Have a Kindle Fire at home?  Now you can run your waitlist and schedule reservations for your business on your Kindle. Just go to the Kindle app store and search for Waitlist Me to get started.

Waitlist Me has been on the Android platform for a while, but historically the Kindle has been more of a consumer rather than a business device.  Recently though, we have seen businesses start to use Kindles more in work environments, and decided to make our app available in the Kindle store. Amazon has added a number of security and IT-friendly features to Kindles including Mobile Device Management Compatibility, Device Encryption, VPN, Single Sign-On, and more, making them more enterprise-ready for businesses.

Running Waitlist Me on a Kindle Fire, with its more portable form factor, can be a nice option extra device for managers that might be walking around the restaurant.  By logging into the same account, it will automatically sync with other devices the business may be using.  The 6 inch Kindle Fire is also very cost effective at only $99 dollars.

WiggleWorks kids is a popular destination for children and their families, being the only indoor playground that caters strictly to kids who are 48-inches tall or less. Weekends can be very busy, and Waitlist Me helps WiggleWorks kids reduce wait times, increase the number of kids they serve, and make parents happier.

WiggleWorks kids provides soft, moveable, interactive play equipment for children at its two Washington State locations, one each in the towns of Bellevue and Puyallop. The equipment is used to help children build motor skills and the unstructured play area gives them an opportunity for social interaction with children their own age.

“We limit the number of children who can play at one time and we are first come, first serve. There was no way for someone to get on the waiting list unless they called in or came into the store,” said Bellevue store manager, Kristen Deskin. “We had a lot of complaints about our wait list system because there were opportunities for a lot of user error and it often got confusing.”

That confusion was compounded by the fact that employees were responsible for taking down names and phone numbers, which were sometimes misprinted or missing key letters or numbers. Troubled by the many customer complaints, Deskin and her team looked for a better way to manage their waitlist. In 2013, they turned to WaitList Me.

“When we launched Waitlist Me we immediately felt more in control of our waitlist and felt like we had more opportunities to serve the public. This is because we could accommodate the number of people wanting to get on the list,” Deskin said. “It also has freed up an employee because they are no longer tied to taking names.”

Deskin likes how WaitList Me is easy to use and provides a simple way to keep track of store waitlists and whether customers walk in or add their name from home through the WiggleWorks kids website.  Since making the switch, customers have been happier and are more excited to come into the locations.

“We have had wait times of up to two hours in the past and WaitList Me has reduced those times so no one waits now for more than 45 minutes to an hour,” Deskin said. “I also use it to see and track how many children are coming back into play after waiting compared to how many names we are having to delete. That was one big improvement I was able to track that enabled me to make some good business decisions with the owner.”

– By Valerie Killifer, special to WaitList Me

Want an way for your customers to check their place in line?  Now you can easily display your public waitlist view on any TV screen through a new integration with Enplug. It’s great for your customers, as they can just glance at a TV screen to see their place in line instead of constantly wondering or asking how much longer they need to wait.

View of public waitlist on TV screen

View of waitlist managed on Waitlist Me

The Enplug device streams digital content onto any TV or display, so businesses can browse through a collection of apps to engage their audience, including Graphics (HD images and videos), Live Social Wall, News, Weather, Directory, Web Page, and now Waitlist Me. Apps and display settings can be instantly managed through Enplug’s web dashboard.  The integration with Waitlist Me is very intuitive, so it is simple for any business to set up and manage.

“Waitlist Me is the first third-party app available to our customers,” said Alex Ross, Chief Operating Officer, Enplug. “They’ve done a fantastic job at integrating their waitlist app software using our SDK. We want to provide our customers with as much great marketing content as possible, and Waitlist Me allows us to do exactly that.”

The integration with Enplug also marks an important milestone for Waitlist Me as the first publicly announced use of the Waitlist Me API.  The Waitlist Me API allows third parties to build Waitlist Me features into their websites and applications.  It can be used to display and customize the public waitlist view appears, add and remove parties, register users and more. For companies interested in using the API, please send an email to [email protected]

Where did NoshList go? It is now Waitlist Me. But don’t worry, everything you loved about NoshList is still there, plus a lot more.

