If you run your own restaurant, chances are, you’ve tried all sorts of ways to fill empty tables with happy customers. If someone said you could take reservations for 90% of your 100 seat restaurant in two hours with a simple SMS message you probably wouldn’t believe them. Here Kunwar Sood from Vari tells us how it can be done and exactly why he believes SMS is an integral marketing tool for his business.
If you’re in the hospitality trade you probably work long, unsociable hours and barely have enough time to sit down; let alone come up with new ideas to market yourself. Putting together a marketing campaign may be the last thing on your mind, which is why SMS could be the perfect solution. Not only could it save you time and money but it enables you to communicate with your customers direct to their pockets 24/7.
Vari is a popular North Indian restaurant and bar in Newington, Kent with a proactive marketing strategy. Kunwar understands the importance of marketing in order to grow his client base, but running a restaurant keeps him very busy. He says: “I was looking for a platform which would enable me to send a simple message to my customers instantly, SMS was the perfect solution.”
Kunwar wanted to get a simple message out to all of his subscribers in an instant, with the aim of getting a quick response and to increase bookings for that weekend. He put together a simple message containing all relevant information, the offer, price, contact details and a website link to enhance the content.
The message read: “Father’s Day lunch on Sunday, 6 courses £20 per person. Under 10s Half Price. Call to book, 01795 842540 visit www.vari.co.uk Text STOP to 82228”
The message was sent out to 2,505 contacts at 11:20am on the Thursday before Father’s Day.
By 1:30pm, 90 of the 100 seats in his restaurant were reserved.
Kunwar knows the importance of giving customers the chance to opt-out of his marketing which is another reason why he chose SMS; contacts can be unsubscribed with a simple message making it easy for both business and customer to opt-out. The good news is, of the 2505 the message went out to, retention rate was high with just 9 choosing to opt-out of future offers.
You can’t argue with those results – and all for just £100!
This is just one example of the use of SMS to boost sales and enhance customer experience. Take a look at a couple more below:
Fill Empty Tables
Although you may have a busy restaurant a lot of the time, everyone has quiet days. Perhaps it’s a Monday night in the middle of winter, there’s not many people wandering around looking for places to eat. You need to give them a reason to come out:
“Hello Hannah! Free bottle of wine for every table of two this week at The Riverview Restaurant, call 01234 567890 to book a table.”
Save Time & Money
At just 4p a message, putting together an SMS campaign is extremely cost-effective. You only pay for the messages sent and unlike costly flyers and adverts; it takes just a few minutes to send out a message to your entire database. If the only chance you get to look at your marketing is after a long nights service, don’t worry, you can schedule the message to go out at a more appropriate time.
Grow Opt-in List
Advertise your keyword on menus, posters and bathroom mirrors (the list is endless) to allow customers to opt-in to your mailing list, providing you with lots of new contacts and letting your customers do the hard work:
“Text RESTAURANT to 82228 for news, promotions and updates.”
Reward Regular Customers
Try sending a reward message to previous customers to thank them for their custom and entice them back to your establishment. This will not only increase bookings but will also please customers; encouraging positive reviews spreading through word of mouth.
“Hi Hannah, we hope you enjoyed your visit to The Riverview, we’d love to see you again soon. Enjoy free starters on your next visit when showing this text. Call 01234 567890 to book a table”
Take/Confirm Bookings
Lots of restaurants now take bookings online, giving the customer more flexibility to book a table at their convenience. Why not take it one step further and let them text their reservation in? What could be more convenient than sending a quick text – you can even set up an auto reply to get straight back to them.
“Thank you for your reservation, we look forward to seeing you at The Riverview Restaurant.”
This is by no means a definitive list of how to use SMS for your business; but hopefully it will get ideas flowing! To find out how to use SMS for your business visit www.firetext.co.uk or email Holly on h.barber@firetext.co.uk