What does it take to run a successful restaurant business? A prime location, passionate chefs, great ambiance, customers that are willing to try the new? You might rattle out a hundred other factors that impact the success of your restaurant. But at the heart of all this are the customers, their experience and the desire to visit again. Having said that, restaurants should always look for new avenues to widen their reach to the relevant customers and avoid the risk of lagging behind in the competition.

    
Design the complete experience

Every detail matters. From the time the customer enters the restaurant and until he leaves he has formed an overall impression about it. Customer experience about the restaurant starts much before he enters into the restaurant. May be through word of mouth feedback or an advertisement hoarding or a flyer or the website or a facebook post or a blog article or a customer review and many more. After reaching the restaurant, the interiors, dining tables, theme of the restaurant, staff behavior, the taste of the food, and several other details are unconsciously playing out on the customer’s experience. All of this culminates into making the decision of either visiting or not visiting the restaurant again. You need to have better control on all the touch points that determine the customer experience.

Build your brand identity
Tell a story of what you do and why you do. Branding is about projecting your identity on to the world. This identity is communicated through a logo, tagline, mission statement etc. Customers perceive your restaurant through the story you are telling about yourself. Over time, the brand acquires a real force and directs the course of your business.

Digital presence is mandatory
Today it is a must for any food business to have digital presence to communicate with customers and for customers to look at. Internet is the main stream of information exchange today and if you are present there, you are definitely missing a lot of opportunity. Communicate your USP by owning a website, taking advanced reservations & sending confirmations, taking online orders, running digital campaigns to send out new offers and much more. High performing, visually impactful websites that are optimized for search engine results tend to perform better. Ensure that you engulf your customer with relevant timely information so that they can make a decision to dine with you.

 

To manage the entire experience, technology can help you in managing all the aspects of the restaurant business. Unique brand design, pleasing color theme, catchy slogan, a great restaurant management system, providing timely information social media campaigns are all wonderful additions. They need to be backed up by efforts and actions with the end-goal in sight, that is to provide a coherent and wholesome experience to the customer.

     
The right technology partner
Finding the right technology partner is the most important piece of the puzzle for a perfect digital transformation. Choose someone who has been there and done that. The tech partner should be able to find the right sweet-spot between creativity and business while designing the branding identity, taglines and creatives. Tech partner should have right set of framework to understand the food business and its challenges and provide right technology solutions to solve them. Providing unique business solutions and yet maintain the brand design pattern is essential. And finally, choose an experienced technology partner because he is better prepared in taking on the challenges that your business may encounter.

You probably have enough clarity now on why and how digital presence shapes your business outcomes. However, this does not guarantee that everything is hunky-dory. Digital strategies that are effective today can turn obsolete tomorrow. To survive in the digital landscape you need a constant course correction, consistent re-evaluation, and persistent efforts. Having worked with multiple clients in the food business industry, team Aurora can provide great value-add to your digital game plan. You can read more on the role of technology in the remarkable growth story go Godavari Restaurants in USA. Reach out to us at hello@auroraelabs.com to know more.