Technology

It's not too late to pivot digital

When the pandemic struck, many brands had to pivot to digital or get left behind. Hope Neiman, chief marketing officer for Tillster, says it isn't to late to jump on the digital wave for 2022.

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November 12, 2021 by Hope Neiman — cmo, tillster

When the pandemic struck, the restaurant industry had to find a new way forward. Goodbye lunch and dinner rush, hello delivery and takeout.

To manage the pivot, most brands deployed new digital tools at admittedly varying levels of sophistication. Across the six segments of food service, 40% of operators added tech solutions to their businesses in 2020, according to the National Restaurant Association 2021 State of the Restaurant Industry report.

Some implemented online ordering platforms. Others found ways to inject DoorDash orders into POS systems. Others still launched brand mobile apps for the first time.

In a "rich getting richer" sort of moment, it was the big national brands who had the money to pivot to digital programs fast that defined restaurant success in 2021, while mid-sized and local QSRs were left ceding a third of their take-home to delivery driving apps and third-party ordering platforms.

No matter where your QSR sits in the industry landscape, one thing should be clear: last year's rush to the digital ecosystem defined the winners and losers and the trends that they power aren't ever going away.

If you feel like you missed the boat, the good news is this: you didn't yet. But the time is now to jump on the digital wave for 2022 and beyond. Here's everything you need to know on how to acquire a digital-first future:

The successful, scalable restaurant brands of the future look a lot like e-commerce companies. If there's one thing that 21st-century e-commerce brands have figured out -- that restaurant brands by and large have not -- it's how to use the right mix of digital channels and consumer data to attract and retain customers.
Becoming more e-commerce-oriented is how restaurant brands can gain more fans, garner incremental sales and develop pipelines that didn't exist in food service a decade ago.
And what does that all mean for the QSR? First, it means that metrics like throughput are suddenly less critical than a customer's acquisition cost or lifetime value. The future of QSR is in the customer data and how we use it.
The leaders use push notifications, loyalty programs and the science of demand.
As restaurant marketing morphs into something more digitally focused, brands are rolling out the tools to utilize data better and deploy more impactful, targeted marketing.
For example, segmentation of customers based on their previous behaviors allows for specific groups to be targeted at specific times, leading to more orders and better ROI. In other words, you can invite the guests who usually order lunch on a Tuesday…to order lunch this Tuesday. Or better yet, you can incentivize that same guest to do something they haven't done before, like a visit on Thursday for a free drink.
The technology is ready. I've seen the deployment of a recommendation engine – as in, "customers like you also bought," -- that gave one brand a 13% lift to average check size. I've seen another QSR use a well-placed freebie and a single push notification to fill their restaurants nationwide.
Are your competitors changing the slope of their annual performance with these tools? Yes, very much so. If you are not the bright shiny object, be sure that someone else is.
The restaurant of tomorrow extends far beyond the four walls.
One of the best ways to get that "wow" factor going for your brand is to simplify customer experiences across platforms. Your customers ordering lunch or dinner from a desktop computer or mobile browser, from the app, over the phone, or in the store should receive a cohesive and consistent experience.
Every touchpoint should be a branded experience, carefully crafted and built with cross-platform ease of use improvements. For example, use loyalty programs to identify an app customer at the kiosk, or the recent order history of a long-time customer, visiting your website for the first time. Anticipate.
When done right, restaurants use these tools to win greater market share at a lower cost. With the right digital tools, restaurants can extend their experiences beyond the four walls to acquire more customers faster and utilize better data to sell those customers more food per transaction.
Personalization. Your mobile app, website, kiosks and loyalty programs can work together to paint a picture of every customer you serve, understand where and when they visit, what they order and how they respond to offers and help them offers that motivate action.
Well-placed offers can inspire new customers to visit more frequently, engage with loyalty programs for the first time, form habits and become regulars.
And among your most loyal customers, you can use personalization to make sure they "feel the love." After all, losing even one regular could mean the loss of a lot of revenue. Unlocking a hidden menu item or a secret "special" can go a long way.
You can start small. For the restaurant brand that hasn't used COVID-19 as an opportunity to pivot digital, I wonder what it will take. If closed dining rooms, reduced demand and a labor shortage didn't combine to spur action, what would?
But the memo is this: it's not too late. You can start small. Some of the quickest, easy wins in digital restaurant technology, for example, are mobile pay and pay-at-the-table technology and QR code menus.

These are tools that help your customers feel a little safer in a post-COVID world, they're easy to launch and easy to manage, and they give you a straightforward opportunity to start your path into the digital fray.

I will close my digital plea with a promise: these tools will pay for themselves. Ordering kiosks give the restaurants that deploy them a 10%-30% increase in average check size. Branded mobile apps bring an average 10%-15% increase in checks, considerable gains in loyalty and the most valuable customer data in the industry today.

The more tools you use, the better. Stack the benefits, communicate better and watch as the higher average check sizes and increased visits roll in.

About Hope Neiman

Hope Neiman is the Chief Marketing Officer of Tillster, a leading global player in the burgeoning restaurant technology space. Hope and her team drive outcomes by combining data and technology to expand sales and increase consumer engagement in a measurable way. Through Hope’s marketing expertise and brand vision, Tillster grew from a kiosk company into a best-in-class, metric rich engagement and ordering solutions provider for multi-unit national and international restaurant brands.