Customer counting system
A customer counting system (also called footfall , frequency counting system, visitor counting system) is a system that automatically records visitors or customers at a certain point, an entrance, an exit or within a common area. The accuracy depends very much on the quality of the evaluation algorithm of the situation detected by the image sensor , light barrier or other sensors . This technology is mostly installed in the entrance and exit areas of shops, shopping centers, museums and other highly frequented places so that the total number of visitors and the people currently in the property is recorded. As eyes or sensors for the firstVarious techniques are used to collect raw data , including infrared radiation , computer analysis of a single or double CCD sensor , a thermal imaging camera, or a pressure sensor mat .
application areas
retail trade
There are a number of reasons for collecting visitors. In the retail sector, this survey is an essential contribution to business intelligence - a decisive factor in the raw data, from which the basis for decision-making is derived using various relationships. One indicator of business success is the ratio of visitors to actual customers. This is also called conversion . For example, in two stores of the same type, the absolute turnover for store A may have increased more than in store B - and yet the net business success based on the number of actual customers in store B is higher. The staff there acted better because the higher or lower absolute number of visitors may have been entirely external. In this example, the KPI (performance indicator) would be in favor of business B and suggest a direct need for action in business A from the management's point of view. Analogously similar deductions can also be made for periodic comparisons or by referring to other indicators such as season, weather, etc. meet.
In addition to this benchmarking benefit, knowledge of the data history also serves to promote customer satisfaction within the CEM measures ( Customer Experience Management ). One of the decisive factors for positive customer experiences is the availability of staff appropriate to the business in question. This applies to both advice and check-out and checkout areas.
If you use the customer count to accurately forecast the need for staff with foresight, direct and indirect additional exploitation of the customer potential results. If you follow the process up to the checkout and add the real and emotional aspects as well as the actual and the perceived waiting time, the portfolio of advantages fills up. While the soft factors such as satisfaction may still be questioned as a vague contribution to customer loyalty, according to the Erlang calculation method, a waiting time that is reduced by up to 30% is to be regarded as a hard factor.
For larger companies, optimization in the CEM has a time-shifted, measurable influence on the brand and company value.
- Adapt personnel roster to changing visitor demand and shopping habits
- as a powerful ad hoc micro-management measure, predict the optimal number of tills that have to be open in 15 and 30 minutes
- ensure the desired level of service quality
- show direct and indirect relationships between waiting times and turnover rates
- Make full use of sales potential and identify so-called heat maps
- Find an optimal relationship between checkout staff and visitors, with increasing sales exceeding increasing personnel costs
In a world in which the heart of trade suggests increasing by numbers, data and facts and the delimitation through marketing and customer loyalty ( Word of Mouth ) is given concentration processes in the area of sales and profile sharp monobrand or flagship stores in city centers and outlet malls , the shopping -Change the world, the contribution of customer counting systems has become almost indispensable as a decisive input source in the big data flow. A finding that more than 25% of retailers have already put into practice.
Shopping malls and centers
A shopping center or a shopping arcade is now almost 100% equipped with frequency measurement or customer counting systems. On the one hand, they serve to document the success of marketing and advertising measures. On the other hand, they help to justify the rents for the individual shops by recording the different areas and floors using sensors and evaluating them in a differentiated manner. The only knowledgeable and economically reliable method to prove this is an exact measurement of visitor flows. The operators of these shopping centers document for the tenants how many passers-by walk past the (shop window) areas they have rented at a certain distance. The shop owners try to win over a percentage of these passers-by - it is up to them to keep this percentage as high as possible. In any case, they have a fixed output which - when the information is brought together - makes a clear indication of individual marketing, shop attractiveness and the success of advertising measurable. For that applied parameters are CPT (Engl. Cost Per Thousand ) or SSM (Engl. Shoppers Per Square Meter , dt. Customers per square meter ) for both the centers and for the business.
Museums, venues, passenger transport, casinos
In all places where a large number of people visit, it is crucial to know how many people are where and when. This can hardly be recorded precisely enough in admission tickets or sales. In a museum you have to know where the visitors are going and how long they stay in certain areas. If you know this data, you can divide the guidance systems and exhibits so that a largely trouble-free process avoids traffic jams as well as yawning emptiness. This benefits the visitor as much as it does the operator. Theaters and event halls such as the new Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg will also be equipped with precisely working customer counting systems, which will record the expected 10,000 visitors per day. The data are used for control, security and optimization and fine-tuning of the air conditioning technology.
If you plan major events and carry them out, you have to guide crowds. Only with knowledge of these flows can security and timely feasibility achieve the priority that is appropriate to these factors. Even large crowds can be measured with high accuracy and the early warning system can take effect. If one calculates the available area and assumes that a critical risk limit has been reached if the area is less than 0.4 m² per person, countermeasures can be taken.
The Staten Island Ferry ships in New York transport an average of around 75,000 people a day. The passenger counting systems used there work with almost 100% accuracy and each trigger a verification alarm if the number of people on board does not match the number of people who leave the ship.
In Las Vegas, the US gambling center, the state controls the tax revenue from the gambling business from the ratio of players to the reported sales. On the other hand, almost three quarters of the almost 40 million annual visitors to the city are automatically counted as casino visitors who spend an average of more than 2.5 hours a day in a casino. The count is uniform and binding with a system that has been certified by the US government with the highest possible accuracy.
Many non-profit organizations need verifiable visitor and user numbers to justify their further funding. Public libraries, for example, have far more visitors than the actual loans show. This is because a registered lender often borrows books for other family members on presentation of a membership card. These active accompanying persons are not recorded by the pure bookkeeping, but are in fact in the library and make use of the advisory services.
Technologies
Modern frequency measurement and customer counting systems are based on different technologies. The important differences are shown below.
Individual evidence
- ^ Franz Locher: Numerical mathematics for computer scientists. Springer London, Limited, 1992, p. 45 2.6 ( limited preview in Google book search).
- ↑ Peter Klausmann, Claus Wetzel, Bertram Anderer: People counting for customer-oriented shop controlling. Eul Verlag, 2009, pp. 52–73 ( limited preview in Google book search).
- ↑ Customer potential ( Memento of the original from March 8, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Kai Axamitt: Waiting time for services: A theoretical and empirical analysis. Diploma theses Agency, 2000, ISBN 3832427112 , p. 14 ff. ( Limited preview in the Google book search).
- ↑ Erlang formula explained graphically
- ↑ Exchange: Analysis by Johann-Günter König (Bremen) and Manfred Peters (Düsseldorf) Verlag Suhrkamp ( Memento of the original from March 8, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ↑ Heat Maps
- ↑ Flagship store
- ↑ 100% installation density in shopping centers
- ↑ Visitor count Glow Festival 2012
- ↑ Las Vegas Stats & Facts ( Memento of the original from January 11, 2018 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ Example library Unterföhring according to Merkur-Online
