2009 KioskCom Self Service Expo and The Digital Signage Show
at New York’s Jacob K. Javits Convention Center

It’s rarely a straight path from concept to final deployment. Innovation requires a fair amount of flexibility. “More often than not, the business plan that you start out with is not the plan that you will end up with,” said Gregg Kaplan, COO and President of Coinstar, and this year’s keynote speaker at the 2009 KioskCom Self Service Expo and The Digital Signage Show.

Coinstar is one of the great success stories in the self-service space. Coinstar broadened its product line last February with the acquisition of Redbox, a DVD movie kiosk network. The acquisition added more than 12,000 automated retail locations to their coin-counting kiosk footprint.

Coinstar has developed strong consumer and retail relationships that have propelled its growth. By the end of this year Coinstar’s network of automated retail systems will grow to 20,000 Redbox locations, and more than 19,000 coin-counting machines across the US.

Mr. Kaplan shared some of the lessons he learned about successful self-service deployment. You need to simplify the value proposition otherwise you run the risk that consumers won’t get it.. “Keep it simple. Can you explain the concept in one sentence?” asked Mr. Kaplan.

Your offer needs to be compelling enough to convince consumers to change their normal pattern of behavior. You need to offer consumers real value and differentiate your concept from everything in the market.

You should be wary of developing concepts that rely to heavily on buzzwords to sell the idea. “For example, ‘It’s cool’ can often mean that there’s not a real compelling offer—cool concepts are often just a distraction,” said Mr. Kaplan. Other marketing buzzwords to watch out for are “we’re brand building.” If your kiosk concept is a brand-building exercise, then there may not be a solid business model to start with.

It’s also important to consider how consumers will interact with your system. The user interface needs to be simple. You don’t want it to feel like the cockpit of an airplane. For example, the Redbox interface basically consists of 3 buttons.

Convenience Is a Prime Driver of Sales

Self-service kiosks work best by providing instant gratification. It’s the spur-of-the-moment purchase decisions that enable kiosks to satisfy demand. “The Internet gives your product reach on a global scale, but it can’t satisfy the immediateness that a kiosk can provide,” said Mr. Kaplan. Self-service kiosks provide consumers with a level of control. They also act as “lane-busters” by giving consumers the option to bypass the traditional checkout lane. Your deployment plans should focus on new ways to provide efficiency by reducing wait time and increasing customer satisfaction.

Once you have a unique concept, you need to consider how it will be executed. “You need to get the model right. Going fast with the wrong model only makes things worse, slow down,” said Mr. Kaplan.

Coinstar will be adding more options for consumers in the near future. Consumers will soon be able to return any movie to any Redbox location across the country. Redbox.com will also enable consumers to check availability online, and an iPhone application is currently in development that will allow users to reserve movies at designated Redbox location.

The Next Big Idea

Coinstar also announced the winner of "The Next Big Idea Contest," which awarded $10,000 for the best new concept in retail-based kiosk design. The contest received more than 100 entries, each competing to address a unique need or solve a consumer problem. The winning concept also needed to have a high potential to capture significant market share.

The winning entry was ecoATM, a San Diego-based developer of self-service solutions. EcoATM is a kiosk-based eCycling station that collects portable devices, such as cell phones, PDAs, and iPods for recycling. The kiosk provides payment to the consumer by providing trade-in promotions and discounts, gift cards, or charitable contributions. Consumers place into storage more than $25 billion of used electronics each year, so the potential market is huge.

Kiosks and Digital Signage, Coexistence
Versus Convergence

When one looks around at all of the kiosks and digital signage systems on the tradeshow floor, you can begin to see that there are overlaps between the two platforms. In fact, many have predicted that convergence is inevitable but it may not be as easy to achieve as some might think.

Ken Goldberg, CEO of Real Digital Media, clarified many of the issues that separate the two platforms and presented the reasons he believes that real convergence won’t happen. Mr. Goldberg’s presentation, Coexistence Versus Convergence: Digital Signage, Interactive Applications and Their Future explored the issue.

“Interactive applications by nature are one-to-one experiences. They map well to Web-based tools, often emulating them,” said Mr. Goldberg. The common thread between kiosks and the Internet is that they are transaction-based, collecting and dispensing information.

In contrast, digital signage is primarily presentation-based. Digital signage is a one-to-many experience that often involves a call-to-action, branding, and sales-oriented messaging. Digital signage networks are often centrally driven versus kiosk-based systems that are primarily user-driven.

There are some overlaps between the two platforms. Larger screens are beginning to appear in many kiosk designs. Larger screens can function as an attractor to engage users to interact with a kiosk system. In addition, video content can be stored on a kiosk-based system enabling the screen to function as an on-demand digital signage display. Digital signage displays are also beginning to incorporate touch screens that enable viewers to drive content on screen.

Mobile phones have the ability to bridge the gap for digital signage, linking a call-to-action with the action itself. “Mobile applications make digital signage active, but not interactive,” says Mr. Goldberg. Consumers have the ability to capture information using QR codes and SMS on mobile devices and retain information such as coupons and Website addresses for future use.

If true convergence is really going to happen, an organization needs to consider the application as a strategic asset in order to push the integration to a higher level. “Digital signage applications are often owned by the marketing department, whereas kiosk applications are run by an operational department. For true integration to happen, all parties need to own the digital signage and kiosk applications, controlling both ends of the pipe. The two are unlikely to converge into one application stream. Doing both really well is very difficult,” said Mr. Goldberg.



<— Return To Main Events Page