Understanding the Customer to Enhance Brand Experience

More than ever, brands, especially QSR and Fast Casual restaurants brands, are taking advantage of the vast and varied platforms available for consumer engagement; most notably social media. Scroll through Twitter, and you’ll notice Burger King receives more than 100 thousand retweets for their memes, posted with an added Whopper flair. In creating this social media persona, Burger King, and other brands, establish a voice. They speak to their core audience of current and future customers.

For as trendy as buzzworthy social media in QSR has become, there is another under-the-radar resource that can be utilized to create the same degree of connection, drive the same kind of loyalty, and deliver bottom line impact – digital ordering platforms. With a suite of kiosks, online and mobile ordering capabilities, coupled with personalized offerings, restaurants can utilize their data for insights to further drive return visits. With increased visibility into customer behavior, brands are well-equipped to leverage their technology and create a seamless experience to increase sales and brand loyalty.

Making Personalization Central

As consumers weave through the maze of brand possibilities and opportunities available for their online purchases, the customer experience drives selection, and personalization is the buzzword. For restaurant brands, this is no different. A recent survey found that 42 percent of customers will choose takeout from a restaurant if they receive offers based on their dining history and another 39 percent will choose to dine at the same restaurant.

How can restaurant brands get personal? Digital ordering platforms give restaurants access to data and insights needed to create highly personalized experiences with the hopes of increasing brand engagement and loyalty.

Digital platforms provide a broad scope of available insights for brands to leverage in creating and refining customer experiences and offerings. As guests make selections and complete purchases on personalized brand apps and websites, brands can take stock of the trends, behaviors and preferences of their customers and offer guests rewards and promotions to increase check sales, customer visits and overall share of wallet.

With better customer understanding, restaurants no longer waste resources guessing what will resonate with guests. Instead, equipped with intelligence, restaurants can successfully send offers and messages at the right time, to the right audience. According to Tillster’s Digital Coupons & Loyalty Index, more than 80 percent of customers would choose one brand over another based on a digital coupon. Guests are listening. Brands just need to make sure it’s the right offer.

With insights, a restaurant may notice that a customer often places an order on weeknights around 6 p.m. Rather than lumping this guest into a larger campaign related to lunch deals, the brand can send an offer that has a better chance of resulting in increased visit, or check size, like “Work got you hungry? Add fries to today’s dinner meal for only $0.59.” After receiving this discount, the customer may be more inclined to opt for dinner at the restaurant or to increase the size of their order during their usual stop on their way home from work.

Beyond just this individual order, the restaurant brand also reaps the benefits of providing the customer with a personal experience. Customers will take notice when the brands they frequent understand them, remember their order and make offers that are easy to take advantage of based on personalized information. It’s the kind of interaction that results in a more positive brand opinion, as guests feel that they are treated like an important customer. It’s an opinion they form precisely because they have received an offer based on their history with the brand.

With insights, a positive and personalized guest experience becomes the norm. As this occurs, guests become more inclined to share their time and money with the brand, resulting in increased sales and loyalty as the customer is better understood. With data gathered across the platform, and across the ordering process, brands are better equipped to further explore and develop how they approach their customer base for increased results.

Creating a Seamless Experience

The more important personalization becomes for success, the more brands must ensure they have control over their platforms and that each is individually optimized to create natural, efficient experiences for their customer. This means that across mobile, online and kiosk ordering, the experience, the menu layout and the flow of information provide easy navigation while leveraging the benefits each platform provides based on what is important to the guest.

By creating this seamless suite of platforms, consumers feel comforted by a familiar experience, allowing for increased attention to be placed on the individualized elements that keep these same customers excited and loyal.

A unified user experience keeps them coming back for more, establishing the restaurant brand as a place that promotes and fosters accessible experiences for consumers, prompting loyalty and repeat visits.

Customized and seamless brand experiences are what consumers desire. As customers interact with these platforms daily, they expect the brands and organizations they choose to meet their expectations and needs. Adapting and optimizing kiosks, online and mobile ordering platforms for this success – these are the tools that will drive results in the long-term.