Why your restaurant should consider email marketing?
Email marketing can be a powerful tool for restaurants, helping to bring new customers through your doors while also providing a chance to reconnect with previous customers and give them more reasons to come back, time and time again. It gives you a direct line of communication to a captive audience, and allows you to make your communications highly relevant to each member of that audience.
How much work is involved and what results can you expect?
According to Campaign Monitor, email marketing produces 174% more conversions than social media and costs less in time and effort than other forms of marketing. It’s also a more reliable way to reach people than social media as you are using data you have collected to contact people directly. Algorithms and changing terms and conditions can make it hard for businesses to get what they need from social media.
Restaurants can also guarantee a strong return on investment (ROI) using email marketing. In Hubspot’s State of Inbound Marketing Trends 2022 report, research by Litmus shows that email marketing delivers a $36 return for every $1 spent.
There’s proof that a growing number of customers are responding to email marketing, making it a more effective means to reach them now and in the future. The same Hubspot report found that in 2021, 77% of marketers had seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months.
So what is it about email marketing that makes it so effective?
There are a number of reasons that email marketing offers such great potential, not least because you can make each message timely and relevant.
Email is easily accessible across all of our devices, meaning our inboxes are quite literally at our fingertips most of the time. Perhaps that’s part of the reason that 99% of email users check their inbox daily. That’s great news for restaurant email marketing campaigns, because there’s an extremely good chance that your subscribers will see your message the day you send it.
Add to that the fact that emails – thanks to a CRM system’s ability to segment and personalise data – can be made bespoke to each subscriber. It’s easy to see why email marketing offers an extremely powerful method of communicating your message to a large audience.
Benefits of email marketing for restaurants:
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Makes use of the data you own
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Provides strong marketing ROI
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Easily accessible for most customers
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Offers high levels of conversion
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Ability to personalise can improve brand loyalty
Practical advice on getting started with email marketing
Restaurants can reap rewards by using email marketing, but it’s important to get it right. With that in mind, here are some key things to consider from the outset:
1. Install supportive technology. Quality technology software systems (e.g. online reservations systems, CRM and EPoS) that integrate and provide data will give you a strong framework to support your email marketing. Suppose you’re in charge of a group of restaurants. In that case, you will want one with the flexibility to send out to all customers on the database if you’re running a group-wide promotion, while also being able to segment your list according to site when relevant.
2. Have a clear marketing plan. Each email should have a purpose; it’s no good sending emails for the sake of it, without understanding what you’re trying to achieve, or who the message is for. Each email should also be part of a larger strategic plan; make sure you’ve created a comprehensive plan before you start, and communicate this plan across your brand so that everyone understands the ultimate goals.
3. Keep it on brand. Make sure you use the same branding and tone of voice throughout all communications, whether you’re sending an email, posting on social media or updating your website. Consistency is key, and email is only the first in a series of steps that will eventually lead someone from awareness to conversion. If your emails don’t have the same look and feel of your website and other channels, it creates discord in a reader’s brain, and makes them trust you less. It’s often handy to create a section of your brand guidelines that relates specifically to email marketing.
4. Streamline messaging. Before you compile any email marketing message, ensure your website is updated with the correct details, that your social media posts are in-step and all staff are aware of promotions, to avoid potential confusion.
5. Authenticate sending domains. This is an important step for any email marketing. The newest guidelines mean that if you haven’t put the right authentication in place, your messages won’t get through.
When you’ve sorted the basics, you can move on to creating great email marketing campaigns.
10 Email marketing top tips for restaurants:
Have a clear strategy and stick to it
If you’ve taken the time to create a marketing plan, you’ll have a clear understanding of what you want to achieve. Adhering to this will help you build the most effective campaigns.
Grow your customer list
The law of averages means that the more people you are able to send marketing emails to, the better the results will be. Ensure you have an email opt-in on your restaurant’s website, on social media for passive searchers, and at the point of booking for active users so you have as many people signed up as possible.
Segment your database
The most effective strategies for restaurant email marketing campaigns revolve around intelligent use of your data. According to Hubspot's State of Inbound Marketing Trends 2022 report, segmentation and personalisation are used by 78% of marketers who responded to the survey. You can use your CRM to segment by different customer types (if you’ve grown your customer list as suggested, you’ll have lots to choose from) so you can target them appropriately.
Be GDPR compliant
As you are handling customer data collected via a website, you must be GDPR compliant under European rules introduced in 2018.
Choose email marketing software carefully
There are many systems on the market which offer a range of features. These might include the ability to create bespoke templates, advanced tracking and analytic functions, dynamic content features, and the ability to build sophisticated automation journeys. There’s a chance that the software you’re already using at your restaurant has an email marketing function that does everything you need it to, so check this first. If it’s not offering what you want, look into those that do. It can be a good idea to take the time to choose the right software for your needs from the outset so that you don’t find yourself restricted in what you can do further down the line.
Include photography
People eat with their eyes, and our brains process images 60,000 times faster than words, so with mere seconds to capture the attention of your reader, high quality imagery is vital. Make sure your images tell a consistent story to the words; if you’re sending an offer for 2-for-1 cocktails, don’t use a picture of a restaurant packed with young families.
Include calls to action
Make it really easy for people to get from your email to your website or booking link. 80% of people never scroll past the top section of your email, so make sure there’s a clear call to action visible immediately, and then place further calls to action at strategic points through your message. Also make sure to double check that links work, or you could lose customers. According to Access Hospitality’s Hospitality Tech Shift Report, 65% of consumers are more likely to revisit a venue if they have a positive technology experience.
