Today multimedia is to be thought no more away from marketing and sales. But different than at all other multimedia scenarios, at kiosk systems - that applies also to interactive posters and signs in the sense of the now new term „Digital Signage" - mainly the EDP unusal user, der „occasional user" is addressed. Nevertheless as consequence of badly deployed projects fears of threshold have adjusted themselves both with the employees and with the customer which caused that some kiosk system did not obtain desired success. While the Internet surfer is familiar  with the PC and looking and scrolling within the Internet pages, the target group for kiosks is the normal user, if one leaves  children and young people out of consideration. These do act however after completely different, i.e. own subjective criteria which are only conditionally comparable with the use behavior at other multimedia projects. Therefore for the success of kiosk projects relevant quality criteria are not only optimal hardware (housing) and software (applications), customized to this target group, but also the following items:

• Analysis of the company's structure and evaluation of the (past) sales and communication strategies referring to the
  promising integration of all available sales channels - with special consideration of kiosk systems.
• Definition of the target group(s) and their subjective criteria using kiosk applications.
• Evaluation of the added value of a kiosk strategy from the view of the enterprise and its employees.
• Conception of the surrounding field factors and the activities to lead the customers to the kiosk systems -  regarding
  psychological aspects of sales promotion, readiness and barriers of usage.
• Attention of the kiosk users' individual discretion needs.
• Selection of the right, experienced and suitable partners - considering strict criteria for selection.
• Multimedia conversion strategies concerning hardware (design of the housing, peripherals, network), software, content
  as well as graphical user interface (GUI) with consideration of customer loyalty and customer attraction procedures 
  and inclusion of "Best Practices" of comparable solutions.
• and finally to absolutely ensure a comprehensive service conception for internal and external pro¬mo¬¬tion, service, 
  maintenance, reliability, responsibilities, actualization as well as quality control and success measurement and
  monitoring  the "Strategic Alignment".

Before a kiosk project can be started, a very detailed analysis and evaluation of all and in the future necessary strategic activities of the enterprise are necessary. With the increasing variety of alternative multi channels also the  importance of the strategic evaluation of these alternatives is growing, as can be seen in the overview "Comparison of  Selected Communication Channels".

Before a kiosk project can be started, a very detailed analysis and evaluation of all and in the future necessary strategic activities of the enterprise are necessary. With the increasing variety of alternative multi channels also the  importance of the strategic evaluation of these alternatives is growing, as can be seen in the overview "Comparison of  Selected Communication Channels". The concentration on new customers may not lock the view for the securing and enhancement of the existing core business. To that extent the question about the optimization of the sales channels has quite a defensive and an offensive component. The optimization of the sales channels can only succeed if it is based on the connection of strategic analysis and technological evaluation of the possibilities. The crucial question, which kiosk need actually exists, therefore is not more technical, but excluding strategic nature: each enterprise has an individual surrounding field situation and therefore must guarantee that above all those channels are made available and those media are used, which are strategically important due to the accomplished business process analysis. For the durable success of a kiosk system in the market therefore superior and flexible processes are substantial, which are  arranged out of the enterprise. Only a "Strategic Alignment" , i.e. the each-early feedback and agreement of the operational decisions within the personnel, technical and organizational range with the total enterprise strategy,  and the ability for permanent adjustment to the rapid change of the basic conditions of market, competition and customer behavior secure the efficiency of complex market strategies.

If one may now be convinced that the deployment of kiosk terminals as additional communication channel beside all other sales channels may be helpful,  then it is however necessary to place itself to some fundamental questions regarding the goals which is to be achieved concretely - whether the customer service should be improved, more sales promoting information should be made accessible, the business processes should be automated or whether all these goals are to be achieved at one time. Set up a detailed business plan divided into individual phases and consider you also any business process changes. The plan to reach everything at once is surely fastidious, however has been rarely proved as meaning­ful. It is better to focus "Quick Wins", i.e. to be successful with small steps however not loosing sight of the total goal. In addition, considerations must be employed regarding the location and the entire surrounding, in which such a kiosk is set up, regarding the kind of the promotion, application and leading to such a terminal, regarding the psychological barriers of different user groups, regarding target group-fair attraction, design of the application, regarding the design of the graphical user interface, the user guidance and the ergonomic design of the kiosk system as well as finally regarding the value for the customer with consideration of its time and stress situations (e.g. at the purchase).

Crucially for the success of kiosk terminals in any case is also the selection of the right partners, because the area of kiosks is an industry of absolute specialists. Therefore one should let in oneself only with professionals and not with dazzlers and charlatans, from which you will find some again and again also in this industry. Unfortunately also quite high-level personnels are blue-eyed and fall in on these guys, because they tell and insure them with their "charm" that it does not cost all anything and they don't need to worry. That sounds naturally enticing in view of scarce resources - but if one had thought of this only a little bit, one would have found that this can not come up and will. Select therefore very carefully your supplier(s), your location operator(s) and clarify all responsibilities before the conclusion of the contract. Analyze all pros & cons of the respective vendors and partner as well as of the individual business models. Clarify also before conclusion of the contract the financial situation of the respective partners, in order to exclude time delays, bad surprises or the complete delay by insolvency. Examine with the partners whether these bring along at all experiences from kiosk projects or whether they have made a kiosk "project" only beside their Web design activities - see also for this the accompanying vendor selection criteria according to "the 4th Annual Kiosk Benchmark Study" from Kiosk Business and Gartner Group. It is also wrong and in respect of kiosk projects sometimes quite fatal to believe that mainly large and well-known names can make everything. A Bill Gates thereafter would have received today hardly a chance. The specialty of small, medium-sized companies is that with them innovation and a lot of ideas are paired with speed of conversion and individual design. Therefore take up contact with independent institutions, with experienced experts who can be helpful to you in the selection of your partners and advisors due to their neutrality, objectivity and experience. That might cost you perhaps a few more EURO notes, however it will efficiently defend you from partially inefficient and unreasonable bad investments. And do not believe that you can do everything in your own house - because your employees don't have the necessary experience.

