​All hail email!

At a time when Instagram is helping restaurant menu items go viral and having a well-curated social media presence is billed as a must for a growing business, it can be easy to overlook the power of email. But the numbers tell an important story: According to research from the Direct Marketing Association and Demand Metric, the return on investment for email marketing is 122 percent compared to just 28 percent for social media (other marketing channels rank similarly low). Email carries a number of benefits. When you pour your marketing dollars and ideas into your email list, you retain control of what happens next. You’re not at the mercy of changes to a social media network’s algorithm and you stand a better chance of reaching your most loyal guests directly. Your email subject line has the power to prompt the recipient’s action at the time you send it — you’re not competing with content on a person’s social media feed or having to wait until people visit their account. As The Rail suggests, you can use your data to deliver a more customized experience via email, sending messages when you know your list is most apt to open them and with a mix of images, video and text depending on what you’d like to promote. There are also ample email tools to target guests with not just birthday promotions but also deals that consider their personal preferences and ordering habits. OptinMonster suggests using your list for such tasks as nurturing your loyalty program and spelling out its benefits, winning back guests who haven’t visited in a while, or following up with people who made a Groupon deal or otherwise expressed interest in your restaurant but haven’t visited yet.