ETA Expert Insights: Restaurant SMBs: Payment-Parallel Resources to Help Your Business Grow
By ETA Retail Technology Committee
Shalav Gupta, FSS • Rory Hersch, DishOut • Parag Ladhawala, Google •
Jay Myers, American Express • Russell Palay, Nuvei • Jim Poulson, AnywhereCommerce • Jenn Reichenbacher, Paysafe • Jake West, Vend
The way we do business has changed considerably since March 2020 — and it’s changed even further in the past six months. How do customers discover new restaurants without going out? How do restaurants attract new customers without pedestrians or traffic passing by? What payment options are available now that decreased physical contact and interaction is appreciated and expected? Many assumptions about the way we do business were made pre-pandemic, and those assumptions must be reassessed and tested to make sure they are still valid.
Don’t just use your marketing plan from 2019 and assume that it holds water or is still relevant. Human behaviors have changed, and many of them are here to stay. Marketing is a key tool to help drive revenue to a restaurant, and using free and low-cost tools is a great way to amplify those opportunities. The better user experience a customer has, whether when approaching your place of business online or in person and whether through their payment experience or the marketing approaches that brought them to your establishment, the more likely you are to keep their business. The ETA Retail Technology Committee has compiled the following thoughtful payment-parallel tips to help drive revenue and customers to your restaurant — and to ensure that, once there, customers have a seamless user experience alongside their payment experience.
FREE IS GOOD
Before you buy, make sure your free profiles are set up and updated. Start with the basics: Google, Yelp, Facebook, Bing, and Instagram. Make sure you have the correct address, hours, website links, and phone number, and be sure to add photos to your profiles. It’s important to keep all of this information up-to-date.
It’s also critical to ensure that you use a current email for reviews and direct messaging and to make sure you’re staying on top of your online reviews and customer inquiries. Whether the customer reviews are positive or negative, responding to online reviews is critical to building your social footprint.
Finally, leverage your social media profiles. Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok are all great platforms for connecting with consumers, showcasing your goods (retail, food, and more), and sharing promotional offers.
GET ON A DELIVERY APP!
Most of the restaurants that have survived the pandemic were quick to offer takeout/delivery by registering for one of the popular food delivery services like DoorDash, Uber Eats, or Grubhub. Although people have started to dine in again, this consumer shift has stuck. Most consumers have one of these apps on their phone and, increasingly, discovery of new venues is happening on these apps, not only for takeout/delivery, but also for an evening out. You will pay a commission to the app, but this marketing expense has proven to have a strong and sometimes essential return on both the takeout and dine-in sides of a restaurant’s business.
THE KEY TO RESTAURANT PROFITABILITY IS REPEAT CUSTOMERS
Focus your marketing and promotional efforts on getting customers to come back. Many SMBs spend all their marketing budgets on attracting new customers and don’t do nearly enough to encourage repeat business.
While bringing in a new and wider set of customers is great at generating buzz and excitement in the community, it is the repeat customers, the ones who remain loyal and committed to you through thick and thin, who deserve the most attention to ensure that they remain loyal.
Expert Tip: Target your existing customer base by starting a loyalty program to maintain affinity and reward repeat purchases. Through a targeted loyalty and rewards program, you will quickly discover not only increased revenues from existing customers, but also an opportunity to turn those repeat customers into brand ambassadors who guide their friends, family, and other acquaintances straight to your door.
ACCEPT ALL PRACTICAL PAYMENT OPTIONS & MARKET THEM!
Whether it’s contactless payments, QR codes, or pay-from-the-table options, take the payment however the customer prefers. Consumers have become more familiar with and willing to try new technologies, and they are comfortable accessing menus, checkout pages, or dining hours via a QR code — companies like Shopify and PayPal make it easy to create QR codes for a mobile checkout page. A good place to start is by checking with your payment service provider (PSP) to make sure you’re up-to-date on various payment acceptance options (e.g., payment terminal has NFC turned on, ecommerce site accepts all major credit cards, Google Pay, Apple Pay, etc). It’s also critical to make sure consumers know all the ways they can pay, and that means displaying the top payment acceptance marks on your website and storefront. You can always get free stickers either through your PSP or by requesting decals online that you can apply to your window or point of sale. Make sure people know which payment types you accept!