As more and more businesses from all types of industries have been signing up to manage their waitlists, reservations, and appointments, we decided having a name that was broader and less tied to food would be better. As Waitlist Me, we are excited about all the opportunities for helping people that are waiting everywhere.

The road to Waitlist Me was paved with a number of features and user experience improvements. It started with enhancements for customized notifications and waitlist views. Table management was made more flexible so customers could also be assigned to people or other resources. Later, more prioritization was put on features such as reservations and appointments that were essential to many businesses. Finally, we invested more resources into making Waitlist Me cross-platform, so it would work on iPads, iPhones, Android tablets and phones, and even computers.

Being truly cross-platform is key to bringing the services to businesses everywhere. Some businesses don’t have Wi-Fi or have concerns using an iPad because of possible damage or theft. Now, even businesses with computers plugged into the Internet can use WaitList Me for their waitlists and reservations. The Android app also runs nicely on Clover, which is revolutionizing the way businesses think about POS systems.

In addition to the name change, we have redesigned and improved our iPhone and Android phone apps, and made a number of usability improvements in our tablet apps and online waitlist. Waitlist Me is also launching with a few powerful new features, such as the post-visit feedback surveys. Premium users can now customize and enable feedback surveys to go out after customer visits. Customers can easily send quick numerical ratings back in text messages or take surveys to rate their experiences in more detail, leave comments, an even request a manager to contact them about their visit.

Waitlist Me is also rolling out its first major API integration with Enplug, a company that helps businesses better engage their customers with smart digital signage devices and software.

More details on these new features will be coming soon.

Memories of sitting on Santa’s lap can evoke strong feelings of nostalgia for many of us, and continuing the tradition of capturing these magical moments can be a must-do for parents and grandparents of younger children.  The problem is that the holiday season is already a very busy time of year, and getting a turn on Santa’s lap usually requires some waiting. In worst case scenarios, it can even take several hours. Santa’s Playground and Santa’s Castle in Calgary have found a way to give back some of this precious time to families this holiday season by using NoshList for their waitlist.

Believe Imaging, an event photography company founded by Shelagh Anderson, photographs children with Santa at two of the busiest malls in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. At each location, employees are tasked with the responsibility of making sure every child who visits gets a turn to tell Santa what they would like for Christmas.

On average, the two centers combined receive upwards of 7,000 visits per week during the holiday season from November 23 through December 24.  To better handle the large number of visitors, Anderson was able to streamline the registration process and improve the customer experience by rolling out NoshList at both locations.

Prior to the launch of NoshList, employees were using pen and paper to take down names and numbers.

“The problem with pen and paper was the constant barrage of customers coming to ask if it was their turn because there was no visual display letting the customers know where they were in line,” Anderson said.

At first Anderson researched paging system, but the high initial and ongoing costs led her to seek an alternative solution.

“Originally in 2013 I sought out pagers, but after speaking to someone who had a system in excess of $3,000 I thought to myself that it didn’t make sense to invest in that archaic technology and there had to be a better way,” she said. “So I started looking on the Internet and came across NoshList in March 2014. This type of concept has been in my head for a number of years, so finding NoshList has definitely helped us realize some of the vision that I’ve had over the years.”

With the busiest days bringing over 700 kids to see Santa, children and their families can wait up to an hour for their turn.  While there is a play room in each location to ease the boredom, having a waitlist system like NoshList gives parents and families the ability to do other things while waiting for their turn.

“In terms of improving communications with our customers and allowing them the opportunity to roam the shopping center rather than stand in line, NoshList has been extremely well received by both mall administration and customers,” Anderson said. “Mothers are thrilled because they can register and know their kids are going to see Santa, while they have the freedom to go get a drink, use the restroom, continue shopping, or do other things.”

Registration is handled by three employees who are each armed with an iPad to start the waitlist process.Customers can see their places in line by clicking on a link to the public waitlist view and get a better estimate of how much longer it will be before their turn. The company also encourages their customer service desks to also log on to www.waitlist.me/n/believe_mm to accurately convey to customers who phone in asking about the wait times.

But the best part is that employees can also take down the children’s names and ages so Santa is prepared even before the child makes it to his lap.

“The elf standing next to Santa can relay the names of the next kids to him, and it adds that extra level of magic to the experience,” Anderson said. “If you’re a child and you round the corner and Santa calls you by name, that’s pretty awesome.”