Month: July 2014

Mobile Websites for Restaurants

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Most restaurant websites fail to deliver the most basic information required by customers. Basic info such as phone number, hours, address, menu, specials are often neglected. Unfortunately many restaurant owners focus on design only, instead of the contents. In many cases, customers can’t even find the menu; even worse, some menus are heavy PDF files that take too long to load or the site is filled with so many graphics which makes the whole site slow. Instead of finding what they need on the website, customers end up seeing a ton of graphics and hear annoying background music. With any website, especially a restaurant website, the following points are important to keep in mind.

  • Mobile Website – Nowadays, people access the web from many different devices, not just computers. Websites need be mobile-friendly, which allows smart phone & tablet users to view the site with ease. Site contents should not be heavy and deliver the most necessary & basic information commonly requested by users. Some site homepages are filled with flash animation, music, pictures and more. While this might be easily accessible from computers, but for a mobile device, this is total nightmare. Considering the increasing amount of handheld devices, mobile websites for restaurants are 100% necessary. Restaurant owners, if you don’t have a mobile website you should think about having a mobile website or at least make your existing site mobile friendly.6
  • Site Contents – The most common mistake found on restaurant websites is the absence of important information pertinent to restaurant customers. Restaurant customers visiting a restaurant’s websites are not there to see how nice the site looks, how many flashy graphics are displayed or what kind of annoying music is playing on the page. They want to see one of the following things, address, phone numbers, and business hours, menu and any specials if they exist. These things must be clearly visible on the homepage or within 1 click. Some pictures showing the design of the restaurants and/or foods are always nice additions, but not necessary.
  • Menu – Some websites provide their menu in a PDF file. For a user on a mobile phone or tablet device this will take too long to load. Menus should be on the restaurant website and/or mobile website directly so it loads as fast as possible. The best way to display your menu would be to show it along with an online ordering system, this way your customers not only see what your restaurant is offering, but order directly order from it.

For the best example of restaurant websites, including a mobile website and online ordering system, you can click our demo page here and see the sample of restaurant websites we offer. Restaurant website, mobile website, online ordering system all in one. Low cost monthly fee, no contracts!

Restaurant Owners, Your Customers Will Love You!

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Dear Restaurant Owner,

Here’s what your customers has to say…

Like most people I work hard to provide for my family.  Some nights I don’t want to cook and in today’s technologically advanced age, the convenience of online ordering is a wonderful thing.  Yes while I do have a cell phone, I don’t want to call a restaurant, ask what they have on the menu, ask what’s in specific dishes, all the while trying to remember the names and prices of those that sound interesting. This is the main appeal to a restaurant having its own website. I can see it for myself, get the input of my family and all in less than half the time it would take for me to call them and ask.  To make it even easier on me, the customer, to be able to place an order at the same time, now that is a wonderful thing!

Let’s say the restaurant has a website with the menu listed but no way to order. Well now its extra work on my part! I’ve gone out of my way to pull up the company, review the dishes, and now I have to call them just to place my order. What if they get my order wrong? What if my daughter changes her mind at the last minute? As the consumer I want the guarantee that it is right the first time without hoping that whoever took the call didn’t mess it up.

As a restaurant owner you want to get the word out there about the quality of your food, your selections, and your customer service. What better way to do this than letting 247Waiter handles your site and online ordering system? Read the testimonials for yourself and see what others have to say about the service we can provide and how it has improved business for them.

Allowing Restaurant Customers to Order Online Increases Sales

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Hungry customers are now provided the option from many innovative and sales-conscious restaurants of placing their meal orders online through their computers or cell phones. Marketing studies have determined that this usually results in larger sales. Restaurant owners and managers have long known that making it easy for customers to order is one of the keys to optimizing food sales, and it doesn’t get much easier than pointing and clicking on an item on a restaurant’s website.

Those who take advantage of convenient online ordering are often busy, time-pressed professionals. Others might be active families with several mouths to feed, couples looking for takeout for a picnic in the park or single people wanting a meal on their way home from work. Whether they’re ordering for dine-in or food to be consumed in-house, those with time constraints especially value the convenience of being able to order easily in advance. This eliminates frustrated wait times at tables in crowded restaurants or standing in long lines at takeout counters.

All of these types of consumers have one thing in common — they’re hungry. Just like how hungry people fill grocery carts fuller, they also purchase more restaurant items. Providing them with an online venue where they can click on pictures of desired entrees and ala-carte offerings creates a situation where they’re ordering more than they actually need. Human beings are visually hard-wired when it comes to primary needs such as food, so looking at tempting photographs will create more desire to eat than reading the descriptive text of even well-written menus.

Restaurant owners can even cut costs on staff by providing customers with an online ordering option. Because the customer is essentially putting in his or her order directly to the kitchen, serving staff can be reduced in establishments where online ordering is a substantial part of how they do business. It also significantly reduces chances of server error in ordering, therefore decreasing costs accrued by food waste and ordering mistakes.

There are three major factors that make online ordering systems beneficial for restaurants, delis and takeout facilities. Convenience is the first; most people like being able to click on a desired item and have it ready for them by the time they arrive at the establishment. Because most people are closely connected to their online electronic devices throughout the course of the day, offering online ordering options simply makes sense for restaurants that want to successfully compete in today’s tough marketplace.

The second factor is hunger. When people are hungry, they want the quickest available option. Hungry people are often also tired or winding down after a busy day. Hungry and tired people love the convenience of clicking on a tempting culinary photograph and having it quickly available for consumption.

