Acquiring new guests is five times as expensive as trying to change the behavior of your existing ones, according to research from Invesp. So how can you entice a happy-hour customer to stay for dinner, a morning-coffee lover to add a breakfast sandwich to their order, or a weeknight diner to return for lunch the next day? A recent report from Modern Restaurant Management advises operators to focus on guest segmentation and follow through with personalized messaging to nudge guests in a new direction (while ensuring you’re not swamping them with messages that don’t resonate). It helps to consider time and place when planning your outreach. For instance, a person who comes for Thursday happy hour is more apt to take you up on a weeknight appetizer or dinner offer if they receive your promotion at a time and place where they are able to take you up on it – not on a weekend, or after they are back at home for the evening after work. You can gain insights into guests’ preferences by mining your data – your loyalty program, online reservation records and even your WiFi hotspot can all inform you about when guests are visiting you and what their taste preferences are. From there, you can approach guests in a number of ways based on their behavior and when you’re trying to drive traffic. That could be sending a text when they are on premise to entice them to return the next day for a deal on an appetizer, reaching out to guests visiting during slow periods and offering loyalty reward points for return visits during those periods, or contacting them shortly after a visit to incentivize them to leave a review on social media platforms where you need a boost. There has been a lot of focus on restaurant culture in recent years – and restaurants are making changes so the industry feels like a good place to work and one that can provide flexibility and security if something goes wrong. One safety net for restaurant employees has recently expanded its scope and it’s worth having on your radar if, say, your restaurant experiences a natural disaster or one of your employees faces a medical issue or family loss and has difficulty paying household bills as a result. CORE, or Children of Restaurant Employees, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping families in the restaurant industry make it through a rough financial patch. As Restaurant Business reports, it can provide funds needed to pay essential bills like rent, utilities, mortgage fees, auto loan payments, or required medical equipment or pharmaceuticals. The money is a gift, not a loan, and is not taxed as income. CORE is not a new organization but its scope has expanded in recent years in the wake of the rising number of natural disasters that have impacted communities and restaurant businesses around the country. The cause could generate goodwill with staff, whether as a fundraising recipient or a potential source of funds for an employee in need. Lunchtime looks different in many cities right now. A recent report from Restaurant Business said that according to new data from tech supplier Toast, weekday lunch transactions in 19 of the country’s biggest metropolitan areas remained down considerably in the first quarter of 2023 compared to 2019. The numbers suggest that the shift in post-pandemic work habits is having a continued impact on lunch business. When Americans do have lunch out, they are spending more, which could be due to higher menu prices, or because people are dining out in larger groups and placing bigger orders. In any case, the lunch day part has potential to become more of an experience driver in the current environment – a time for events as opposed to casual meals in the middle of the work week. Consider the new working habits of the organizations with offices in your area – or the people who reside in your neighborhood. Have hybrid work arrangements become the norm? If so, employers are likely looking for opportunities to bring employees together in meaningful ways on the days they do come together – and catered food can play a big role in that. If people living near you are working from home, they still need to eat – and maybe you can provide a meal deal, salad kit or delivery promotion that can make at-home break times feel like something to look forward to. Inflation has made restaurant meals a tougher sell for consumers, so the experience of your restaurant carries more weight. In a recent webinar from Datassential, speakers referenced some very different examples that illustrate how restaurants are approaching this. For example, at the Mini Chef restaurant at the Lego House in Denmark, each guest is given a packet of 16 Legos. Each piece in the packet corresponds to a customizable ingredient listed on a simple menu. To submit their order, a guest must “build” their desired combination with their Lego pieces and submit it into a machine at their table that confirms their preferred ingredients. The novelty of the ordering system becomes entertainment – and as much of a focus as the food. But boosting your experience doesn’t require an operational overhaul. Consider one low-tech approach by a restaurant across from a children’s hospital: Guests can buy a beer for a parent or carer of a patient at the hospital and their purchase is marked with a sticker on a sign posted in the restaurant. The free beer can give recipients a brief respite from the stress of a hospital stay and help those buying it feel like they are doing a good deed for someone who needs a lift. When you take approaches like this that are special to your brand, you can get guests in the door. If you then combine them with guest personalization – by collecting data about what a guest has ordered in the past, what they like and dislike, and then making targeted recommendations they are more likely to enjoy – you have a formula to keep those guests coming back. Considering your own community, guests and brand, how might you adjust the experience you offer in ways that have a big impact? |
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