Introduction
Innovative digital solutions and new technologies are still new for many restaurants. They find it hard to adapt to the new technology trends and digitize their restaurant business.
But in 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced restaurants to look beyond the traditional and accept digitization. Are you planning to digitize your restaurant business? But don’t know where to start?
Read this blog to know the answers to your queries.
We have listed all the technology trends you can adopt to digitize restaurants in 2023. Also, learn How to digitize Restaurant Business in 2023? And the benefits of digitizing the restaurant business.
Read Also: How to Open a Restaurant | End-To-End Guide to Starting a New Venture
Technologies to Digitize Restaurant Business in 2023
Using Modern POS Machines
A Point Sale system combines hardware and software that restaurants can use to bring up customer orders and accept payments. The POS software can bring a complete restaurant digital transformation.
However, a cloud POS system operates in cloud servers, unlike a traditional POS system that stores data on the local server.
A cloud POS System does much more than just accepting orders and printing receipts. Let us look at the benefits of a POS system for restaurants.
Benefits of POS:
Streamlining Transactions: Instead of having to hand physically write each customer order and tally up the total payment, the pos system does it all for you. Using a mobile pos, you can take orders from any location.
Tracking & Increasing Sales: The POS system tracks all that data related to a food order which you can then pile into reports and make informed business decisions.
Customer Loyalty: Most POS systems have some loyalty program or management functionality that allows you to track customer data such as their purchase history or birthday. You can then use that data to recommend future products or offer discounts or promotions.
Optimizing Inventory: Instead of physically counting the number of items on your shelves, the pos system can track all that. You can then make inventory purchases based on usage, so you aren’t over or under-stocked. Most POS systems also have extra features like alerts, notifications, or even automatic purchases when your inventory runs low.
Improve Employee Performance: Most POS systems have some time clock and permission functionality within them so that you can track when and what each employee is accessing your system. You can also track employee sales history and performance and then use
that data to reward your top performers and maybe encourage your underperformers to increase sales.
CRM & Feedback Management
Every restaurant owner has its prime focus on customer satisfaction. People willingly pay more for stellar customer experiences. At the same time, if your services are not up to the mark, they immediately switch to your peers or competitors.
The Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software helps restaurant owners gain a deeper and holistic understanding of their customers. They can use this to deliver personalized customer experiences. So, customers feel valued and happy. For instance, send personalized birthday or anniversary messages, offering a 20-30% discount on birthdays or anniversaries, etc.
People love when they are valued or given personal attention, and thus, it leads to greater chances of conversions.
Order & Pay at the Table (QR Code Ordering)
QR Code Ordering is the next technology that will help you digitize restaurant business. The digital order management solution that best helps restaurant owners to gain back sales during the pandemic and post-pandemic times.
As per statistics, people add more to their cart and do more upsells on a device or computer than when speaking to a human. QR Code Ordering allows customers to scan the menu on their phones and order online.
QR code menus require zero upfront investment because the screen is the user’s mobile which they can use to scan the code and get the menu.
Restaurants can increase their sales by 30% and table turnover by 20% while greatly decreasing their labor cost and increasing their customer satisfaction.
With a QR Code order, the host or employee instructs customers to scan the QR code on the table once they’re seated in the restaurant. Scanning brings up the restaurant menu, which restaurant owners can easily set up and customize.
Customers can then check the digital menu on their phones and add the dishes they want to the cart with their table number. Then they enter their payment information, submit payment, and their order is sent to the kitchen.
Mobile Order Taking
Are you running a restaurant on a low budget? Can’t afford a POS system for your startup restaurant? We have a solution for that too. You can collect orders on your mobile or smartphone too. We integrate the POS software to your mobile phones, which you can use for your small cafe or food truck.
Kitchen Display System
Kitchen Display Systems are a part of digital restaurant management solutions. They display orders on the computer screen fixed in the kitchen. The POS automatically sends the orders to the kitchen display system. It removes the need for pen-paper tickets for order taking and increases order accuracy.
The Kitchen Display System displays orders in the queue and keeps them on the screen until they are completed. Any order notes like extra cheese or light cream are displayed, ensuring you always provide excellent customer service.
Benefits of Kitchen Display Systems
Cut Costs: It helps reduce huge labor costs as restaurant owners don’t need as many people in the dining room and the kitchen. The order taking and completion is more streamlined and easy.
Improves Customer Service: The Kitchen Display System helps the kitchen and dining staff get the food out faster. Thus, the restaurant owners can give the guests more attention. The restaurant need not hand write orders as everything can be managed at the push of a button on the computer screen.
Increase Order Capacity: Since orders are automatically collected, waiters have more time to attend to the guests rather than walking between the kitchen and customer tables. With a kitchen display system, one waiter has enough time to attend to 16 people at a time.
Waiter App
Another latest technology trend in the restaurant industry is the waiter app. Call the Waiter apps are gaining huge popularity for better table services. The mobile app allows guests and kitchen staff to call the waiter with a tap on the screen. The waiter will arrive at the table with a single tap for help. Kitchen staff, too, can call waiters for food serving once they are done cooking.
Thus, call waiter apps to help in improving staff efficiency and customer service.
