How NOT to Do Customer Check-In
When checking-in customers, knowing what to avoid is every bit as crucial as knowing what to do. Here’s how NOT to run your customer check-in process.
Customers hate waiting. A customer check in system reduces wait times and improves the experience. Here are the features of a great customer sign-in app.
Executive Summary
- Since clients hate waiting to get served, your competitors are eager to capture the customers that you can’t serve quickly enough (or if you don't fully satisfy their needs).
- A customer sign-in app is an automated customer reception platform that systematically receives customers and reduces wait times.
- That frees up receptionists and employees so they can concentrate on other pressing issues instead of customers, increasing revenue and efficiency.
The primary duty of a customer check in system is to receive guests whenever they visit your premises. In short, the goal of any visitor management system is to minimize the number of time customers spend waiting at the reception.
It would help to minimize the wait time because no customer likes to stand by for so long, what with competitors all over the place. If anything, a TimeTrade survey found that 75% of retailers lost business because of wait-time-related issues.
A customer sign-in app will automate the visitor reception process to eliminate time wastage and ensure customer service at the quickest time possible. Here is the rundown of customer sign-in apps.
The Importance of Having a Customer Sign in App
A customer sign-in app plays a vital role in ensuring visitors get signed in and served by your employees in the least possible amount of time. Other benefits include:
Helps Generate More Revenue
Receptionists often have to multitask to ensure customers receive excellent service. Having multiple customers can create a spillover effect where other employees have to receive the customers.
Employees don’t have the training to receive customers, and doing so means neglecting their primary duties. That affects productivity and revenue, so that’s where a customer sign-in app comes in handy.
With such an app, you can cut down on the number of receptionists, and employees won’t have to receive customers. That eliminates time wasted and resources allocated to catering to customers, which will improve revenue. This is how the customer sign-in app achieves that:
- Faster, better service: customers can receive instant notifications about when they will receive assistance, reducing time spent waiting for products or services. Further, the app comes with an automated service, resulting in fewer organizational issues.
- Captures customer info so you can continue to communicate with them: customers will provide contact information so you can send them a notification a few minutes before it’s their turn. Moreover, sign-in apps are compliant with legal requirements for handling customer information.
Smoother Operations
Know Who Is Next in the Queue: The sign-in app will create a virtual queue and serve as a virtual receptionist to direct customers to the staff that will serve them.
That way, you can process any number of customers on time. Moreover, it’s efficient since customers can make visitation arrangements remotely.
Can Segment Customers: you can group customers by why they are visiting; for instance, separate customers as sales versus service. For a mobile phone store, try phones versus tablets versus wireless plans.
You can tell repeat customers from new customers and assign them to personnel with the required training to handle them. That makes certain that you will close business deals more efficiently.
Key Features
Your customer sign-in the app should have the following features. These enhance efficiency and help capture all relevant information:
Legal Document Electronic Signature Capture
Shows Service Providers Which Customer Is Next to Be Seen - Queue Management
A core feature is letting employees know which visitor is next in line. This needs to be customized based on different services offered, like sales versus repairs or haircut versus wax.
Great User Experience
An excellent user interface reinforces your branding. This involves certain practices like displaying your business logo consistently across all platforms. The interface needs to have a functional and familiar design so first-time users won’t have difficulty familiarizing themselves with the app.
Legal Document Electronic Signature Capture
Need customers to sign waivers? Or want them to sign off on your terms of service?
Whatever your legal or insurance requirements are, customer sign-in apps are a convenient way to capture customers’ electronic signatures on legal documents. No more physical documents to awkwardly stick in front of them, ask them to sign, and then either spend time filing away or digitizing.
Easy to Use
Navigating a sign-in app should be easy even (especially!) for first-time users. It starts with ensuring a responsive display and sufficient spacing between text and icons. Additionally, simplifying the steps to get a particular service on the app can help. The key is to minimize the number of clicks and actions without limiting functionality.
Contactless
Contactless visitor management is a must-have during pandemics since it prevents the spread of diseases. The app produces a unique code that grants passage and facilitates the collection of personal information. Besides ensuring safety, it also eliminates queues and the use of paper.
Temperature Scanning
Speaking of stopping disease spread, you can’t go wrong with temperature scanning of customers. The app will scan all visitors and employees and deny entry to persons with spiked bodily temperatures to prevent disease spread.
Government-Issued ID Scanning
Ensure customers sign in even faster by using a welcoming app with integrated ID scanning. The scanner recognizes government-issued IDs, driving licenses, military, and corporate IDs, or other forms of identification to hasten the sign-in process.
What’s more, the scanner keeps customers safe as it will only let in people after verifying the information with other databases like sex offender, criminal, or FINRA lists.
Starts a Conversation
Business today is about conversations and relationships, not merely transactions. Using a customer check in app allows you to:
- Let customers know when you are ready to see them.
- Send messages to guests when they check in, like marketing messages or links to complete their profile.
- Send messages after they depart, like a thank you or exit survey.
- Push their information to your CRM database.
How to Choose a Customer Sign-in App
These considerations should be at the forefront when choosing a customer sign-in app:
- Has all your required features: Start your search by building a list of mandatory and nice-to-have customer check-in software features. Make sure to choose an app with every essential feature you need and as many optional elements. Within your budget, of course.
- Compatible with existing software and hardware: You don’t want to drive up costs by upgrading software and hardware to utilize the new sign-in app.
- Customize the look and feel: Select software that you can customize to reflect your organizational values, such as icons, app background, and company logo.
- Integrations: Look for a software provider with direct or Zapier integrations in order to automate processes and eliminate manual efforts. Examples could include links to your CRM or survey applications.
- Capable support: The best customer check in apps should be as easy for the admin as your guests. That said, you may need support on occasion. Look for a software provider with high-quality, 24/7/365 service.