey is what attracts customers and improve their experience.
Reason No. 3: Transform Customer Experience with Purpose Made Interactive Self-Service Kiosks
The interactive self-service kiosk industry have grown rapidly in past few years. Now a days, the manufacturers and vendors are providing purpose made or industry specific solutions which are more efficient and more user friendly. This feature allows the businesses to easily digitalize a lot many services which were previously delivered manually by employees and customer service agents. It is not only cost-efficient for the businesses but it can also ensure the customers will get ultimate user experience by integrating all software or hardware features required for those services. Which makes the service delivery process more convenient, easy and quicker.
Here are some examples of the most popular purpose made interactive self-service kiosks:
Interactive Self Service Kiosks
The interactive self-service kiosks are designed specifically to allow the customer to perform certain tasks by themselves which were earlier performed by the agents/servers or staff. These kiosks are further sub-categorized as per their application for many industries:
- Self-Service Payment Kiosk: This kiosk allows the customers to pay bills, make transactions, and pay fees through the self-service interface. The payments can be done by Credit/Debit Cards, Cash Deposit, Digital Mediums (Google Pay, Apple Pay, and Samsung Pay, etc.
- Self-Service POS Kiosk: The POS self-service terminals are for the retail store where customers can scan the barcode/QR code of the item and then pay for their purchases.
- Self-Service Queue System Kiosk: This kiosk is used to sign-up for the queues and it can provide facility to choose service, scan QR codes, print tokens, etc.
- Self-Service Sign-up Kiosks: These kiosks are usually used to sign-up for the events and exhibitions, the customers can also make payments (if needed), and they can also print tickets.
- Self-Service Food Ordering Kiosk: These kiosks are used at food courts, fast food restaurants and ordinary restaurants. The customer can browse through the entire menu, select items, place orders and make payments from the kiosk.
- Self-Service Boarding Kiosk: These kiosk are used at airports to provide self-service boarding service. The customers can scan, barcodes, QR codes, passport and ID whatever is needed and can print their boarding pass without waiting in the long queues.
- Self-Service Hotel Reception/Check-in Kiosk: These kiosks are used by hotels and motels who placed them at the reception, the customer can check-in through the kiosk and perform all tasks that are needed for check-in including document scanning and payment.
- Self-Service Car Rental and Taxi Ordering Kiosk: These kiosks are usually placed at airports and mass transit stations. The customers can book a rental car or a taxi/limousine service from the kiosk and they can also make the payment for the service through the kiosk.
- Self-Service Student Enrollment Kiosks: These kiosks are used by colleges, universities and schools, students and parents can enroll for a semester or course and the student can also access their student portal and avail other services such as changing the course, selecting the course, or making payment for the tuition fee or such functions.
These are just the most popular applications of the interactive self-service kiosks. There are too many other application too. In addition to that the interactive self-service kiosks are highly customizable so a business can customize the kiosk by adding any feature from any type and innovative their own unique solution for their specific needs.
Self-Service Information Kiosks
The self-service information kiosks are used to provide information for the customers or visitors. Usually these kiosks provide all the information which is also provided by the information desk, but the customers can easily browse through various content to get precise and most updated information they are looking for. The major application for self-service information kiosks are:
- Shopping Malls
- Government Offices
- Healthcare
- Museums and Libraries
- Etc.
Self-Service Way Finding Kiosks
The self-service way finding kiosks are based on 3D modeling and mapping technologies. The kiosks are used at malls, government and public offices, usually multi-story public areas and large indoor or outdoor spaces, exhibitions and fairs. The purpose of these kiosks is to provide the customers the details of their current location and provide them with the help and route for their destination. For example if a customer is in a big shopping mall and they are at the north side and they are seeking a store which is at south side but on a different floor, the customer will have to find the shortest way to reach it. Which can be provided by the self-service way finding kiosk.
Self-Service Internet Kiosks
The name explains itself very well. The self-service internet kiosks are used to provide internet service to the users. Usually such kiosks are placed in airports, mass transit stations, libraries, parts, project sites, etc. The service can be offered for free or can be charged using credit/debit card and/or cash. These kiosks usually also contain physical keyboard and tack pad for better internet browsing experience. These kiosks are also used in places where the wireless network is not available or not permitted, so the people can have access to the internet using the self-service internet kiosk.
Self-Service Digital Signage Kiosk
The self-service digital signage kiosks are basically digital signage with interactive features and user interface. These types of kiosks are mostly used by the retail sector. They are used to provide detailed information about the product and also run adverts, if a customer liked an ad and want to know more about the product, they tap on it, they can get more information, and they can share that information to their smartphones, emails, or mobile apps. These types of kiosks are used to increase in-store sales. The self-service digital signage kiosks are usually very large and can attract more customers easily.
