WiFi While Your Customers Wait

Christopher Carfi pointed me to a great article from Noel Franus titled Building the Better Guest Experience.  Noel suggests four small things that could make a big difference for your customers:

• Provide a comfortable space. A couch or coffee table is the first step you can take in shifting the mood from annoyed to relaxed. (Relaxed customers usually shell out more money than annoyed ones.) Investment: $2,000 (furniture).
• Do you have any coffee? A little java goes a long way toward making customers feel like valued guests. Get a decent coffeemaker and good beans. Or outsource the opportunity to a local brandofcoffeebucks that people know and enjoy. Investment: $1,000 per year (coffeemaker and supply).
• Dish up the fishwrap. For less than a buck a day, you can give them something to read or watch while they pass the time. Newspapers and magazines can keep those rambunctious customers under control. Investment: $100 per year (daily news and magazines).
• Nothing but net. Most people are missing out on work while they're in the store. Give them wi-fi, give them access to information, give them back their productivity, give them back their time. Investment: $700 per year (wireless router and high-speed Internet).

Noel continues:

If you're responsible for your customers' happiness, chances are you have an opportunity to create your own best-imaginable, rich experiences that need not cost an arm and a leg.  Whatever you do, don't just sit there with limited-profit space, focused on today's numbers rather than tomorrow's viability. Providing memorable moments will help your brand become one that customers truly appreciate. With an investment this tiny, there's so little to lose.

I think Noel is right on.  How many doctor’s offices (and lawyers offices and accountants offices …) have you been stuck in for longer than you expected to be?   If you knew there was WiFi (or at least a desk to work on) the wait wouldn’t have been so memorable.