Text Message (SMS) Marketing. 6 things you must do to make more money for your restaurant.
Introduction
In 2024, SMS Marketing is one of the most consistent ways to generate new sales & drive repeat purchases for your restaurant or local business. Just look at your own inbox, you get dozens of emails per day & spend just seconds peaking at the communications you get from businesses to decide if what they've sent you is of interest or not.
With SMS marketing you get a direct line of communication to your end customer where open rates average 98% where even the best email marketing strategies top out around 60%.
Just think to yourself, how often do you try a wonderful new restaurant or local experience & then realize you haven't been back in a year or more? Was it because you didn't like the business? No. It's because you're a normal busy human being, with hundreds of different tasks flying around, & enough to remember as it is.
With SMS marketing you can send friendly, efficient reminders to your customer base to stay top of mind & keep them coming back for more. Here are six simple steps to implement SMS marketing effectively at your restaurant.
Step 1: Build your contact list
Before you start messaging customers, you need to have a list to reach out to & know who you want to target - this starts by compiling a database of customer information. Fortunately, many of the systems you use in the restaurant already do this for you. Check your POS system, delivery apps, & any marketing suites you currently use to download a list of potential contacts. Some WIFI providers offer the option to add contact information before sign in & can be a good way to grow your contact list, especially if you're a coffee shop, bar, or cafe.
If you're providing delivery orders, consider creating handouts or flyers to stick in the bags of all of your third party deliveries with a QR code linking to a signup form in exchange for a special offer.
Lastly, consider setting up a lead collection form on your website to capture user information in exchange for a discount code.
The more contact information you get over time, the larger your retargeting list & future profits will become.
Step 2: Segment your audience
Once you have your contacts downloaded you'll want to start to segment your audience based on purchase frequency, last order date, etc.
The communication you send to a customer who orders from you three times per week & one that hasn't visited you in six months should be significantly different.
Segmenting your audience based on their behaviors ensures your messaging resonates more closely with them & in turn the value you offer will be more applicable.
For example, you may want to run a win back SMS campaign offering 15% off their next order for anyone who hasn't purchased in 3 months or more, where you may want to run a text thanking a loyal customer who ordered twice this month with a high margin free side.
The possibilities are endless when you start breaking down your audience, but it will allow you to come up with creative ideas to drive value to both your most loyal customers & those who haven't even tried you yet.
Step 3: Select a Messaging Service
There are many different services out there that allow you to send promotional SMS campaigns with varying degrees of complexity to setup. They range from solutions like Twilio that require some technical know-how to set up, to Ghost where everything from set-up, compliance, implementation, & even messaging is done for you. Here are some services that might work for you:
- Ghost - we believe we've built the best SMS messaging service for restaurants that's out there. We take care of set up, building your customer list, segmentation, compliance, delivery, & have an advanced AI system that writes your messaging for you to ensure you're getting the highest possible conversion rates. The product has been designed to be taken care of for you so you don't need to spend any extra time or effort & get all of the benefits SMS marketing provides. It's a flat monthly fee with no contracts or commitments.
- EZ Texting - EZ Texting is a platform that allows you to get setup & send messages quickly & efficiently. They provide do it yourself tools to run campaigns, grow your audience, & stay compliant with rules & regulations. They are one of the best self serve options out there with flexible pricing options to meet your size & scale.
- Twilio - Twilio is arguably the national leader in SMS based services. They have a robust API that can power a variety different use cases & is highly customizable. For restaurants with dedicated engineers or technology teams Twilio is a fantastic option. They have a self serve option that can be great, but provides a more complex interface than companies like EZ Texting.
- Klavyio - If you're running your business on Shopify, Klavyio is an amazing self serve option. They integrate directly with Shopify & allow you to segment your audience efficiently & set up different flows for abandoned carts, new customers, repeat buyers, etc. If your restaurant or coffee shop has an e-commerce component Klayvio can be a great tool to start with.
Step 4: Ensure compliance
Systems like Ghost ensure you're compliant with the latest rules & regulations & make it so you don't have to worry about this step. If you're using another provider, read on...
Always make sure the contacts you're downloading have opted into receiving SMS communications with you before reaching out, as staying compliant is not only important from a legal perspective, but also ensures you're not sending unsolicited messages to those that may not want them.
Provide explicit opt-in notifications if you begin to collect user information on your website or using handouts.
Lastly, ensure there is an easy way for your customers to opt out of their communications - if you're setting up your own system it's important you follow all of the legal requirements here & do additional research to make sure you're staying in compliance with the law.
Step 5: Craft Effective messaging
This ties back to step two. Always make sure that you're providing something of value to your target customer when they hear from you.
Text message marketing needs to be short, sweet, & to the point, while hammering home why your customers would want to keep hearing from you & jump on your offer you're sending to them.
One of the best ways to do this is with limited time offers (LTOs) to encourage your customers to act now. For example, if you're a pizza restaurant & it's Saturday morning during college football season you may want to send something similar to the below:
"🏈 Touchdown Time! Ghosty Pizza's Game Day Deal: Try one of our most popular pizzas this weekend & get FREE garlic knots with every purchase over $15! 🍕🥖 Don't miss out—order now: ghostypizzeria.com/order"
This message accomplishes several things.
- It gives your business credibility by mentioning your most popular dishes, everyone wants to try something that's popular with other people.
- It provides value - you're offering a free item & earned the readers attention. Even if they're not interested in pizza today, chances are they may be in the future & will want to hear from you again.
- You're able to send them to order directly through your website instead of a third party delivery app.
- You're hitting them at a good time. If you have 1,000+ contacts in your audience & reach out to them on a Saturday at 10 am, there's a great chance that a portion of those people will in fact be watching college football & could be in the market to order a pizza.
Step 6: Stay consistent!
This may be the last tip but it's arguably the most important. One of the greatest indicators of the success you'll have with your SMS marketing strategy is the ability to stay consistent with your outreach.
Let's break it down.
Even a poor performing SMS campaign will typically have a conversion rate around 2% (this can be much much higher if you're sending relevant content to your audience segments), but for the sake of simplicity let's say that 2% of people will take the desired action from your SMS campaign.
For a typical restaurant that's been in business for at least a few years let's assume you have somewhere between 5,000 & 10,000 contacts you can reach out to.
If we take the lower end & reach out to 5,000 people & assume 2% conversion per campaign, that would translate to 100 new orders for your restaurant. Assuming an average order value of $30 you're driving $3,000 in new revenue through your door every month.
There are some nuances here in the sense that you don't want to be overdoing it, as people will start to unsubscribe, but we've found a healthy spot is anywhere from 1-3 SMS campaigns per person per month. This can vary based on your goals & targeted audience, but is generally a safe rule of thumb.
Wrapping Up
SMS marketing is an incredibly effective way to drive new & repeat customers to order from your business. It can be personal, provide value, & a gentle reminder to customers that your business exists & to order from you. For anyone looking for strategies or ways to make their SMS marketing more effective please don't hesitate to reach out.
