Turn Frustration Into Delight By Providing Virtual Waiting Rooms For Your Customers

Facilitating a positive waiting room experience often creates customer satisfaction and loyalty. Waiting room experiences have quite adverse effects on public perception and satisfaction for many industries, so much so that it’s worth considering how to improve customer expectations, no matter your business.

Implementing queue management and online scheduling software into your business benefits the public and employees, allowing for a more streamlined customer management process. Avoid client frustrations by offering queueing and scheduling solutions.

Understanding Customer Frustrations with Waiting

People despise waiting in lines. There are myriad reasons, but it often boils down to the customer or patient feeling that their wait time is or will be too long. As a result of these negative projections, many customer appeasement techniques focus on using distraction or underpromising and over-delivering.

In actuality, many customers are looking for choices and options. They want to feel that they’re in charge of their own time and that it isn’t wasted. Fortunately, modern technology provides new solutions that give customers or patients more control over appointment scheduling and waiting room experiences.

Introducing Virtual Waiting Rooms

One of the more appealing customer experience improvements is the virtual waiting room. Although you don’t have to plug into the matrix to get there, it does often involve a phone, just the same.

Virtual waiting rooms and online queueing software allow customers or patients to check in for appointments with their computers, tablets, or phones. Once the customer digitally or “virtually” checks in and indicates they’re ready for their appointment, they can wait in their car, outside on a bench, or anywhere nearby.

Meanwhile, the customer still has a place in line in the virtual waiting room. They’ll be notified via SMS when it’s time for their appointment. Not only does the customer get to skip sitting in an actual waiting room, but they can also avoid the potential crowds.

Virtual waiting rooms are also gaining popularity because they direct some of the responsibility and decision-making process back to the customer or patient. Autonomy is an essential aspect of customer satisfaction.

Reducing Perceived Wait Time

One of the biggest complaints about waiting in line is that the customer or patient has waited too long. In actuality, most people exaggerate the actual wait time. Nevertheless, once the perception of wasted time has entered the psyche, altering said perception is challenging.

With a virtual waiting room, though, the customer or patient has confirmation of their place in line and is then allowed to forget about the wait. Customers or patients then create the distractions or diversions of their choice.

Before they realize it’s time for their appointment.

Offering Self-Service Options

As we’ve been discussing, many customers and patients have expressed that they wish for more control or direction over their appointment scheduling and waiting room options. The public can pick and choose more readily with queueing and scheduling solutions involving modern technology.

Using scheduling software allows clients, patients, and customers to set their own schedules based on times they know will work best. Scheduling software also allows for relatively easy changes to scheduled times or dates, improving customer satisfaction. When the public can schedule themselves, they’re more likely to keep the appointment.

On the day of the appointment, virtual queueing software allows the customer to check in and out independently. Customers can even install mobile apps that send alerts and reminders for appointment times.

Enhancing Customer Engagement

Expanding the role of the customer or patient in their appointment scheduling and waiting room processes often increases customer engagement with an organization, a company, or their brand. Customer empowerment gives customers a bit of psychological ownership.

Once a customer is committed to a business or organization, they’re likely to stay loyal. Retaining these loyal customers isn’t hard, but it does require showing appreciation and giving the customer something tangible in the form of a reward or acknowledgment. Customer engagement through enhanced roles or responsibilities can work well to keep customers returning for more.

When a customer or patient is then allowed to schedule or amend their appointments at their leisure, check in virtually without the assistance of a receptionist, or offer their opinion on their wait experience, their engagement is sure to feel increased.

Managing Customer Expectations

One of the keys to helping customers to have a pleasant experience is to manage their expectations ahead of time. When a customer is fully aware of how a process works, including the time and the steps to completion, they’re far more likely to accept the results.

In a virtual waiting room, customers are regularly informed of their place in line and approximately how long they’ll be waiting. This omnipotent knowledge helps to ease the person’s mind and settle them in for the wait.

With an online scheduling process, the customer or patient can know the full scope of the process because they’re in charge. They pick the day and time and can decide to set themselves a reminder.

Implementing Virtual Waiting Rooms

Helping customers to have a positive experience is necessary for long-term satisfaction and loyalty. For many companies and organizations, that’s coming through increased technology usage and application.

With queue management and appointment scheduling software, customers and patients receive technological improvements that benefit everyone involved. Not only can they schedule and manage their appointment schedules, but the virtual waiting room offers a more expedient and safe process for attending the appointment.

A virtual waiting room can also be a source of customer data for a company or organization. Businesses can analyze individual customer trends and the ebb and flow of total customers throughout the day, week, or month. This data can help with allocating staffing and managing walk-in customers or peak times for customers.

Give Customers What They Want

When increasing customer satisfaction, one of the best places to start is virtual queueing, virtual waiting rooms, and online appointment scheduling. Customers will feel empowered to manage their appointments and wait times, and employees and staff will find they have more time for other projects and duties. Customers are likelier to keep their positions and become more loyal with each positive interaction.

Call Nemo-Q today if you’re ready to see the difference virtual queueing software can make. Contact us to plan for a demonstration or to learn more about our award-winning systems.