Delivery Management
Online Delivery has become an important service for restaurants more than ever. People nowadays prefer ordering food online and getting them delivered to their doorsteps. Millennials prefer home food deliveries, allowing them to watch movies without interruptions.
As a restaurant owner, if you plan to start a food delivery service but are lacking your fleet, we can help. If you don’t want to invest in a fleet, we can help you connect with third-party delivery services like Dunzo, Borzo, Porter, and Picker. It will help you track your food deliveries in real-time, check the driver’s current location, etc. Thus, you can deliver food quickly, efficiently, and on time.
Table Booking & Waiting Management
Some restaurants are still using pen and paper and cannot easily access valuable information about their customers.
The online restaurant reservation and table management system is very easy to use. It enables restaurant owners to accept online reservation requests and book tables. They don’t need to wait in queues outside the restaurants for bookings.
Restaurant owners can see all the tables on the software and check which are occupied and free. They can also check the guest’s name, expected arrival time, the table they were assigned to, and the size of the party.
In addition, they can also see the rich database of all customers, including their past visits, preferences, contact information, birthday, anniversary, etc. They can use this information for future promotions and marketing strategies. The online table reservation system also supports advanced features like sending SMS and email confirmations.
Advantages of Online Restaurant Reservation Systems:
- Convenient Table Booking: The online table booking system makes it easy for customers to book restaurant tables. They don’t need to visit or call the restaurant for bookings. They can check the table arrangements on the online table booking app, check the available tables, and request a booking online.
- Capture customer information: Another big advantage of an Online Restaurant Reservation System is that it collects and stores vital customer data for future use. Restaurant owners can use customer data like their food choices or table preferences for future bookings. It also helps in creating customer-focused marketing strategies. For example, loyalty rewards, discounts, etc.
Self Ordering Kiosk
A self-order kiosk is a large touchscreen device for customers to interact with a restaurant or store. Restaurants can embed the pads into the physical square hardware, which costs a few hundred pounds and minimizes the risk of iPad theft.
How do Self-Ordering Kiosks work?
Self-ordering Kiosks let customers place orders themselves. The beautiful squares enable restaurants to beautifully display their digital menus and give customers the flexibility to add items or change ingredients. Customers can easily pay and check out with a swipe or tap.
Benefits of Self-Ordering Kiosks
- Increased Ticket Size
As per statistics, 7 out of 10 customers like placing orders themselves. Self Ordering lifts ticket size by 30%.
Kiosks make people spend more. As per research, on average, people prefer self-checkouts over cashiers. People seem to spend more with the kiosk than they would order from a human in one experiment.
Restaurants can highlight their special dishes, pricey meals, and add-ons to get extra bucks. The self-ordering kiosk also prompts targeted upsell items when guests choose the dishes for their orders. For example, extra paid toppings, meal combo, etc.
Mcdonald’s found that people who used their kiosks spent up to 30% more as they were more likely to supersize their meal. Taco Bell experienced a 20% increase in orders through the use of kiosks. The American-Mexican chain chiles also claimed that people spend more on desserts when ordering through kiosk solutions.
- Decreased Wait Times
The primary benefit of self-ordering kiosks is that they make the whole order-taking process fast and efficient. Data showed that kiosks could reduce 40% of total order time.
Customers do not like to wait in long queues. A study by Tillster found that 75% of customers prefer to order from a self-service kiosk if the queue has more than five people. And it rises to 91% if the queue has ten or more people. With self-ordering, customers can place their order independently, pay, and send it to the kitchen.
- Enhance Order Accuracy
We face situations where we get something we never ordered due to miscommunication. During peak times, waiters often serve the dishes to the wrong tables.
A self-ordering kiosk eliminates these manual errors. When customers order on their own, directly to the kitchen, the restaurant staff has enough time to pay attention to serve customers efficiently.
Moreover, when customers can see images of each dish they order, they can be sure of what they are ordering. It helps avoid situations where customers read a new dish name on the menu and order out of curiosity.
- Save Money on Labor
Self-ordering kiosks reduce manual tasks to a great extent as the computer takes care of order taking, sending it to the kitchen, and receiving payments. Restaurants need fewer staff members to manage orders and attend to guests.
So, the restaurant owners can use the staff for more important tasks, and thus, it helps in improving productivity. They can attend to more customers, improve customer experience, and also help in increasing sales.
Social Distancing
Post-pandemic, restaurants must follow COVID safety guidelines to keep the virus at bay. Customers also prefer visiting restaurants with less traffic and maintaining proper hygiene and social distancing.
Self-Ordering Kiosks reduce in-person interactions and crowded queues, making customers comfortable about ordering and COVID safety.
Conclusion
So, now you know how you can digitize the restaurant business. We have listed all the technologies that must give your restaurant business a digital push toward success.
If you are looking for an apt online food ordering and delivery software for your restaurant, try DeOnDe-our Ready Made Food Delivery App Solutions. The restaurant ordering suite is ready to launch and requires zero initial cost.
You can ask for features and design customizations and get full-fledged software for a minimal monthly fee. Contact us now at +9184010 60119 for a free product demo.
