Self-Service Kiosks:
How do customers want to identify themselves?
Customers want the added convenience of personalization, but many may not want to give up any personal information. Still other customers may forget any credentials they have given to set up their account. And some customers may not see the value in “signing on” at all. Given all of these factors and more, our team devised and executed a research plan to help our client make decisions in this area.
Innovation Case Study
Contextual Research.
Our client had a large amount of quantitative data from bulk email surveys about how customers would prefer to “authenticate” in a given experience. Not surprisingly, respondents often chose “email and password” as their go-to method. Given the data, we sought to intercept real customers in a real store setting and present them with light visuals (wireframes) on an iPad Pro. We wanted to meet customers and have them respond in context, and on a device that would feel very similar to the current kiosk experience.
We visited 8 different store locations, spoke with 118 real customers, and we were able to refine our wireframes 3 times to truly dial-in and optimize the results.
Ultimately, our findings indicated that adding identification (via phone number), personalization (product/loyalty), and account registration to the self-service kiosk experience would be embraced by our client’s customers.
Building a Playground.
Coming out of the research phase, the team was tasked to build a fully functioning app that would run on an iPad Pro (12.9”) and could be mounted, anchored, and secured inside a store. The plan was to co-locate our “new kiosk” next to the existing kiosk hardware. If usage was too low going the organic route, the existing hardware options could be powered down — to funnel customers to test out our hardware.
We crafted and annotated wireframes as part of our normal design process, quickly moving to the creation of design comps. Along the way, we were building a prototype that our stakeholders could quickly tap through on their own devices to get a feel for the experience.
Part of the new app will also include features and functions in support of A/B testing some of our most critical parts of the customer experience. This, and too many other features to discuss, will further assist our client in making key decisions as they move to rolling out a new kiosk system to all of their stores.