Self-service kiosks are becoming an increasingly popular option for restaurants looking to improve customer experience, increase sales, and streamline operations. Here's a detailed look at some of the top reasons why your restaurant needs a kiosk.
Improves Customer Experience
One of the biggest benefits of adding kiosks is an improved customer experience. Kiosks reduce wait times in line, provide more payment options, give customers more control over ordering, and even enable ordering ahead of time.
Reduces Wait Times
Long lines are one of the top complaints customers have about restaurant experiences. Self-service kiosks enable customers to put in their own orders directly instead of waiting for a cashier. This means food can be cooked while the customer is still inputting their order.
Self ordering kiosk also allows for multiple orders to be placed simultaneously, further speeding up the ordering process. The end result is customers spending less time waiting and more time enjoying their meal.
More Payment Options
Kiosks open up all kinds of payment possibilities beyond just cash or traditional card payments. Customers can pay with mobile wallets, QR codes, gift cards, and more. Support for new payment types leads to higher customer satisfaction.
Additionally, self ordering kiosk eliminate the need to wait for checks or process payments with a server. Customers can pay on their own time, which enhances convenience.
Custom Ordering Control
Customers have more control over customizing their orders exactly how they want when using a self-service kiosk. They can take as much time as they need to build out their order, add extra toppings or ingredients, and ensure accuracy.
Giving customers control over the ordering process caters to their preferences and removes friction points like dealing with a cashier. Even picky eaters or those with dietary restrictions can tailor orders to their liking.
Order Ahead Capabilities
Some kiosks let customers place orders ahead of arrival or even schedule future pickup times. This adds a huge layer of convenience, as a customer's food can be hot and ready as soon as they walk in the door.
Order Ahead works together with features like custom ordering control to enable customers to place their customized orders when it makes sense for them. It's a major perk that keeps customers coming back again and again.
Increases Average Order Value
Self-service kiosks have been shown to increase average order sizes by as much as 30%. There are a few key ways self ordering kiosks lead to customers spending more per order.
Upselling & Cross-selling
Digital kiosks present many more opportunities to expose customers to upsells and cross-sells. Menu items can be accompanied by suggestive selling buttons, banners, or notifications to prompt customers to add items.
Kiosks also eliminate the pressure customers may feel when being upsold by a cashier. The experience is more relaxing and conducive to purchasing add-ons.
Impulse Purchases
Similar to strategically placed impulse items next to checkout lines in stores, self ordering kiosks enable restaurants to highlight items that encourage impulse buys. When customers have more time to look over menu options in detail, they are more likely to add extra side items, beverages, or desserts.
Dessert photos and milkshake images are particularly effective at driving impulse purchases. Kiosks let restaurants prominently display these types of temptations to boost order values.
Accurate Ordering
Because customers have direct control, kiosk orders have much higher accuracy rates than orders placed with cashiers. Higher accuracy means fewer mistakes, remakes, or missing items that diminish order values.
More accurate orders mean happier customers who end up receiving exactly what they want. Over time, this increases satisfaction and average order size as customers have faith that their specialized orders will be handled properly.
Streamlines Operations & Labor Costs
Using self-service kiosks allows restaurants to reduce costs and run leaner while still providing better customer service. Self ordering kiosks alleviate strain on front counter staff and kitchen crew for optimized operations.
Reduces Counter Congestion
Excessive queues and clusters of customers waiting to order can quickly congest ordering counters and front area real estate. Kiosks help spread out the customer flow for a less crowded countertop.
Counter congestion also leads to constrained customer throughput. Self-service kiosks mean less bottleneck and higher volumes of customers can be served, especially during peak hours.
Optimizes Labor Costs
One of the biggest operational benefits of self ordering kiosks is optimizing front-of-house labor costs. Kiosks reduce the staff needed to take orders and process payments. Self-service ordering better matches customer demand instead of leaving staff idle.
With self ordering kiosks taking over mundane tasks like cash handling and order entry, staff can be better utilized to enhance customer experiences. Employees have more capacity to run food, and bus tables, answer questions, and handle customer issues.
Accelerates Order Fulfillment
Kiosk orders relay directly to kitchens and display systems to speed up food preparation. Kitchen staff immediately sees orders appear on screens and can have food cooking within seconds.
This creates a seamless automated flow from ordering to fulfilment. Combined with order-ahead capabilities, this allows kitchens to plan and stage orders when possible to hit target serve times.
The result is faster fulfilment, hotter food, and quicker table turns to accommodate more total guests. For restaurants, small changes in service times make a big difference in volumes at capacity.
Conclusion
As illustrated throughout this article, self-service kiosks provide restaurants with a powerful solution to enhance customer experiences, optimize operations, increase sales, and reduce costs. The multitude of benefits is simply too significant for restaurants to ignore this technology any longer.
When the time comes to add self ordering kiosks to your restaurant, Shenzhen Sui-Yi Touch Computer Co., Ltd. is the ideal partner to turn to. Regardless of your concept, menu, restaurant size, or budget - Sui-Yi has versatile kiosk solutions to match.