In  the above mentioned business plan it also must be considered, which hardware, which peripheral devices, which additional components, which networks, which data bases and which other software solutions already exist in the enterprise or are planned in the future and have to be merged in the kiosk project in order to ensure the compatibility of the individual components and solutions. In addition, it is to be examined very carefully, which components are

Integrate your employees already from the beginning - e.g. by trainings on the job, by questioning over its experiences with the customers and their desires and in the long run by granting Incentives, if they bring customers to the kiosks  and generate new sales. Such projects have successfully proven themselves again and again that have granted such sales to the store and  respective the sales personnel which is generated via kiosk terminals in the store or online via Internet terminals. Thus also the fear of the kiosk has been taken away from employees as a job killer. It is also inevitably to locally determine employees for certain tasks such as support, maintenance, cleanliness, paper supply as well as function and system availability.

Considerating these and additionally some other factors, which cannot all be listed here, would have prevented the failure of kiosk projects, e.g. due to

• the missing integration of the local employees, especially such employees which spend day for day with the customer and therefore know best their desires and needs and also fears - and which in addition have even personal fears, e.g. see the kiosk as job killer
• the enterprise-internal rivalries between marketing and organization / IT departments, the vanity of some high-level management and the personnel fluctuation, which meant frequently the end of a project
• and finally also due to the cooperation with the wrong, that means: within the kiosk area unsuitable partners. 

Crucially for later success of kiosk terminals is in the long run the acceptance of the customers - so explained high-level experts at a kiosk conference: "...it would be too beautiful, if one could get now finally the customers to the kiosk terminals ... ".Test therefore constantly during the development and pilot phase the system and application by the customers - best in the environment planned later by the intended target group as well as by accompanying market investigations - there even do exist enterprises, which have been conducted 16 (!) market investigations before the start, during the development as well as after the introduction of the kiosk terminals. Often however sufficient time for examination and additional corrections are not considered. Unfortunately this important time interval is frequently missing in the project plans or is regarded only as buffer and is deleted when time problems arise - with the consequence that further developments result on incorrect and/or not secured intermediate results and therefore mistakes will continue over several phases. All functions and processes therefore must be so accurate and so understandable that customers do not have problems with them - and in contrary for them the use of the terminal is more comfortable and more time-saving than the usual procedures. Therefore it is necessary to use expressive buttons and diagrams in accordance with the slogan "KISS - Keep it simple, stupid" and to avoid long-winded instructions for text, which nobody read anyway. Change if nesscessary the application, the graphical user interface and the design of the hardware due to the lessons learned.

One of the most difficult and in any case most important challenges with kiosk projects is the accurate definition of customer needs, customer expectations and the „Value-to-Customer" as well as an appropriate conversion to the need/satisfaction chain of the potential user. If one does not succeed closing this chain with all information elements of the kiosk terminal, the information, the message, which one would like to convey to the customer, is set into the sand.  Kiosks must provide to the customer a visible, considerable value, an added value - e.g. saving of time, discounts for faithful customers. It has to be made clear to the customer, which advantage you do offer to him and which value he will get - however you have usually only a few seconds time for that. Only if the customer gets or believes to recognize sufficient "value", he would be willing, to pretend a service such as a kiosk. With attention of this experiences, kiosk solutions developed with high expenditure of time, cost and manpower would not have been unconsidered by the customers.

Customer satisfaction is to understand as "successful orien­tation at the quality perception of the customer", which means,

• that the customer has a quality perception, which corresponds to its own,
• that this becomes the target criterion for business activities and finally
• one corresponds to this demonstrably, measurably.

This requires to make measurable, to objective the  subjective perception, which customers have received from the services, from the quality of the vendor. The "objectification of the subjectivity" of quality perceptions is the crucial competition factor, the measuring pole for the market success: who wants to be successful, must orient itself to it. If one succeeds placing the customer perception into the center of a kiosk project and not only uniquely, but permanently, only then a perceptible and durable competition advantage for the enterprise can be realized. The intended success presupposes thereby however, that as much as possible case studies of comparable enterprise solutions as expert's assess­ments are to be considered for the permanent analysis of enterprise-internal business processes, for target group segmentation, for the elaboration of customer use criteria, for the determination of enterprise-internal success criteria as well as for the integration of customer relationship (CRM) procedures. Therefore not a special high creativity is primarily crucial, but above all the consideration of already existing kiosk experience. 

Read more shortly in the "MediaCityReport 2005/6" - the extensive study over the practical use of Kiosk Terminals and Digital Signs all over the world with tipps, tricks and check lists for a successful kiosk project management.

Visit also the KIOSK EUROPE EXPO 2007 (http://www.kioskeurope-expo.com/) at  May 08 - 10, 2007 in Essen and learn there on the basis of appropriate case studies and successful concepts from the exhibitors on the fair as well as of competent specialists from several European countries in the conference and in the forum, how to plan a kiosk project or how to optimize your current project.