The service sector knows very well the importance of customer experience. Businesses in Dubai or anywhere in UAE understand the importance of customer satisfaction. The UAE is a very competitive market and the customers simply have too many choices, which is why they are also very demanding. However, it is crucial for a business to ensure customer satisfaction and offer excellent services at their service center. A good customer experience not just make your customer happy but it also increases their loyalty and improve the brand image. A good brand image always attract more customers and vice versa. That is why it is absolutely essential for a business to offer a great customer experience at their customer service centers. Businesses in Dubai and anywhere in UAE are investing heavily in customer satisfaction solutions. Regardless of industry a queue management system is the perfect companion for a modern day customer service centers. Businesses can find industry specific solutions as well as fully customized queue management systems which are exclusively designed to meet the very specific needs of the business.
What is a Queue Management System?
By definition a queue management system is a tool which is used to manage the customer flow and queues in the customer facing environments. The queuing theory is the learning and understanding of the line formation and customer flow. Businesses were managing queues since long time ago, even before the technological revolution and internet. Earlier businesses were managing footfall by forming waiting lines which worked on first come first serve bases. Later on businesses started issuing token numbers manually in form of small paper piece or tags, which have greatly improved customer flow and allow businesses to serve customers in different priority groups, and also enable them to segregate customers on the bases of services they need. However, things have changed and the internet and IT technologies have evolved. Businesses then started deploying digital queue management systems. A digital queue management system is based on a software program and some hardware components. The modern digital queue management systems greatly improved the management abilities, control and performance of the queuing which also had a great impact on customer happiness and raise customer satisfaction.
Why Businesses should Deploy Queue Management Systems?
There are many reasons to deploy a queue management system. Every business who serves its customers at their offices, customer service centers or at their premises, need a mechanisms to manage footfall and ensure a frictionless customer journey. The customer journey is impacts customer happiness which is essential to attain customer loyalty and improve brand image. In this blog we will enlist key advantages of investing in a queue management system and how it benefits businesses.
Queue Management System Reduces Customer Wait Time
The customer wait time is the most crucial and significant factor in managing customer experience. Long wait time results in bad customer experience and unhappy customers. Only happy and satisfied customers will contribute to your business growth. Happy customers become loyal and loyal customers tend to be a good brand advocate who help you improve your brand image and attract more customers. On an average a 12 minutes wait time have least impact on customer happiness, more time added and your customers will become more unhappy and eventually they will become annoyed and angry which will not only ruin the customer experience but will also cause increase in customer churn and could badly impact your business’s reputation. A queue management system digitalize the queuing process and digitalization drives automation which can greatly improve efficiency and reduce customer wait time. It also help improving employee efficiency and eliminate common queuing problems which results in less wait time and better management. Less wait time means happy customers and happy customers mean repeated business which will help you grow and increase profitability.
Queue Management System Improves Customer Experience
Queue Management System not only reduce customer wait time but it is very capable of improving the entire customer experience. Usually customers are welcomed with a self-service interactive ticket dispensing kiosk which allow them to choose the service they need or sign-in and get a ticket number. The customers can wait comfortably in the designated areas or they can go out to spend the wait time as they want, this allow them to sign-up for virtual queues, hence the customers doesn’t need to stand in long physical waiting lines. Furthermore the wait time is also a complex phenomenon, there is one actual wait time and there is one perceived wait time. The perceived wait time is always higher than the actual, it is our brain who tricked us in believing that more time has passed than what have actually passed. The queue management system give customers more freedom and allow them to wait outside and keep them updated with regular alerts and notification such as SMS or WhatsApp, etc. The queue management system also have in-built announcement and customer calling system which keep customers distracted from waiting, it also have a digital signage which displays live queuing information and it also plays multimedia content or promotional material which keep customers distracted from the waiting time and help reducing their perceived wait time. These features significantly improve your customers’ waiting experience and raise their satisfaction.
Queue Management System Improves Employee Performance
The queue management systems also helps improving employee performance. It offers a comprehensive performance monitoring framework having multiple KPIs to monitor and evaluate employee performance. These KPIs help businesses to enhance their resource management strategies and are also very useful for the HR department. The HR can extract employee performance data to improve their training programs and take several HR decisions based on the employee performance data which help businesses improve their productivity in longer run. Furthermore the queue management system can automate several customer journey processes and digitalize several interactions which helps automating many tasks which are previously done by the service staff. An effective queue management system can significantly reduce the workload of the employee which results in better performance. When employee works under balanced workload their satisfaction rises which raise their morals and have long term impact on employee performance and also enhance the quality of their work. The queue management system can also automatically reroute the customers based on the current customer flow at each counter to minimize the customer wait time which also help balancing the workload and enhance employee performance.
