Real fashionable phenomenon, big artists’ exhibitions attract important flows of visitors. If the museums want to improve the public’s perception and offer them a better experience, a key point to review is the waiting time; indeed there are countless case of long queue outside museums with flagship exhibitions.  Rationalization of time and mobility is the new trend; actually we do not like to waste our time and we are glued to our mobile phones.  Museums and cultural center are now adapted to this trend.  They are also trying to decrease the perceived waiting time thanks to mobile phones. What are the challenges with customer reception in these particular places? What are the alternatives?

A multitude of reception modes

One of the challenges of optimizing reception in tourist sites is the multitude of reception modes that exist.  Most of the site currently use: the traditional tickets sales on location (at ticket offices or ticket machines), remote tickets sales (Online, supermarket chains, etc.), free tickets (children, students, etc.) and passes (Paris Museum Pass for instance). Thus, it is necessary to take into account all these reception modes at the same time.

Avoid waiting lines

On average we spend 2 years in our lifetime waiting, no need to say that visitors do not like waiting lines and that they need other alternatives. There are more and more innovations that appear to meet these expectations. Some locations offer to check online the peak hours, others offer online booking. Finally, there are some that offer the possibility to be placed in a virtual queue with a mobile application. The benefit of this application is that it frees the customers from the queue and allows them to use the related services (shops, special exhibitions, etc.).  It is also possible to speed up the waiting line thanks to an automatic single line queue solution. With this solution the process is 30 % faster, the reception staff better managed and it enables to have more people at the desks: customers are detected and directed automatically to free desks.

From real waiting time to perceived waiting time

For those that do not have the chance to experience one of these solutions it is still possible to offer them a better experience by reducing the perceived waiting time, transforming the passive wait into active. It may be through information display, promotion on video screen, or with a QR code allowing them to play a game on their Smartphone or even without via a game directly on the screen.

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