What your rental car business really offers is freedom – freedom from stressful train schedules, uncomfortable bus journeys, and extended waiting times. Renting a car means the freedom to choose one's own pace and maybe even enjoy a premium model slightly above your everyday budget.
The customer experience of self-service kiosks in car rental
What does that mean for a rental company? Car rental brands need to refine and digitize the customer experience they provide. Otherwise, they will not be ready to develop into the mobility providers of tomorrow. We’re here to show you the way forward.
The future lies in Sharebox, an innovative and user-friendly rental car handover system that offers digital check-in and check-out for keys. Trusted by customers, Sharebox streamlines the process by removing the need for manual handovers and payments.
As the car rental industry transitions into a sharing-focused society, where new generations prefer sharing over owning, it's crucial to make transactions effortlessly simple for the customer.
Why customer experience is key for a super easy car rental business
Car rental companies are looking to offer a way to put their customers first and also maintain a long-term relationship. New tech can help create this experience by predicting customer preferences and offering recommendations based on those.
How far do these use cases go? That’s debatable, but it’s clear that there’s a steep learning curve. Companies leveraging technologies that enable personalization, usage prediction, and tech automation will see the friction points early. Then they will be prepared to lead the market when autonomous vehicles become part of our daily routine.
A good place to start looking for inspiration is in the consumer-tech sector. Online-based direct-to-consumer brands are raising the bar for best-in-class digital customer experience.
It is likely that the next customer generation, accustomed to instant gratification in the digital space, will potentially opt out of car rental altogether if it entails a time-intensive and inconvenient experience.
Convenience is just one feature of Sharebox, the super easy handover system for car rental businesses, dealerships, and workshops. Sharebox lets customer drop off and pick up their keys from a smart cabinet, ready for upsale and accessible 24/7.
Matching the car to the right customer makes for self-service car rental
In the past few years, we have seen multiple data sources due to connectivity, machine learning, and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies that provide valuable insights.
Just as real-time data analysis can provide forecasts, it can also help match the right car to each customer. A vehicle can be specifically assigned while considering different parameters such as pick-up time, car type, destination, and even child car seats, and racks for carrying sports equipment or snow tires.
Imagine super easy car rental – an entirely different service experience.
With super easy car rental, the customer no longer has to wonder when her vehicle is ready for pickup. She has updates on her smartphone and mobility options to get to the pick-up point. Car rentals might even bundle their short-term service as part of a mobility package, with a monthly fee to cover the rental rate, with variable car size and engine options.
The good news is that a lot of these changes to self-served experiences can have a sizable effect when it comes to improving growth, running costs and availability 24/7.
Car rental operators can deploy existing third-party digital tools that facilitate online booking, upsale, driver’s license control, and check-in with payment options, to provide even greater convenience for customers.
These types of integrated solutions enable a slim organization to devote more attention to streamline operations instead of having to complete administrative time-consuming front desk tasks at their pick-up points.
In the rapidly evolving landscape of car rentals, the future is clear: technology-driven, customer-centric services like Sharebox make car rental super easy, signaling a shift towards more accessible, efficient, and personalized mobility solutions.
As the industry embraces these innovations, ensuring a seamless and delightful customer experience becomes paramount, positioning forward-thinking companies for success in a competitive market.