Email as often as you have something valuable to say
Instead of trying to work to an arbitrary schedule of posting X times per week/ month because that’s what someone else says works, you should send emails as often as you have something interesting to say. Your audience will quickly become bored and disengaged if you are sending communications for the sake of it, so make sure you’re giving them a reason for them to open your emails. That doesn’t mean you should be sporadic about messaging, just make sure your sending schedule is planned around your content, rather than the other way around.
Use your analytics to make improvements
Check your results against industry benchmarks to understand how your campaigns are performing. Certain results should raise a red flag and prompt further action, for example if the bounce rate is very high you need to check the quality of your data. And if your open rates are consistently low, you may be getting sent to spam folders (check your domain and IP reputations against blacklists).
Test everything
A/B testing and multivariate testing will allow you to better understand what works and what doesn’t. From subject lines to imagery, you can get real data on what your audience finds most compelling, and use that information to improve future emails.
Examples of effective restaurant email marketing
New menu promotion, week-dining discount and Christmas offer
The Red Deer email example
Dining pub The Red Deer’s email delivers a hefty punch. Immediately at the top of the email, they include a menu style call to action, giving readers easy opportunities to click through to the landing page of their choice.
By highlighting their new autumn menu and then providing customers with an incentive to try it (in the form of a 25% discount), they are offering a level of value in return for the reader’s attention. Note the offer is only valid Monday to Friday for lunch or dinner, therefore helping to fill it at traditionally quieter times, but it is highly tempting with photography of one of the new dishes and a link below to view the menu. The call to action ‘Book Your Table’ right under the promotion makes it easy for customers to redeem the deal.
The operator has also used the email to tell customers about another promotion – Christmas Fizz - providing further incentive to visit and helping the pub cement some early bookings for the festive season.
Personalised birthday incentive
Ask Italian email example
Restaurant group ASK Italian maximises personalisation by addressing its email to the recipient and sending it just in time for their birthday. The email title ‘Do you want your £10 off?’ sounds like a generic offer but is strong enough to entice a click-through. The personalised ‘birthday treat’ available for four weeks around the recipient’s birthday makes them feel like the restaurant group values their custom, but the ‘inspiration’ angle gives them enough space to not feel pushed into booking.
Database segmentation reaches relevant customers
Bills email example
This simple communication from family-friendly restaurant chain Bill’s is sent out to a segmented database of those who have previously ordered from the children’s menu. The message is simple, direct and an effective promotion to bring families in during a specific timeframe. The photography is relevant and fun and the ‘book now’ button makes it quick and easy for customers to reserve a table and take advantage.
Tools and software that help restaurants with their email marketing
Good email marketing for restaurants requires supportive software. Here are some that will help:
CRM
A Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) platform is an essential tool to support your email marketing activity. This is where customer data is held and managed.
Some CRM systems also offer email marketing which can remove the need to source additional software.
Access Acteol can help you connect, segment, engage and measure your data through its Single Customer View, allowing you to use it in the most effective way and analyse the results of a campaign.
It also has a suite of functions, including the ability to automate the sending of email which can streamline the process and avoid sourcing additional email marketing software.
Online reservations system
As previously outlined, the purpose of email marketing could be to promote a special deal, tell customers about something new in your restaurant or just remind them you exist, but in all cases the communication is designed to draw customers into your restaurant.
Having a robust and reliable online reservations system in place before sending out any email marketing campaign is a must because it will make it easy for customers to book their space so they can join you during the promotional week or take advantage of the offer you’ve told them about.
Access Collins, our booking and reservations software for hospitality, manages every stage of the customer journey. Access Collins also allows restaurants to tailor the look and feel of email communication and the fact that email templates, menus and photos can be uploaded to one place means the process is quick and simple. Perfect for busy restaurants.
EPoS
The majority of restaurants already have an EPoS system in place, and it is the backbone of all technology systems used in the business.
An EPoS system can gather data relating to every customer visit, including ordering habits and allergen information which can help build a better picture of each customer and help with segmentation and personalisation of email marketing campaigns.
Choose an EPoS with the ability to integrate with other systems for a seamless experience - like our hospitality EPoS.
Email marketing
If your CRM system doesn’t allow templates to be created or support automation and you aren’t using a booking system with a marketing function, you’ll need to use email marketing software to reach your customers.
There are hundreds of these on the market, but some of the most popular ones include MailChimp and Sendinblue.
Your restaurant email marketing checklist
In this article, we’ve covered the most important considerations for restaurants and hospitality businesses who are just getting started with email marketing, and we’ve shared our top tips on how to get the most out of your email campaign strategy.
Check out our email marketing checklist to help you get started with highly effective email marketing campaigns:
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Software support. Check you have researched the systems required and have them in place before you devise your email marketing strategy. This will save you valuable time and money as you may already have some in place but aren’t using them to their full capacity, or you may find you need to add or upgrade if you don’t have access to the tools you need.
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Check your marketing strategy. Take a few moments to remind yourself of the wider plans to ensure any email marketing campaigns support them and are on-brand and on-message.
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Work your CRM. Make the most of the functions your customer relationship management system offers, including segmentation, automation and analytics, to really reap the benefits.
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Personalise. Customers love to feel special so make the most of segmentation and personalisation tools to encourage them to feel the love for your business.
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Think outside of the box. Be creative with your campaigns to make your email stand out in your customer’s inbox.
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Include calls to action. Make it easy for customers to find out more about an offer, check your menu, or book a table.
What next?
If you're interested in taking your restaurant's marketing strategy to the next level, email marketing and CRM tools can be a powerful way to engage with your customers and drive business growth.
If you want to learn more about email marketing or our hospitality CRM, or if you want to see a demo of the tools in action, don't hesitate to reach out to us for more information and to help you determine if these tools are right for your restaurant.
Book a demo today and take the first step towards growing your business and connecting with your customers.
