Article

4 ways to drive mobile engagement

What's the secret to extending the conversation past the in-store dining experience?

December 11, 2013

By Sara Kowal
VP of Innovation, ePrize

Restaurants today, whether mom-and-pop shops or nationwide franchises, have trouble engaging with consumers past the seated meal. In a world of overstimulation, it is no longer enough for a restaurant to have amazing cuisine —much more is needed to keep diners coming back. So what’s the secret to extending the conversation past the in-store dining experience?

Say it with me: "Mobile."

Within the restaurant and franchise industry, mobile is an underutilized yet key component to customer engagement.Researchfrom the National Restaurant Association explains that customers specifically want mobile technology to be incorporated into their dining experience. With an effective mobile strategy, restaurants can start a conversation with diners, not only to keep them entertained during the seated meal, but to bring them back for repeated visits, offer them discounts and deals, and use it as a means of learning preferences and demographics of valued consumers.

So how do you incorporate mobile into a larger marketing engagement strategy? Here are four need-to-know tips to effectively bring mobile into your restaurant’s marketing initiatives — to increase brand loyalty and ultimately drive sales:

1. Saying hello! Start a conversation with your guests

There’s nothing better than feeling immediately welcome. With mobile, marketers can welcome guests, starting a dialogue through a customer’s most personal device, their mobile phones, as soon as they walk into the restaurants’ front door.

Whether sending text messages upon entry, presenting diner’s with daily deals, or offering mobile discount codes for a free appetizer or dessert, marketers can make customers feel special before they even sit down to eat.

Once seated, restaurants can use table tents and menu real estate to offer compelling content, such as mobile-based special rewards, chances to win, or interactive mobile games. This helps to continue the conversation between restaurant and diner, one that is engaging and fun. 

Mellow Mushroom is a great example of a brand taking advantage of the seated dining experience to offer engaging content and games to their customers. Understanding that their brand loyalists are a mobile crowd, with mobile traffic accounting for 39 percent of their overall web traffic, Mobile Mushroom decided to launch a “Spin the Coke Bottle” digital tabletop game where diners were invited to scan QR codes while seated in-restaurant to gain access to the brand’s mobile optimized site. The site offered guests trivia questions about Mellow Mushroom and Coca Cola, as well as conversation starters for guests to discuss during their meal with their friends.

2. “No, you hang up, No, you!” How to keep the conversation going

A family of four spends a lovely evening dining in your restaurant. That’s enough for them to keep coming back every Thursday as a weekly ritual, right? Sad to say, but not quite.

Restaurants need to tap into mobile not only to complement the in-store dining experience, but to motivate guests to come back for more.

Have you considered a loyalty program for your restaurant? The National Restaurant Association reports that 57 percent of consumers are more likely to choose restaurants that offer reward programs. Fans will be pleased to have a ritual loyalty experience and this dedication will heavily aid in bringing repeat customers and take the mobile experience to the next level.

Bagger Dave's is all about customization when it comes to allowing patrons to craft their own burger. To this extent, the brand wanted to further enhance their personalized experience with their tailor-made loyalty program, Bagger Dave's Fresh Rewards. Their campaign was built with the flexibility to optimize, based on consumer insights and program performances. It rewards guests who check-in at any Bagger Dave’s location, purchase specific products, rate their dining experiences, refer friends, or share the program on Twitter or Facebook. The mobile program also includes dynamicinstant win game experiences with gift certificates, and a $10,000 holiday shopping spree.

Sara Kowal

In addition to the benefits that Bagger Dave’s program touts, another overarching draw is the social tie-in. Bagger Dave’s offers an engagement tool for customers to not only stay connected on their own accord, but to share brand happenings, discounts and promotions with their entire social networks online.

3. We’ve got the POWER: The power of customer data

With mobile, restaurants have a direct channel to cull important information from visitors, the challenge is using that information to offer a personalized communication channel, not a spammy one.

 As a restaurant marketer, have a set frequency with which you plan to collect data —it doesn’t make much sense to ask your guest their favorite food as they’re walking out the door. Always ask for small amounts of information —no more than three marketing-related questions at a time is a good rule of thumb.

Requesting this data helps to establish a customer profile to help track diner’s preferences anduse as fodder for future marketing activities. If diners indicate that they normally join you for lunch, you can encourage a dinner visit. If you know they typically order an entrée only, create special promotions that cross sell appetizers or cocktails.

Boston’s understands the impact of customer data to create a personalized customer outreach strategy. To drive loyalty and engagement at 51 locations nationwide, Boston's Restaurant & Sports Barbuilt a mobile CRM program that incorporates location-specific alerts and coupons. Guests are rewarded with a mobile coupon for a free pizza, as well as deals and alerts specific to their favorite store. Locations can track real-time coupon rates, which saw 24 percent average redemption at program launch.

4. Treating mobile as a key piece of the multichannel puzzle

While mobile is integral to the success of a campaign, it should be treated as just one part of an essential multichannel strategy. Restaurants need to not only become acclimated with the mobile space, but to take the plunge into multichannel. Mobile is simply the glue that holds it all together. Each form of marketing should be leveraged to build up and enhance another form. Consumers access different channels at different times of day, and a multichannel approach will help you tie in all your marketing efforts to create a holistic approach.

We already know that mobile users are who you want to target, as research shows that consumers who use mobile regularly are not only the most digitally-savvy customers, but have a higher average income and order take-out more than customers who don’t use mobile regularly. What’s more is that 50 percent of adults want daily communication with their favorite brands; implementing a cross-channel strategy will help increase communication and engagement (source: National Restaurant Association, 2012).

Again and again, industry trends demonstrate that mobile is becoming a main focus for restaurants today. And when a mobile campaign is integrated into a multichannel strategy, your restaurant will soon stand out in your customers’ minds as a place to return to again and again.

Cover photo: Mellow Mushroom table tent

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