TECH: 5 Ways Data-Driven Marketing Benefits Your Restaurant
There’s a lot of gold living in your restaurant’s customer data — if you know how to use it. Here are five ways data-driven marketing can benefit your restaurant and marketing campaigns. Everything from menu improvements to forecasting and more.
DID YOU KNOWS…
MAP: What Countries Drink the Most?
It’s not exactly Beerfest,but gotta any guesses on which countries drink the most alcohol, in liters per capita? The winner would be Moldova with 17.4 liters/capita. Bet you can’t even find Moldova on the map. Anyways, here’s the rest of the top 10 list plus a little infographic map laying out the deets.
To Regulate or Not to Regulate
Countries are divided by the role government plays in regulating businesses. Western Europe, as a region, falls more in favor of governments regulating businesses for the good of society, while the American public is divided on whether government regulation is beneficial for society at large. Small business owners in America cite government regulations as the single biggest issue facing their businesses 14% of the time, with quality of labor and taxes preceding it. Governments’ role in business is a major rallying point for the two main political parties in America, both historically and contemporarily.
The Generation Gap in TV Consumption
While Nielsen's latest finding show that television is still relevant and shouldn’t be written off prematurely, a closer look reveals a trend that could spell doom for TV networks in the long run. According to Nielsen’s findings there appears to be a generation gap in TV consumption. While those aged 50 and older spend more than six (ages 50-64) and seven hours (ages 65+) a day in front of the TV, young adults watch significantly less TV.
STOP ON TRUCKIN’
Why it matters to you: A lack of truck drivers and rising import costs are pushing to buy local.
As we all probably know by now, Trump’s trade war has affected many levels of restaurant’s day to day operations. Items are being hit with up to 25% level tariffs on imports and exports means prices on American products (like pork or chicken wings) are plummeting due to oversupply and it is really hurting certain industries. Meanwhile, while the prices of US products are going down the cost of shipping has skyrocketed due to there being less people to ship items available. That said, it has created some interesting issues and opportunities for our industry by buying/supporting local businesses.
Simple put: with less food being exported and imported then there is less need for large transportation. That translates into fewer truck drivers but shipping becomes more expensive. This means restaurants have two options – raise prices to keep up with the changing cost (and we know how much we love doing that), or we essentially must buy more locally out of necessity.
This isn’t a bad problem to have as it turns out. Diners love to know the back story of their food and showing them where it came from provides a certain level of comfort and trust with your food. If they know the chicken was well treated and free-rangedthey may enjoy their meal experience more. Same with fruit and vegetables harvested by local farmers. Putting a face to the food they’re eating can help your guest feel a connection with their meal and therefore your business. We’d insist as we move forward as an industry, we make the best out of a strange and uncertain situation by flying the flag of locality and seasonality and marketing these aspects of your restaurant. People will take notice.
[Source: Table.Skift]
TIER IT UP, LITTLE DARLIN’ [SONG]
Why it matters to you: Guests would like more insight into rewards programs and some restaurants are trying tiered programs.
It may as well be a rite of passage for people to blindly join a customer rewards program only to realize later that the card is taking up unnecessary space in their wallet and throw it away because they don’t know what the program does for them. We have heard this story from our friends, loved ones, and customers alike and, in many of those cases, it has resulted in an operator shying away from a rewards program.
Now, however, several large operators are flipping the script how reward programs work by having absolute clarity with their customers of what their purchases get them, what their points totals are, and when they get freebies (what a novel idea J). Chick-fil-A’s program is based around an app where, after spending as little as $15, guests can start redeeming points for rewards. But the real rewards come when you reach silver-level ($100 spent), or red-level status ($500 spent) when the same dollars you spend earn you more points and choices of rewards.
By utilizing their app, Chick-fil-A has shown us what a successful rewards program can truly be. Customers have to give all of their information and will expect constant e-mails and notifications about their status or new items, etc. Just think, it doesn’t feel like an ad for a new menu item if you roll it out on the lowest level of the rewards program and notify your customers they are eligible for it. We may not agree with everything Chick-fil-A does or stands for but we can acknowledge a greatly executed program when we see one -- and this is it. Their program shows us that loyalty programs can succeed. All it takes is clarity, real & engaging rewards, and subtler advertising.
[Source: Restaurant Business Online]
