Some people think email marketing is dead. We couldn’t disagree more! Email marketing essential for restaurants that want to grow and thrive. We help restaurants set up email marketing systems that are designed to bring people in the door with the click of a button. Framing your email list in the right way is essential and will show you exactly how to do so.
What’s a Good Email Marketing Strategy for My Restaurant?
Step 1 – Create an Irresistible Offer
Offering something that people can’t refuse is a great way to get people in the door. You need to do this because the hardest type of customer to acquire is the type that has never been to your restaurant and has very little trust in your business. Once they visit your restaurant and have a good or great experience, they will be much more likely to come back! The idea here is to create the lowest barrier possible for someone new to come in and try your restaurant. We recommend offering something for free. This works very well for our clients. You may not be profitable by giving away one of your appetizers, desserts, or entrees, however, this will increase the chances of your customer coming back for more in the future which will add to the value. Because, before, they weren’t your customers at all.
It’s essential that you pre-frame this interaction the right way. You must first offer a coupon for a free item in exchange for the contact information. Then, you must let them know that they will automatically be added to your VIP list and they will get exclusive offers from you for being a part of the list. If you don’t do this, they will not look for your emails or text messages.
Step 2 – Get Them to Come Back
To get people to come back, you need a plan. And the plan is this: Plan one new offer for the month that you send out only to your VIP customers who are on your list. We know these people are more likely to come back anyway because they’ve already visited your restaurant. If you offer them something valuable, they will be sure to come in and revisit your restaurant. Having a month-by-month plan of offers for the next 12 months will help ensure you will have consistent customers coming in each month. Increase the value of each customer will naturally make your customers want to spread the word about your VIP program.
Step 3 – Get Their Feedback
Now that you’ve given people a reason to come into your restaurant every month and they’re excited about your business, it’s time to ask them for feedback. You should have an automated system in place that asks your customers for feedback after they visit your restaurant. You can do so if your offers are redeemable, meaning the servers in your restaurant can mark the coupons as redeemed in your system. We provide the service for our clients and it works out great! your questions can be anything, but we recommend asking about the quality of the food, the quality of the service, the overall experience, and also offering them the opportunity to write whatever they want. Sometimes you’ll get some really good comments and feedback that will help you improve your business. For anyone that answers negatively, you should be notified immediately so you can handle the situation and try to make things better. For every one that answers positively, the system should allow you to send them a link instantly that sends them to Google, Yelp, or Facebook to leave a review.
Top 5 Email Marketing Tips for Restaurants
- Segment your subscriber list from day one! And if you haven’t, it’s never too late to start. This will allow you to send more personalized messages and get a better impact when yous end emails.
- Have an automated email series in place that follows up with customers after they use your offers to help increase your reviews and to help you weed out any negative feedback.
- Use your system to track when offers are redeemed to avoid customers trying to abuse your offers by using them more once.
- Combine the use of your email marketing software with messenger marketing software like ManyChat. Being in touch with your customers via Facebook Messenger and SMS text combined with email will create a powerful force – we like to call this omnichannel marketing. And we highly recommend it!
- Ask for your customers’ birthdays so you can send them a special offer on their birthday. The big companies do it, and so can you. And there’s a simple reason why they do it (and have been doing it for so long) – it works! People don’t eat alone for their birthdays – they like to celebrate birthdays with their friends and family.
What Software Should I Use for Email Marketing for My Restaurant?
We are strong advocates for ActiveCampaign when it comes to using smart and automated email marketing software. While that’s our recommendation, that doesn’t mean there aren’t other great solutions as well. We do, however, recommend going with an email marketing software company that specializes in email marketing – not something else. For instance, your POS company may offer email marketing as a cross-sell. This can sometimes work but your functionality will be lacking when compared to the power of a system like ActiveCampaign. If you’re not very tech-savvy, schedule an appointment with us and we can help get you on the right path with our done-for-you restaurant marketing services.
Sign up for ActiveCampaign by clicking here.
The Answer
The answer is yes! Restaurants need email marketing to grow more quickly. You need to consistently build your list and you also need to consistently engage that list to help bring the customers back in. And as we said before, email marketing systems will help you receive feedback that you need to improve and strengthen your experience for future customers to come.
We hope you have found this article helpful, if you need help with anything or need help creating a VIP list with email marketing, reach out to us and we love to help you as we’ve helped many other businesses.
