No matter how successful your restaurant is, there’s always going to be somewhere you can improve. You might have stronger dinner sales than all of your competitors, but maybe your sales throughout the rest of the day are lagging a bit. There’s no reason you can’t change that. The question is, where do you begin?
The answer is different for every restaurant. You’ll need to examine where your sales are strongest along with where they’re on the weaker side.
Optimizing your sales throughout the entire day requires an understanding of your different demographics, and what they expect from you. Customers come to your restaurant throughout the day at different times, for different reasons. The central reason is that (of course) they like your food. But a single, working twentysomething might be more likely to come in to grab a sandwich for takeout, during their lunch hour, rather than a sit-down dinner later that evening.
There are many ways to drive your sales throughout the day, but today we’ll be focusing on two very specific methods, catering and takeout, along with how you can use digital marketing to raise awareness and drive sales for those services. Let’s take a look.
Catering
According to a report over at the National Restaurant Association, sourced from research done by Technomic, restaurants are making four times the catering revenue compared to retailers such as club stores. Catering isn’t necessarily for every operation, but the numbers don’t lie. Catering can be a massive source of revenue for your restaurant.
When building a successful catering business, you’ll need to be acutely aware of who your customers are, and how you’re positioning your catering services. If you’re running a fast casual restaurant, you’re probably more likely to market to businesses that need catering for lunch. On the other hand, if your restaurant is more high end, then you’re more likely to get catering business for private parties, weddings, etc.
Takeout
Takeout presents an opportunity to create sales from customers that either don’t want to dine in, or simply can’t. Another report from the National Restaurant Association says that a third of consumers consider takeout an “essential” part of their lifestyle. 46% of adults, and 61% of millennials say takeout or delivery options are an important factor in selecting tableservice restaurants.
The importance of takeout to millennials can’t be understated. It’s like I said about the twentysomething grabbing a sandwich during their lunch hour. It’s all about lifestyle – and not just for millenials. Time and convenience are chief factors when it relates to why people order takeout.
Not everyone has the time to sit in and spend an hour eating dinner at your restaurant. That needs to be an important thing to keep in mind when marketing your takeout services. If you want to standout in the world of takeout, incentivizing your customers with a deal or special is a great way to do so.
Increase Catering and Takeout Sales With CoGoBuzz
A key factor in promoting both your catering and takeout businesses is awareness. Even if your restaurant offers both services, your customers won’t immediately associate your restaurant with catering or takeout until you’ve placed the idea in their head. You could do that by advertising it on your menu or in-store. But wouldn’t it be great if there was a more effective, easier way?
That’s where CoGoBuzz comes in. Our fully-featured digital marketing service digitally promotes your catering and takeout services straight to your customers’ mobile devices – and it does it automatically.
Leveraging state-of-the-art WiFi, SMS, and Email solutions, our service effectively promotes both in-store and out. Through WiFi, CoGoBuzz displays an interactive landing page on your customers’ mobile devices when they login to the HotSpot. We produce full customer profiles and integrate them with your favorite marketing list. You’ll be able to segment your audiences, and pinpoint who might be interested in your catering or takeout services. Through SMS, you can send automated text messages at specific times, and enroll customers in your new digital text-based loyalty program. You can remind your customers that you’ve got catering and takeout services, all with a simple text message! Check out the rest of our website to learn more!
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Have any advice for catering or takeout? Let us know in the comments!