INCREASING BUSINESS WITH ONLINE MENU ORDERINGTips for using your online ordering website effectively

Your Online Menu Ordering website can generate a significant amount of new business, increase per-order size by up to 30%, and increase customer satisfaction and loyalty.

If you build it, they will come IF they know it’s there! Use all your communication channels to let prospective and current customers know that you’re offering a service that will make ordering from your restaurant fast, convenient, and accurate.

Tip #1. Counter Tent Cards

Put a counter card near your register area with business cards that customers can take with them with your website’s address promoting Online Ordering. Consider putting one on every table. Customers will appreciate knowing about this convenient service.

Tip #2. Bag stuffers – make sure that every takeout and delivery order has a flyer in it letting your customer know that they can conveniently make

their next order online. Tip #3. Train your staff. Make sure that every person that takes phone orders says, “Thank you for your order. Oh, and by the way, did you know that you can now order online from us? It’s fast, easy to use, and convenient – you can find us at on the web Tip #4 Newspaper ads, flyers, pennysavers, etc. Make sure that all your promotions mention online ordering!

Promote - Promote - Promote! GROUPSOnline ordering naturally caters to groups. Consequently, those who

spend hours in front of the computer and routinely work in groups should be obvious customers for which to heavily market online ordering. Examples of such customers are employees of local businesses, hospitals, academic institutions, churches, etc. Chances are, if these customers order online from your restaurant once, they will stick with you for other group orders. 1. Call or visit offices in your delivery area... speak to an office manager and

tell her how online ordering will save time and make ordering takeout or delivery for meetings convenient and fast - and you can offer discounts to specific groups. Print a handout that you can leave with the web address. a) Medical offices - doctors, dentists b) Law offices c) Stock brokers, insurance companies d) Corporate home offices

GENERAL PROMOTION

1. Door hangers - door hangers are an effective way to target customers for online ordering in your delivery area. Offer a percent off meals or a free appetizer for a short period to stimulate sales. You can print and distribute 5000 door hangers for around $1100.

2. GroupOn, LIvingSocial, and similar “group buying” websites that offer daily deals on everything from furniture to lunch and dinner deals at restaurants. You can offer a coupon for a free appitizer or percentage off the total order IF they buy online for takeout or delivery. GroupOn and LivingSocial have 100 million subscribers!

3. Pay-per-click web advertising. You can pay a per-click fee to search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing to send buyers to your site.

4. Pennysaver and other coupon distribution networks. These can be effective - offer a discount coupon.

5. Guerrilla marketing - 1. offer free meals or some incentive to an employee of a large company,

office, or students atteding a local school or college to 'talk up' ordering online from your restaurant

2. offer free meals or some other incentive to a local resident to put a magnetic sign on their car when its parked in your delivery area. Use the sign to offer a special deal like a discount or free appetizer to customers that order online.

6. MAKE SURE any advertising or promotions you currently do let customers know that online ordering is available with the web address.

Marketing POWER! Your OnlineMenuOrdering.com website has built-in marketing features you can use to build more business:

Coupons - Coupons allow you to offer discounts for a specific amount or percentage discount. You can limit the number of coupons available and the time that they are valid. Call a local office and say, “If you order within the next week and enter coupon code “disc001” we'll discount the order by 10%. Group Marketing. You can create groups and then provide special pricing to that group. For example, every MGM employee receives a 10% discount when they log in and buy. Cross Selling. You can recommend other items when an item is ordered. Specials. The specials feature allows you to put any number of menu items on the front page as “specials” with a single button click. .

Site Statistics are a Goldmine. Every time a customer uses your website, an opportunity to collect useful data exists. How many customers use the site to order? What time are they most likely to order? What coupons do they most use? Where do they order from? How often does the average online customer order? What is the average check? Can this number be increased through different promotions? Your restaurant can achieve a whole new level of success by aggregating and utilizing the information that your site automatically collects every time a customer visits.

Your System Automatically Harvests e-Mail Addresses. Use them! The customers who go online to order food from your restaurant will most likely want to know when your restaurant has a special or an event. Sending e-mail blasts is inexpensive, highly effective, and very simple. Moreover, it is a universal tool that will reach everyone in your target audience from the hungry college student to the busy professional mother. Keep in mind, however, that unless your e-mail newsletters or coupons have an unsubscribe option built in, they will be considered spam by your users and will be filtered out. Furthermore, make sure that your e-mail campaign management software has statistics that let you see how many people saw your e-mails and whether they worked. Collect email addresses from ALL customers - even dine in customers - and offer a discount when they order online. Remember, online orders are 25% larger - and - are much more profitable than dine-in business.