The visual element is the third factor involved concerning why this strategy increases food sales. As mentioned before, the senses of most human beings are stimulated by pleasing images, and people are likely to order more food when they’ve got a visual reference.

Many busy restaurants have already increased sales by giving their customers an online ordering option. If you own or manage an eating establishment, you’ll find that implementing such a system will be well worth your time.

How Does Our Online Ordering System Work?

Online Ordering System / By

The following process is the same for both the web version and mobile version. Screen shots below is for the web version.

1. Restaurant Menu Items

Our restaurant ordering system is simple, yet sophisticated. You can have an unlimited number of food items all divided into their appropriate categories & sub-categories. These will be professionally displayed on your website & online ordering system for your customers to browse and choose from.

See image below:

categoriesitems

2. Choosing What to Order

Your customers browse through your menu and choose as many items as they want to order. Our online ordering software is sophisticated, allowing customers to customize their orders and choose exactly what they want. Regardless of what kind of food/menu you have, our software can handle the options and choices your menu requires. For group orders, customers can also specify which menu items are for which members of the group. In addition, there’s a box to type in any special instructions the customer requires.

See image below:

addtocart

2. Ordering Food

As your customers add restaurant items into the shopping cart (ordering system), a list with all their selections is maintained on the right side of the ordering website. They have the option to edit/delete/update/change options of any specific items directly in the shopping cart. In addition, they will be required to choose whether they would like place an order for “Pick-Up”, “Dine-In” or “Delivery” (Based on your restaurant’s specific settings). After selecting the order for option, they will be required to choose whether they want to place the order for right now (“ASAP”) or schedule it for a later time or date (Great for picking up your food on the way home from work, or placing an order early to pick up during lunch).

See image below:

shoppingcart

3. Checking out – Step 1

There are 2 steps in the checkout process. Step 1 is to either login or register on your restaurant ordering system and Step 2 is to actually pay & submit the order. Your customers will have to register once on your website/online ordering system and they can place future orders just by logging in. Customers see a login screen with 2 options – login or join the site.

See login screen below:

login

3. Checking out – Step 2

Customers who have not ordered before through your restaurant’s online ordering system have to register and provide the following information (See screenshot below).  All this information is stored securely and you as the restaurant owner have access to them. You will build a database of your customers and can market to them regularly for additional business.

Registration Screen below:

register

4. Submitting the Order

This is the last and final screen customers see in order to complete and place their order with your restaurant. They can either choose to “pay online” or “pay in person” (you can limit payment options to either or allow both options). In addition, customers can fully change their order. They can increase/decrease the quantity amounts, special instructions, whether the order is for pick-up, dine-in or delivery. Customers can also add tip amounts to orders.

checkout

5. Order Confirmation – Sending to Restaurant

Once order is confirmed (paid for), it is submitted to the restaurant to be filled. Restaurant is first alerted with a text message or an auto phone call letting the restaurant know someone has placed an order online, followed by submitting the order details to the restaurant through email, fax, kitchen printer or any regular printer.

 

Restaurant Websites – More Valuable Than You Think

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You’ve invested a lot in your restaurant. Everything from the chefs and ingredients to the decor and music got your complete attention. It doesn’t matter a bit if you don’t get the customers in! Far too many restaurants, especially independent ones, don’t have restaurant websites. In this day and age, that’s a cardinal sin for restaurateurs. With such a competitive landscape in the industry, customers have so many places to choose from, so it’s up to you to make it easier for them to find you and come to you.

Why restaurant websites are valuable?

A recent study by the industry’s information and analytics provider, Restaurant Science, showed that more than half of all independent restaurants surveyed didn’t have a website at all. In addition, less than 40% have their menus online. There are people who hardly ever eat at a restaurant without checking out its menu on the internet first. Or, if they’re browsing through several online restaurant menus to decide where they want to eat, they wouldn’t consider your restaurant because your menu simply wasn’t there. That’s just part of the problem. Lots of people prefer to order their food online rather than find a number and call the restaurant. If they’re already online looking for a restaurant, it’s just easier and faster to order something through a website. That means you’re losing customers who can’t be bothered to pick up the phone. As you can see, you could be really hurting your business if you don’t have a restaurant website that displays your menu and maybe even allows your customers to order online.

You want to have a website, so now what?

You don’t have to worry about how to go about creating and maintaining a website for your restaurant. There is a very simple and cost-effective way that takes it out of your hands. 247Waiter.com can help your business succeed by building and setting up a website for you and creating a streamlined online ordering system for just a low monthly fee. All you have to do sign up with information about your restaurant, a copy of your menu and any graphics or color specifics that you’d like. A website will be set up free of cost with an online ordering system where your customers can browse through your menu and order items easily. The system can provide for both online and in person payments through a completely secure platform. It will also be available 24/7 to all customers, so that they can see the menu and schedule a delivery ahead of time. Once the order comes in, it can be faxed or emailed to you and you can get a text alert as well. Anytime you want to make a change to your website or menu, you can do so yourself via an easy click of a button. This streamlined and secure package is available to you for a 30 day trial free of cost, so if you don’t like it, you don’t lose anything. There’s no contract or upfront fees, just a low monthly payment.

Why not take every advantage you can get for your business? A restaurant website can guarantee more customers and you’ll see what you’ve been missing all this time without one.