For the second consecutive year, digital marketing is the top tech priority for restaurants, according to a new survey of 550 restaurant operators from Restaurant Business and Nation’s Restaurant News. This is especially true for fast-casual brands, with 60 percent of them noting digital marketing as their top tech priority. That said, 36 percent of operators overall said they were dissatisfied with the current digital marketing tools available and 37 percent were dissatisfied with their digital loyalty program. That’s quite a bit higher than the dissatisfaction they report experiencing with their POS system or kitchen display system, for example.
Why the frustration? Some themes have emerged about where digital tools can improve. Synchronizing content across channels can be inconsistent — and the layout of the content within those channels may not be optimal for the user. Operators are also not as confident as they could be that they are optimizing the consumer data they collect.
Does any of this sound familiar? If you’re among the operators looking to invest in digital marketing tools this year, asking questions in several areas may help you get clarity as you discuss your needs with marketing vendors. For example, how well are you managing your online reputation? (I.e., when a negative review comes in, how quickly do you respond — and what are you doing to address the root cause?) When you change menu prices (or booking information or other aspects of your guests experience), is the information consistent across your physical and digital sales channels? Are you highly visible in online searches of local restaurants? Do you have a consistent presence on social media, with content that suits the strengths of each platform — like behind-the-scenes videos on TikTok, beautiful images of your food on Instagram and community building on Facebook? Are you segmenting and personalizing your marketing messages to guests? Are your most successful competitors approaching marketing any differently? How are you using your data to assess “known and unknown unknowns” about your business? Could you be doing anything more with your data to extract value from it? What support do you currently lack that could help you improve in these areas? Identifying your problem areas can help you zero in on where a vendor may be of best use to you — or where they may not be an ideal fit.

Data management is one of the most important things you can do for your restaurant – to support the business right now and to protect its future. But losing ownership of valuable data, or not connecting the dots within it, can be a missed opportunity for many restaurants. Perhaps due to partnerships with certain third-party vendors, you are not able to market directly to your guests – or understand who they are. Or maybe your guests order your food from a wide range of sources and as a result, you may have a number of different pools of data floating around independently – not being informed by the others. How well does your POS help you harness every piece of guest data you can grasp, from every place your guests order from you, and then make informed decisions about how to reach the people who support your business?

You know there is power in the data you collect about your operation. In the coming months, expect to see developments in exactly how restaurant operators can slice and dice that data in order to draw clear conclusions about it (and then create more targeted, personalised marketing messages). On the Lunchbox platform, for one, digital customers are divided into active, regular and lost categories – and they receive different automated promotions designed to increase the frequency of their visits. After you collect data about your guests, how well does your technology help you connect the dots? It should help you convert semi-regular guests into loyal patrons and deliver increasingly customized offers to your best customers over time – ideally without much manual input from you.

You likely have guests whose habits you’d like to change: The one who regularly orders delivery from you even though he lives in your neighborhood, or the couple who visits semi-regularly who you’d like to see more frequently. Understanding and mining your data can help transform some of those guest behaviors in the direction you’d like. Allison Page, founder and chief product officer of the restaurant platform SevenRooms, told the Spoon recently that data is changing the game for restaurants by empowering them to build better relationships with guests. When you know the regular customer who orders delivery from you lives nearby, for example, you can entice him with a promotion of his favorite appetizer if he collects his order in person. If you know the favorite dish or wine of the couple who visits you only every now and then, you can invite them to a wine-tasting event or other experience featuring the wine they like along with a new dish you’re promoting. What clues are your guests providing through the data they’re sharing with you?

Using artificial intelligence in your restaurant isn’t necessarily about investing in a robotic chef to flip burgers. Increasingly, it can help restaurants manage the nuances of customer data – something that can benefit any restaurant. A recent report from Nation’s Restaurant News described how the brand El Pollo Loco is using an A.I. product called Merlin to help boost the capabilities of its loyalty program. By using A.I. to sift through reams of customer data, Merlin can help the brand get more strategic with the offers they make to customers – for example, suggesting items past customers are likely to order, but also not offering deals or discounts where it’s not as necessary to retaining the customer’s loyalty.

Preparing food in restaurants has become a juggling act this year – with people behind the scenes regularly throwing new balls into the air. According to a Datassential report, 92 percent of restaurant traffic is now off-premise. Drive-thru orders represent the largest growth category, followed by 23 percent order-ahead, 21 percent delivery and 18 percent to-go. A seemingly quiet kitchen could actually be as busy as a restaurant with a line of customers out the front door. This year, more restaurants will be adopting tools that allow them to monitor the various ways in which orders are coming to them – and adapt more easily to their ebb and flow. A new report on restaurant technology trends to watch in 2021 says smart scheduling and booking technology, as well as automated kitchen operations technology, can help ensure food is ready when customers want it.