How to Stop Making Guests Work Too Hard to Spend Money

At the recent Amusement 360 event, our sales director, John Keys, spent time on something that isn’t new, but is easy to overlook in the day-to-day. It’s no secret that we want seamless experiences that delight guests, and often, we even know what “good” looks like. But what’s difficult for many operators comes down to actually building it into the way your operation runs every single day.

Friction doesn’t just show up as one big issue you can fix and move on from; rather, it shows up in the small moments, like having to purchase different offerings from different team members. Or guests feeling like they need a degree just to understand your menu board. Or in chasing down a team member just to order a soft drink. Individually, those things don’t feel like much. Together, they change how guests behave and how they think about your business as a whole.

Read on for five simple ways to make creating friction a thing of the past, so you can stop putting up barriers to your guests’ experience.

No. 1: Start Seeing Friction as a Revenue Problem.

It’s easy to label friction as a guest experience issue and leave it there. But if you want to understand its impact, you have to follow it a little further. Every time a guest hesitates, you’re looking at a lost opportunity. They skip that extra game that would get them closer to the prize. They decide to just leave for a restaurant. They don’t bother reloading because they’re simply not that engaged.

That’s why friction is so expensive and not that easy to spot. It doesn’t necessarily show up as a complaint, but often as lower per-cap spend or shorter visits. Many operators track headcounts, daily sales, and admissions, but if you want to know whether you’ve got friction building, be sure to review trends in per-capita spending as well as overall traffic.

No. 2: Look at Your Operation the Way Your Guests Do.

Guests don’t experience your facility in sections. They don’t think about admissions, POS, attractions, and food and beverage as separate systems, but instead they experience your business as a whole, from the time they seek you out online all the way through to your final goodbye.

Friction anywhere in that flow carries forward. If something feels slow at the beginning, it changes how they approach everything that comes after. But we can become blind to it over time. which is why it’s important to take time periodically to step back and walk your operation the same way a guest would.

If you haven’t done this exercise in a while, take some time to view your facility with fresh eyes. Ask yourself:

• Where do things slow down?
• Where do you see guests making decisions away from a purchase?
• Where do people have to ask questions?
• Where does your team have to step in and fix something?
• What minor inconveniences are in the way of guests enjoying your facility’s attractions or other offerings?

Those are the moments that matter. While you’re at it, also look for positive deviance so you can provide praise and coaching, as necessary, with the team.

No. 3: Make Buying Easy.

If you want guests to spend more, the first step is making it easy to say yes. That starts with how you present what you sell. If someone has to stand there and sort through too many options or try to understand your pricing, you’ve already created friction. In most cases, they’ll default to the simplest option (if anything) just to move on.

Clear structure helps. A straightforward “good, better, best” approach gives guests a starting point and removes the need to overthink it. Your team should reinforce that by making recommendations when someone isn’t sure what to choose.

The second part of this is how guests pay.

If guests have to stop to think about how they’re paying (or that they’re spending money) every time they do something, you’re breaking the flow of the experience. Payments should feel simple and consistent from the moment they first engage with you.

That means supporting the methods guests already use every day like Google and Apple Pay and reducing how often they have to go through the transaction process. Consider the technology you’re using throughout this process and whether you would benefit from implementing a new solution to streamline the process. Consider:

• An integrated facility management solution that allows guests to purchase attractions, food and beverage, and gameplay quickly and easily either onsite or online
• A deposit solution for events like Click to Pay that allows you to take deposits quickly and securely while booking events on the phone
• Strategically placed kiosks that make gameplay and package purchases simple for guests who prefer self-service options
• A mobile food and beverage solution that enables guests to order food and beverage wherever they are in your facility, so they don’t have to interrupt their fun to order
• A simple Pay at the Table option so guests can dine, pay at their convenience, and then get back to the fun faster

When buying is clear and paying is easy, you remove a lot of the hesitation that limits spend as well as improve satisfaction.

No. 4: Make Arcade Play Effortless.

The game room is one of your facility’s most valuable assets and you want to maximize every moment. Make sure it’s easy for guests to buy and reload cards or wristbands, earn and redeem winnings, and check balances on the fly.

When running special events with time play options, use payment readers to help distinguish the games that are included in packages and which require additional purchases.

You could even offer flexible payment solutions at certain games, attractions, vending machines, photo booths and the like by outfitting them with readers that accept value media and credit cards. This helps you tap into impulse purchases while getting out of the way of your guests’ experiences.

No. 5: Connect the Entire Experience.

A lot of friction doesn’t come from what guests see, but from what’s happening behind the scenes. When your systems don’t work together, your team has to compensate. That might mean a bogged down sales process, manual re-entry, or explaining process inconsistencies. Over time, that internal friction shows up in the guest experience.

When everything is tied together, from sales and events to food and beverage and reporting, your team isn’t working around the system. Guests move through the experience without having to think about how anything works, because it just does.

That’s where a unified solution for facility management, cashless, and merchant services can makes a difference. With a single solution, you can dig in to understand where you’ve got revenue-generating and cost-prevention opportunities. You’re also able to meet guests where they are with everything you offer, because all your critical offerings can be purchased anywhere your guests choose to engage with you. Check-ins become that much simpler because they’re directly associated with attraction purchases. It just all makes sense and works for your business rather than fraying at the seams between solutions.

When you start treating friction as a revenue issue and begin removing it across the entire experience, things start to change, starting with your bottom line. If this sounds like something you need, please reach out to us today to learn more.