In the restaurant industry, the anonymity of the clients has become a norm. The future of service is customer personalization. On any given month, restaurants have thousands of transactions but no personal interactions. People seem to be fatiguing from feeling that algorithms are messaging them rather than real people, and are craving personalization in their experiences. Buyers want to feel that there’s somebody behind the message who cares about them. In fact, 33% of customers have ended their relationship with a business with insufficient or no personalization in place.
By refusing to accept the anonymity of your customers and incorporate personalization in your service, you open your business to interactions at a more emotional level, so it’s not just a transaction anymore but a meaningful and unique interaction with each one of your customers. Personalization leads to genuine communication. Communication that prioritizes direct communication with your customer in every step of the process to eliminate any pain points and make the entire experience memorable; from searching for a restaurant to getting home from one.
Personalization has evolved into a more sophisticated marketing strategy and by communicating in a personal manner, you can 1) can collect relevant personal data and create guest profiles (e.g. birthdays, anniversaries, allergies, preferred seating, etc.) 2) position your brand by offering a tailored guest experience which your customer wouldn’t have in a traditional restaurant setting 3) be able to continue the communication after the dining experience to encourage more visits and most importantly, 4) personalize the customer experience as you understand how to monetize the relationship.
Think of the opportunities. How would your marketing strategies change if you understood your customer’s consumption habits, their eating-out preferences, their expectations and frustrations while dining out? By making personalization a priority to you can obtain concrete information to create targeted marketing tactics that would lead to genuine communication with your clients and to make incremental profits.
**ProTip** At this time, you may be struggling to survive, clawing to the predatory food delivery apps as your only lifeline but think ahead. Eventually sales will return. Focus on your loyal clients by asking them for relevant information every time they order. Are you asking for feedback with comment cards? Is your staff asking about the ordering experience and collecting data on how your business can improve? Start taking advantage of the current situation by personalizing your customers’ experience. Personalization has become a huge trend among businesses and rightly so. As customer’s expectation of personalization increases, it will become an industry standard. Be in the vanguard!
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