These all above mentioned types of interactive self-service kiosks are designed to improve customer journey and customer experience. The purpose made or industry specific approach makes the interactive self-service kiosk more effective and efficient.
Reason No. 4: Interactive Self Service Kiosks Provide Personalized Experience and Collect Customer Feedback
The interactive self-service kiosks are also very good at providing personalized customer experience. As the customer interface is configured and linked with the customer data and other databases, it can fetch information about the customers, their purchase behavior, their last purchases, their current service subscriptions, and so on. Such data help businesses to not only personalize the customer experience but it is also very helpful for suggesting more relevant products and services to the customer and increase the chances of conversions. Moreover the welcome screens, the messages, instructions, and even in some cases the entire customer dashboard can be customized as per the customer’s preferences and their behavior to provide them with a highly personal user experience. Customers like the personalized user experience, every time they see a statement or message addressing to them, they feel more connected to the brand. This makes them happy and more loyal to the business.
Similarly the customer feedback is a very useful tool to improve customer experience and customer journey. The businesses often take customer feedback form various mediums and channels. The interactive self-service kiosks are a great medium to collect customer feedback. Immediately after finishing the process on the self-service kiosk the customers can be asked to share their opinion or suggestion or feedback. As there is no human asking them for the feedback or their opinion, people tend to be more honest while giving their feedback from a digital medium. Moreover as there is no queue behind or customers are not already exhausted after the long queues the response rate for the customer feedback from an interactive self-service kiosk is very high. When a business collect customer feedback it gives them an impression that the businesses wants to listen to them. This also induce a sense of connection and loyalty and help improving customer relationship with the brand and enhance their experience.
Reason No. 5: Interactive Self-Service Kiosk Can Provide Valuable Business Intelligence
The business intelligence is basically the system usage data, stats about various touch points, and also the customer feedback. You must be thinking apart from customer feedback how the system stats and analytical data can improve the customer experience. Well, you are partially correct, as the stats and analytical data is collected by the interactive self-service kiosk software at the background, nothing is visible to the customers, and it also doesn’t affect the customer experience. However, this data is very valuable for the future. Businesses should base their future strategies and decisions on the bases of statistical and analytical data and customer feedback. The interactive self-service kiosk can be a great source of business intelligence. It can record data from each touch point. It can capture the details and statistical data for each and service delivery step. Moreover this data can be processed and compiled in the form of reports. These reports make businesses able to take informed decisions and build successful future strategies.
The customer feedback can highlight the areas of improvement throughout the entire customer journey and also in the products and services. The businesses can know which products and services are more popular and which aren’t. Which features of a particular service or products are liked by the customers and which aren’t? What customer expect from the business and what do they need? These all information are very vital in making strategies for future. The analytical and system usage data can also highlight various issues. For example, at what point in the customer journey most customer quit continuing. What steps are taking more time and why? How much average time is required for a particular task or function? The information about the busiest and least busy times/hours and so on. These information can provide a deeper understanding and insight of the customer experience and customer journey. With the help of this data the businesses can take steps to improve the customer experience. That is how the business intelligence can be helpful in improving customer experience at interactive self-service kiosk.
Conclusion
The interactive self-service kiosks are the ultimate customer experience transformation tool. The thing that affects the customer experience the most is the wait time, the interactive self-service kiosks reduce it to literally none. The customers and visitors can go to an interactive self-service kiosk to get instant service without any help required from the staff or servers/agents. Unlike the customer service centers or offices the interactive kiosks can operate 24/7 and provide continuous services without any interruption. The services and service delivery steps are digitalized for the interactive self-service kiosk which makes the customer journey shorter and easier. Which also improves customer experience. The customer experience can be further improved by implementing customized or purpose made solutions. There is a wide variety of purpose-made interactive self-service kiosks available in the market, which allows the businesses to choose the most compatible kiosk to ensure the ultimate user experience.
Moreover the interactive self-service kiosks can also provide personalized customer experience which helps building strong relationship between the customer and the brand and increase customer loyalty. The business intelligence and customer feedback data provides a deeper understanding of the customer journey and customer experience. Businesses can utilize this data to further improve customer experience. RSI Concepts is a leading name in customer satisfaction and customer experience transformation industry in Dubai, UAE. If you are looking for an innovative solution to transform your customer experience, feel free to reach us out through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.
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