How to Improve Restaurant Performance Using Innovative Technology

Is your restaurant not performing as well as you’d hoped? Is there a new competitor in town that you’d like to surpass? The answer lies in using breakthrough technology to make your restaurant stand out.

Below, we teach you how to improve restaurant performance using the latest tools and technologies at your disposal.

Before we get into the restaurant improvement ideas we’ve prepared for you, let’s take a look at the advantages of using technology at your restaurant:

1. Increase efficiency: From streamlining order-taking and payments, to quickly making changes to the menu, technology will help you increase restaurant efficiency by taking some of the burden off you and your employees.
2. Improve service: Technology not only makes your life easier but that of your customers too. It teaches you how to improve restaurant service so that every visit is a 5-star experience.
3. Reduce costs: The more organized and efficient your restaurant is, the less you will spend ordering ingredients that you have to throw away or scheduling more employees than needed when business is slow.
4. Boost profits: Any action plan to increase sales in a restaurant should include technology. Your servers will move faster, serving more people daily, with reduced errors and increased customer satisfaction.
5. Improve employee management: Restaurant management tools can help you access your staff information, update and change privileges, train new hires, and be in the loop regarding everyone’s financial transactions.

A POS system is essential if you want your restaurant to run like a well-oiled machine. It can help you:

• Serve more customers faster;
• Accept multiple payment methods;
• Reduce order errors;
• Streamline communication between front-of-house and back-of-house staff;
• Reduce food waste by keeping track of your inventory;
• and more.

When looking for the right POS for your needs, keep in mind these must-have features:

• Fast payment processing;
• Simple printer management;
• Easy-to-use menu editor;
• Restaurant staff training and privileges;
• Built-in analytics.

To learn how to improve restaurant performance, you need to pair your POS system with an efficient QR code menu that enables customers to place orders and pay directly on their smartphones. With this feature, you can:

• Reduce wait times;
• Serve more tables daily;
• Boost sales;
• Increase staff efficiency;
• Improve the guest experience.

Curious to see how contactless ordering works with GloriaFood? Check out the video below and scan the code yourself to experience ordering through the eyes of your customers:

The best part of all? You can enable this service for free by signing up for GloriaFood.

Learn more: QR code menu for restaurants

Follow the steps in this video tutorial to get started with on premise dining:

While a POS system and QR code menu can help you improve the customer experience at the restaurant, you also need technology that will attract clients online, starting with an in-house online ordering system.

As opposed to asking your customers to order on third-party apps, ordering directly on your website or social media will ensure you:

• Keep all the profits you make;
• Offer lower fees for customers;
• Control the entire ordering experience, from start to finish;
• Collect valuable customer data;
• Build loyalty and protect your brand.

The GloriaFood online ordering system comes with a slew of useful features that will help you boost online sales, such as:

• Simple menu editor;
• Pickup, delivery, table reservations & scheduled orders;
• Online payment options;
• Website and Facebook ordering;
• Branded mobile app;
• Sales and SEO-optimized website;
• Promotion templates;
• Email marketing automation;
• Reports dashboard;

A simple way to increase restaurant traffic, a table reservation system enables customers to book a table in advance and even pre-order and pay for their food upon booking.

This allows you to:

• Speed up service;
• Increase table turnover;
• Attract a larger variety of customers;
• Increase efficiency;
• Boost daily sales.

Learn more: Benefits of a Table Reservation System & How to Implement it for Free

One of the best ways to attract new customers and persuade them to return to your restaurant again and again is to offer discounts, deals, and special offers that are too good to pass up.

To ensure you cover all bases, you should aim to have at least two promotions running at the same time:

• One for new customers: Free delivery on the first order, 15% off the first order, etc.
• One for returning customers: $20 off your fifth order, 5% off when paying with a credit card, etc.

If you use GloriaFood’s ecosystem, including the QR code menu, you can choose if the promotions will apply to online ordering, dine-in, or both.

To find out how you can create your own custom promotions that will help you increase profits, watch the tutorial below:

When you have to deal with countless restaurant systems and procedures every day, it’s easy to let marketing slip through the cracks. But that would be a mistake.

Marketing can help you attract new business and motivate those who have already dined with you to become repeat clients.

The solution: Let your email marketing campaigns run on Autopilot.

The GloriaFood email marketing campaigns can help you:

• Encourage second orders by offering a second-order discount;
• Re-engage customers who haven’t ordered in a while with a special offer;
• Prevent users from abandoning their cart with a small discount.

All you have to do is set up the campaign (it takes minutes), and it will run in the background, attracting return customers to your restaurant.

To track the success of your menu, business strategies, and marketing ventures, you need access to detailed analytics that can help you improve operations day in and day out.

First, you need to track in-store analytics using your POS reports. Make sure the POS you purchase allows you to run crucial reports such as:

• Menu item sales;
• Property financial report;
• Employee financial report;
• Check journal report;
• Tax summary report;
• and more.

Then, you need access to online ordering reports that can help you track your success online. For example:

• Sales summary and trends;
• Menu analytics;
• Client report;
• Website funnel;
• Online ranking;
• Order density areas;
• etc.

If you’ve been wondering how to improve restaurant performance, our takeaway is that technology is the key.

Look for free or affordable restaurant technology to improve all aspects of your operation and ensure you build a long-standing brand that will last the test of time.