Kerry Bodine

Forrester Research recently evaluated the environment — physical location, signage and workspace — of 16 self- service kiosks in the airline, hotel and retail industries. We approached each kiosk with a goal suitable to its business use — for example, checking in for a flight or at a hotel room, or browsing a store's music collection — then checked for compliance with 10 kiosk-environment best practices.

Scores varied widely; only four of the 16 kiosks passed our evaluation criteria. The airlines came out decisively on top, led by Delta's nearly perfect score at LaGuardia Airport. (Not a terribly surprising result, given airlines' relatively long history with kiosks and their critical business requirement to cut costs by driving customers to self-service.)

Companies across industries got high marks in our location category. They made kiosks available in multiple, valuable locations — right where users would see them when they needed them. They placed kiosks on prominent, accessible pathways and made it easy for customers to know where to line up and who should go next — even when there was a crowd waiting for the machine.

Unfortunately, poor signage and inadequate working environments sabotaged most kiosk experiences. Problems with signs ranged from confusing or proprietary language that rendered signs useless to text that was completely illegible at a distance. In some cases, kiosk signs were obscured from view by large pillars, piles of merchandise, other signs, or (believe it or not) even stuffed animals. Few kiosk workspaces provided enough room for users to put down what they were carrying, write down transaction details, or pick up the materials they needed to complete their tasks. And not one of the environments we reviewed provided adequate privacy for the user; passersby could always see what was on the kiosk screen.

With all of the hardware and soft ware complexities involved in a kiosk project, many companies fail to consider the importance of the kiosk environment. Unfortunately, the problems this lack of attention creates are more than just annoyances — they can directly hamper kiosk usage and, by extension, the return on investment. To improve the environment, companies should:

• Create corporate kiosk environment standards. Companies that don't will be plagued by inter-location inconsistencies, as local staff are left to make decisions about location, signage and workspace. Effective corporate kiosk environment standards will help ensure that customers have a kiosk experience that's both consistent and aligned with best practices.

• Rely on personas for a customer-centric perspective. Many of the signage and workspace problems we found stemmed from not understanding kiosk users. For example, one airline we visited barely provides room at its check-in kiosks for a single user with one suitcase let alone the many passengers who travel with multiple bags or family members. Models of real users' attitudes, behaviors and goals — called personas — help to shift the design teams' perspective from industry insiders to real-world target customers.

• Be flexible. Although kiosks seem like immovable pieces of furniture, they can actually be moved around. The Hilton New York has two kiosks in permanent locations but positions three others depending on the amount of foot traffic they expect through the lobby on any given day — either up against the front desk or to the side of the registration area. Don't be afraid to experiment with kiosks' location, signage and workspace if the initial design just isn't working.

Kerry Bodine is a senior analyst in Forrester's Customer Experience Group. Her focus on self-service kiosks takes usability and design research beyond the screen and into the physical world. For more information about Forrester's Kiosk Review or the results of this study, please contact Jeanne Strepacki at 312/466-5557. Forrester.com

This article originally appeared in Kiosk magazine, Sept/Oct 2005.