Self-service kiosks play a prominent role in helping retailers meet their customers' increasing demands for more options and better service.
"Consumers have higher expectations of technology and what it can do for them," said Bruce Rasa, offerings' marketing manager for IBM's branded kiosk family of products. Rasa pointed to more widespread acceptance and use of photo kiosks, self-service airline check-in and gift registries.
To meet these expectations, a new generation of dramatically smaller kiosks is on the horizon. These kiosks are more flexible than conventional kiosks, but still meet the same high standards of retail-hardening that deployers expect in point-of-sale platforms.
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The new crop of kiosks, like IBM's Anyplace Kiosk, provides an almost ideal combination. These appliance-like devices also can include full-motion video for a compelling shopping experience.
Location is key
In kiosk industry publication Kiosk Business's Fourth Annual Kiosk Benchmark Study for 2004-2005, more than half of the respondents listed location as the most important feature in kiosk installations. "Location dramatically improves the potential value and usage to the consumer of a self-service kiosk," Rasa explained.
As with full-size kiosks, embedded kiosks are ideal for guided selling. This works best when consumers are faced with a variety of choices in one category, such as digital cameras. Informational kiosks can be attached to the store shelf where the cameras are located to aid customers in the decision-making process. The smaller size makes it easier to add more kiosks within a department or the entire store.
Office Max stores use embedded kiosks to help sell ink cartridges and printers. Mounted on the pegboard display, the kiosk seems to float among a sea of toner cartridges, according to Darby Williams, vice president of marketing for Active Decisions, a guided-selling solutions provider. The kiosks are positioned for maximum use, falling right in line with the shopper's natural behavior.
