Email, Mobile Work Together, Make People Hungry

The foodservice industry - specifically quick-service or casual dining restaurants - has traditionally sold themselves short on direct digital marketing. Having extensive personal experience in the industry, I have seen this first hand.

Why have restaurant chains typically been slow to adopt direct digital marketing competencies as a core part of their marketing outreach? There are several factors. At the top of the list is a combination of low margins and small marketing budgets; plus, a general lack of dedicated resources and expertise in marketing. Additionally, when resources are applied at a corporate level, there is difficulty translating a broad-based messaging platform into store traffic within a specific community.

A simple and cost-effective marriage of email and mobile programs – two cornerstones of direct digital marketing – is well suited to accomplish the goal of every marketing effort for any quick-service or casual dining chain – getting people into the store.

Over the next two posts I’ll introduce the four primary, traditional direct digital marketing challenges in the restaurant category, and how a unified email + mobile channel approach impacts the customer experience and drives traffic.

Challenge #1: Reaching critical mass with opt-in lists

A significant challenge for restaurant operators is justifying the expense of opt-in programs when it may be several months (or longer) before the program pays for itself with a critical mass of active subscribers. Servers and cashiers are not going to ask for an email address (nor should they be responsible for this). Marketers can spend a ton of money on a branding campaign that drives people to a website, only to have the registration form buried.

If a fledgling email program already exists, use the next email campaign to tout the SMS program. With a few mouse-clicks the user is opted-in for mobile promotions sent straight to their phone. Better yet, this allows marketers to assign those same email preferences – geographic, demographic, etc. – to the profile of the SMS subscriber. Using email – alongside in-store POS, print, outdoor, broadcast, and event marketing –builds critical mass for the SMS database.

Likewise, use the SMS program to drive opt-ins to an email relationship. An email relationship is great for delivering new menu announcements, seasonal features, promos, and coupons – using great food images to create the appetite. SMS is a more customer-friendly gateway into an email relationship because the restaurant is able to respond to an opt-in call-to-action immediately, in the presence of the POS signage. Or, send an email opt-in request to the SMS subscriber, delivering a 10% reward coupon in exchange for the email opt-in.

When email marketing and mobile marketing work together they build the critical mass a restaurant operator needs for their online and mobile-friendly guests.

Challenge #2: Coupon redemption

Do all restaurant marketers track the redemption rates of the traditional, printed coupons? Whether from newspapers, FSIs, or local mailers, it’s bound to be a small number. Leverage email + SMS to allow customer-friendly coupon publishing and redemption. Mentioned above, email is a great medium for promotional communications. While some customers may be happy to print and carry a coupon to the store, a better experience for many consumers allows them to forward the coupon to their mobile phone. When email and SMS programs are managed together, this “Send-to-Phone” tactic creates a quick, friendly user experience with relatively little pain for the marketer to deploy.

Read part two!

The Lunch Pail