Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock....
When I arrived at Hennepin County Services to renew my passport, the receptionist said I would wait about 20 minutes before someone could help me. There were only three other people waiting, with about 10 of the 20 counters open. I imagine she has learned to double the actual wait time because it makes the customer feel like they’re more efficient than they really are. Sitting in the waiting area, I was greeted with a digital sign.
Passport, shmassport. Let’s talk about this little ditty.
There is a screen mounted about 10 feet in the air over the seating area. There is another screen on the other side.
Thank goodness there was a giant toy bus.
The main purpose of this screen should be to suspend the perception of time. No one walks into a place like this without knowing there will be a wait involved, so the primary objective should be to capture the viewer’s attention in a fashion that keeps them from looking at their watch.
The screen has three zones. The upper left zone is an entertainment loop, the upper right zone is a vertical space for ads; the third zone is a scrolling ticker across the bottom that indicates the next person in line for service.
From here you can almost make out the phone number on the ad.
Sitting, waiting, and staring at this screen, myriad issues bounced into my head that begged the question: Did anyone do a site survey when installing this? There are several physical concerns I had with this deployment, but want to touch on some of the screen content, things that can be corrected with minimal effort and expense.
In a situation where zones are used on a screen, the viewer is going to have to make constant decisions about which zone to pay attention to. The timing of each zone content must be considered, what changes and when. If the viewer has to work too hard to figure out what to watch, the viewer will get tired of watching and start paying attention to other things, like a clock.
The screen real estate allocated to each of the three zones was fine, but the application inside those zones was troubling.
Entertainment Zone
The practical usage of the zone and the content were completely bizarre. It showed a five minute (five minutes!) clip of Casablanca, and added a cinematic curtain feature to the sides of the screen. Also, the aspect ratio of the film was widescreen. The original film was 1.33:1. (My little ticky-tack there.) Worst of all, the clip was being shown without any audio or subtitles. In a crowded waiting room, I can expect to have difficulty hearing, but not in a waiting room with three people. Where was the audio? (More on the audio later.)
Solution: Use the entire space given to the zone. The screen is so high and away from the audience that this must be utilized for maximum exposure. If showing clips, show clips that are short form and more relevant to the audience. Casablanca? Why? How about something from a recent movie, or a TV show?
Queue Ticker
One way they are great at this is by employing random numbers for people waiting. My number was D201. The number before me was I274. The number before that was Q703, and there were more unrelated numbers after mine. A nice move that keeps people from seeing how fast or slow the numbers are moving and guessing how long it will take until their number comes up.
But it’s a scrolling ticker. Scrolling tickers are extremely difficult to comprehend. With a scrolling ticker, the viewer is constantly challenged with having to check it every few seconds to see if she has missed anything. That checking and rechecking forces her to multitask with viewing, thus making paying attention a chore. What’s worse is that the ticker only changes when a new number is called. So the viewer has to keep glancing at it but often see that nothing has changed.
Solution: Do a simple transition from one number to another with a dissolve or unique effect that captures the viewer’s attention for the new number. Once the number is up there, leave it there. Don’t scroll it or move it. When a new number is called, the new number pops up. This way, the viewer’s attention will be drawn to it only when needed, and the people not affected by the new number can continue to enjoy the rest of the screen.
Audio
During the programming, there was no audio except for the automated and rather Elwood Edwards-sounding voice that calls out the next number in the queue. It make the screen feel less engaging and more like a billboard rather than entertainment. What was even stranger was that the set had speakers.
(Quick Trivia: Who is Elwood Edwards? Answer.)
Solution: Add the audio back into the entertainment zone. When a new number is called, have the entertainment audio interrupted with the queue number. Technology is available that allows the venue to automatically control the volume level depending on the ambient noise. Audio is an experiential device that, if utilized properly, can have tremendous impact on the experience.
Little Things Mean A Lot
With these changes, the waiting area can be much more inviting, especially when preconceptions about time are already apparent with such a venue.
There you go. I officially spent more time writing this post than I did waiting to get my passport. I hope I did a better job of suspending time than Hennepin County did.
