Understanding the digital restaurant guest journey
Why is the Guest Journey so important for your restaurant?
We believe that you should have full control of your customer data and know who your guests are and how they interact with your restaurant(s)! Customers crave an experience when they visit a restaurant. Now, with the experience becoming increasingly digital, how do you make your guests feel special? The Guest Journey is where you can view your customers’ data, get to know them, send automated targeted offers, and increase revenue and retention by having them make repeat business through loyalty. Most restaurants wait until guests have stopped coming back to target them with offers. Our data shows that it’s 300% more effective to target guests that are at risk of churning, before they’ve actually churned (stopped coming back).
How are you retaining guest data?
Whether a guest visits your brick-and-mortar location or places an order online for delivery, you should be making sure you'll see them again and know their preferences. Repeat business is good business. It cost 5x more to attract a new customer than to keep a loyal guest. The best way to collect and retain customer data is through your own online ordering platform. With your own branded online ordering and white-label mobile app, you can collect valuable customer data like customer profiles, delivery addresses, payment details, order histories, order frequency, basket value, and more. By understanding who you're customers are you can build better relationships, provided an enhanced customer experience with loyalty, and reduce costs.
Third-party Delivery vs First-Party
Third-party delivery can be an effective channel, offering increased visibility, to attract new customers that have never interacted with your brand before. However, that's the only benefit before you see them eating your profits. You also have no way of knowing who those guests are, they're basically strangers because you can't collect and retain guest data with third-party delivery services.
Once someone knows your brand and is looking to order from your restaurant(s), directing them to your first-party party platform:
- Allows your brand to avoid 15-30% commission fees
- Reduces services fees and commission fees charged to your guests.
- Allows you to deliver a customer experience worthy of your brand.
- Introduces valuable customer data to optimize for engagement beyond the sale/transaction