Improving User Experience with Interactive Kiosks
Find out how an interactive kiosk can improve customer experience in your restaurant. This technology can help you stand out in a crowded market.
Today’s consumers expect service to be personalized and efficient. More than half regularly use a tablet or a smartphone app, and kiosks at banks and airports are so common they are ubiquitous. This has set the stage for technology to transform the food and beverage industry, helping to increase sales and improve productivity. And, not surprisingly, improving the overall customer experience.
While the early version of kiosk technology had commercial applications, the hospitality industry adapted them for their own use and placed them near cashiers to reduce the wait time of their guests. They quickly found that in addition to the support a self-service kiosk gave to their staff, they also noticed the benefits to their guests. Here’s a quick look at how interactive kiosk technology helps improve customer experience.
Makes Order Customization Easier
The majority of people expect to be able to personalize their orders. But they don’t necessarily feel comfortable doing so when someone is waiting to take their order as they try to read the menu and an impatient line forms behind them. But when in front of a touch screen kiosk, the menu options are clearer and easier to read. This gives customers a better idea of what they are ordering and a feeling of privacy that lowers inhibitions about piling on additional items. When they do it themselves, they don’t feel as judged – or as rushed.
In addition, kiosks can be programmed to present the menu in different languages, giving foreign customers an increased comfortability when ordering. This is especially helpful in areas where there is a lot of tourism and visitors from many different countries.
Makes Wait Times Shorter
A long line can make a customer walk away from a restaurant – even if it is their favorite – in search of a quicker experience. If there are more than 5-7 people in line to order, 57% of customers will choose to go to a different restaurant. And the more people standing in line, the higher the percentage of potential customers who decide not to even walk in the door. The situation changes when self-service kiosks are in use. The kiosks eliminate the agony of wait times and make ordering faster.
Improves Order Accuracy
Getting the wrong order is a major complaint of restaurant guests. Sometimes this happens from human error, and other times, it is due to language barriers or miscommunications with busy servers. A digital touch screen kiosk can reduce these errors. When customers customize their own orders, they are more likely to get exactly what they want. They don’t have to worry about the server understanding what they’ve asked for. And self-ordering kiosks that can be programmed to offer different languages overcome any language barriers between guests and wait staff.
Self-service kiosks represent the unavoidable technological transformation of the restaurant industry. They also solve the fundamental problems that can cause sales to flatten: operational efficiency and customer experience. Quick-serve and fast-food restaurants should actively consider incorporating kiosks into their locations and leveraging the technology to differentiate them from their competitors. If you don’t, your competitors will. If they aren’t already.
