Touchscreen kiosks are, first and foremost, self-service/ self-ordering terminals for shopping, booking tickets, and printing boarding passes, among other transactions. But that is not all.
They have yet another important use case, which is as important for brand engagement and visibility as the impact of kiosk-enabled self-service.
To know about all the use cases of the kiosks, which are responsible for enhanced engagement and traction, read this blog, where we cover:
Let’s dig in!
The most obvious advantage of self-service in terms of brand engagement is that users, in this context, the consumers themselves, interact with the brand elements —i.e., logos, product lines, offers, brand colours, and ads — for much longer while shopping than they would otherwise.
To better understand, imagine the following scenario of customers checking out their shopping bags in a retail store at an interactive touchscreen:
The touchscreen kiosk in question is integrated with a smart, AI-powered ERP.
While using the cashier-free billing terminal, customers must swipe through upselling and cross-selling suggestions actively. The suggestions could be those of a product that the given customer usually buys but has accidentally or deliberately skipped during the particular transaction. This brand interaction does more than just create a potential sales opportunity, signalling that the retailer knows about the customer’s preferences and cares about offering personalised experiences.
Similarly, customers may encounter a pop-up ad for an offer, prompting them to check out other products they may not usually. If they are regular customers, based on transaction histories, the pop-up ad could also lead them to new products that are similar to what they have purchased previously.
In all four cases mentioned in this scenario, customers learn more about the brand, thanks to the touchscreen kiosk serving as a smooth user interface, which also knows what the buyer wants. Further, the kiosks also store transaction histories at the edge, upload the collected data to the integrated Cloud ERP, and can be used for end-of-transaction surveys for gathering customer feedback.
The self-service experience enabled by touchscreen kiosks can be immersive due to their interface resembling a smartphone’s user experience: intimate, easy-to-use, and familiar. This brand immersion becomes possible as the kiosks, spread across the retail outlet, reduce the queue wait time by thinning the crowd at the cash counter and other kiosks.
In other words, self-service/self-check-out kiosks complement the productivity of the cash counter POS terminal rather than replacing it altogether. For example, some customers may still prefer the cashier to process the order, but they could use the kiosks for browsing products.
From a broader perspective—defining brand engagement as the overall customer experience, rather than interaction with the brand’s products or brand elements—queue-busting via self-service kiosks is not just an enabler but also an example of brand engagement. This is because shorter queues enhance the shopping experience.
Here are some more noteworthy benefits, highlighting kiosks as an essential tool for improving customer experience:
It is worth noting that, with interactive touchscreen kiosks installed, the same degree of brand engagement possible in retail stores applies to events and restaurants or QSRs (Quick Service Restaurants). Here too, the self-service ordering and billing machines enable easy check-in/check-out, cross-selling and upselling opportunities, display pop-up ads, and eliminate long queues, besides other advantages.
However, order customisation is a unique benefit of interactive touchscreen kiosks in restaurants.
Most touchscreen kiosk models feature proximity sensors, which save their energy consumption beyond transactions by deactivating the screen when a user is beyond a certain distance from the terminal.
However, instead of the screen going off, changing the kiosk settings to slightly dim the kiosk display when the device is not in use can amplify brand immersion in the venue, adding to the impact of digital signage (not kiosks) and ad display screens.
On the other hand, interactive touchscreen kiosks are also installed in shared spaces, including courtyards, theatres, airports, and bus terminals, for boarding pass printing, ticket booking, and wayfinding. Pop-up ads or a series of static ads can appear on these kiosk screens, respectively, whether they are in use or not. The ads, though not helpful for immediate shopping sprees, can boost brand recall potential. These ads are like the lead generation screens shown on ATMs towards the end of transactions, promoting credit cards or banking products.
To support an advanced ERP—for cross-selling, upselling, personalised suggestions, multi-language support, omnichannel sales, loyalty point redemption, and billing, among other tasks— the interactive touchscreen kiosk must run on a recent version of a quality Operating System.
However, the OS alone is not responsible for swiftly processing the several instructions behind a transaction. A top-of-the-line processor with high core and thread count is crucial for optimally executing complex and high-volume instructions, while OS compatibility itself is a factor decided by the processor’s ISA.
The touchscreen kiosks’ RAM and storage further enable the self-service device to efficiently access and retrieve edge data regarding the customer’s details, including transaction history.
In other words, anything to do with processing user input and information processing, the interactive touchscreen kiosk uses the combined force of its processor, OS, RAM, and storage.
The display quality of the touchscreen kiosks helps register user input instantly, thereby offering an intuitive user interface. The screen quality also determines its visual clarity and brightness. Therefore, while acting as a digital signage, the kiosk attracts customer attention.
Further, it is worth noting that, as kiosks are generally for digital and card payments, while UPI payments don’t need an extra hardware feature, Magnetic Stripe Readers (MSRs) are vital for payment mode diversity.
Finally, other integrated components or ports offering versatile peripheral support contribute to customer satisfaction and brand engagement as well, but the features above directly impact user experience, thereby proving to be the most important in this context.
One of the most well-known OEMs for POS systems, kiosks, and POS peripherals worldwide, POSIFLEX offers three product lines of interactive touchscreen kiosks: the EK, the JK, and the HK Series. Our self-service devices are known for their reliability, hardware security, processing speed, and display quality, which includes visual clarity, brightness, and touch-responsiveness.
Apart from functioning as excellent digital signage, POSIFLEX touchscreen kiosks are ideal for queue-busting, top-notch user experience, and overall smooth operations management—the key drivers of engagement.
Curious to know more? Contact us today, and one of our executives will get in touch with you shortly!
POSIFLEX is a leading provider of innovative point-of-sale (POS) solutions, known for delivering reliable, high-performance hardware and comprehensive support.
