Kiosks and Audio
CRM Daily article on why Kiosks Should Hold Their Tongues
By Kimberly Hill
CRM Daily
September 2, 2004 11:10AM
The real price of bad kiosk design is the cost savings sacrificed because customers refuse to use the self-service devices -- which were intended to offload customer service to a less-expensive channel. I know that it will be a long time before I try that self-serve checkout line at the grocery again.
Not long ago, I decided to try the self-service checkout line at my local grocery store. Having used computers for well on 25 years now, and writing about software quite a bit, I assumed I probably could muddle my way through. I was wrong.
After listening in vain to the crackly instructions coming out of the speaker and pushing various buttons, I eventually was summoned to the front of the store by a live person sitting at a very high desk looking over the lines -- shades of being called to the elementary school principal's office over a loudspeaker.
Not My Fault
In my defense, though, I will point out that Forrester Research's Paul Sonderegger says the machine never should have been talking to me in the first place. Giving voice instructions along with written cues on a screen and physical cues from other devices, such as scanners, simply overtaxes a user's ability to absorb information, he told CRM Daily.
So, as it turns out, I was the victim of bad kiosk design, which makes me feel only a bit less humiliated, but vindicated nonetheless.
"Spoken instructions consume a lot of cognitive horsepower on the part of the user," Sonderegger explained.
In addition, the user may be stepping back from the machine to locate items to which the instructions are referring -- the bar-code scanner, for example, or the platform on which to lay down library books. By the time the user's attention returns to the audio portion of the kiosk presentation, the instructions have moved on.
"What started as a high-anxiety situation to begin with gets even worse," he added.
Driving Employees to Extremes
In addition to embarrassing customers at library checkout lines and information centers at museums, kiosks that talk drive the employees who must listen to them all day to extreme measures. Imagine the librarian who must sit four feet away from the self-serve checkout station that bleeps cheerfully "Use Me for Faster Service" six times per minute.
In discussions with kiosk manufacturers, Sonderegger said, he has heard a number of stories about employees dismantling devices and disconnecting the wires that lead to the kiosk speaker -- effectively disabling the machines.
Of course, that kind of sabotage costs enterprises a good deal. What hurts even more, though, is the cost savings sacrificed because customers refuse to use the self-service devices -- which were intended to offload customer service to a less-expensive channel. I know that it will be a long time before I try that self-serve checkout line at the grocery again.
The potential for savings, said Sonderegger, is what will motivate kiosk designers to eventually get it right.
http://crm-daily.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title=Kiosks-Should-Hold-Their-Tongues&story_id=26718
Posted by Craig at September 3, 2004 02:54 PM