Queue Management System Reduces Cost
A queue management system is a great companion for your business to optimize the operational cost while boosting the performance and productivity. As I have mentioned above a queue management system can greatly improve customer flow and minimize the burden of the staff which results in a productive environment and it ensures high quality services for the customers. Furthermore the queue management system automates several queuing processes. The digitalization and automation doesn’t require any staff assistance at most of the touchpoints which means the overall need of human resource decreases. Businesses can invest in queue management system and minimize the need of human resource which can significantly reduce the operational cost without effecting the productivity in fact the queue management system can greatly improve efficiency. The initial cost of the queue management system is also quite reasonable, as the technology used to build queue management systems are widely available. A queue management system consists of two parts, the software and hardware. Both software and hardware works independently and doesn’t require regular maintenance, which means the maintenance cost is also very low. The improved employee efficiency, decreased human resource need, and low-cost deployment of the system results in high ROI and help businesses minimize the per-service and overall operational cost.
Queue Management System Collects Business Intelligence Data
A queue management system is a digital tool which have a very powerful AI based software with smart algorithms and great capabilities of collecting business intelligence data. The business intelligence data includes customer behavioral data, their interaction at each touch point, system’s statistical and analytical data and various other insight which help businesses understand customer needs, demands, liking/disliking, market trends, staff performance and customer feedback. A digital queue management system also offers in-built analytical tools which help businesses extract actionable reports from the collected data. These reports can be included in the decision making process as well as these can be shared automatically as per set frequency. The management can easily analyze the performance of each branch using these reports and on top of that customized reports can also be generated as per the needs of the management. The staff performance data is very useful for the resource planning and management and the HR can also use this data for several HR decisions. Queue management system can also be used to collect valuable customer feedback data which can be collected using on-premises tablets, touch screen or interactive kiosks and the queue management system can also integrate multiple channels such as SMS, Emails, WhatsApp, mobile apps, websites and many more. The business intelligence data help businesses improve processes, reduce cost and identify the areas of improvement which increase profitability and productivity in the long run.
How Queue Management System Improves Business
When a business deploy a queue management system it equally benefits all relevant parties. Whether it is customers, service staff, managers or senior management/head office everyone get several benefits. Here is a quick overview of benefits a queue management system offer for different stakeholders:
Queue Management System Benefits for Customers
- Customer will have better waiting experience
- More freedom and convenience during wait time
- Less wait time and satisfactory customer service
- Better communication, real-time updates and alerts
- Virtual queuing features and appointment booking facility
Queue Management System Benefits for Service Agents
- Balanced workload and low pressure environment
- Get help and simplify service delivery process
- More control and better customer flow management
- Better performance, higher employee satisfaction
Queue Management System Benefits for Managers
- Digitalization and automation improve administration
- Digital controls help managers effectively control the customer flow
- Analytical and performance data help managers make good decisions
- Automatic alerts and notifications keep managers up-to-date
- Advanced features help implementing company policy
Queue Management System Benefits for Head-Office
- Enable head-office to get real-time updates from all branches
- Improve monitoring and control over all connected branches
- Help head-office to collect data and make reports from all branches
- Help head-office to remotely implement their policy over all or selected branches
Conclusion
For businesses it is extremely important to ensure their customers are getting satisfactory experience at all their branches and outlets. The customer satisfaction is extremely crucial for your business’s success. Happy and satisfied customers tend to be loyal to the brand and they also help building a positive image with their feedbacks, reviews, word of mouth, social media and other online endorsements. For any business who is offering on-premises services whether it is from retail, finance, banking, healthcare, education, or any other service-based industry even the government offices and service centers also require a proactive queue management strategy which is impossible without implementing a digital queue management system. In this blog we have covered the advantages of implementing a queue management system for your business and the benefits it offers for key players and stakeholders. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to design and customized and highly cost-effective queue management system for your business, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.
Check out this: 8 Benefits of Using Digital Kiosks for Your Business