Customers now want to pre-order alcohol online, but what are the benefits for you? Discover how a free drinks pre-ordering system can help you fulfil today’s customer demands.
Pre Order Benefit #1 — Better Staff Organisation
When tides of customers arrive at your restaurant and try to make table orders at the same time, your staff will struggle.
Stop and think for a moment — put yourself in the shoes of the person taking orders. You’re tripping between tables, going back-and-forth from kitchen to customer, hastily jotting down table numbers and new orders on a pen-and-paper notepad.
Well, good news: it doesn’t have to be this way.
A drink pre-ordering app helps staff organise the workload more efficiently, displaying customer orders in an easy-to-digest digital format. No need to provide a yawn-inducing “how to drinks pre-ordering” guide — an intuitive layout means all phone users learn how to use it in seconds.
Instead of waiting for ages before making a drinks order, customers can now order comfortably from their phone outside of the restaurant, as easy as that. The process works in tandem with a virtual queue where customers leave only to return later, lessening the burden on staff dealing with customers waiting for 30—40 minutes.
Figure 2. Waiter by Micadew via Flickr
Pre Order Benefit #2 — Less Burden on Staff
A pre-order system reduces the level of stress on staff. Here’s how it works.
First, staff save time on processing orders. Instead of whipping out the pen-and-paper pad at a table, a pre-order system processes the choices of customer’s choices for them. Then, staff save time on taking payments, as customers prepay for all drinks before they take a seat.
Second, staff avoid any confusion related to customer interactions. Using the service to direct customers, payment confirmation screens show a brief and clear message that informs customers of your restaurant’s indoor procedures (e.g., “please wait for your name to be called”).
Now when customers prepay for drinks, a restaurant can promise instant service as they enter and find tables. You can simply inform customers that they can speed up their orders via their mobile phones. It’s similar to a QR code menu, but far superior because your restaurant prepares the customer’s order before they’ve even stepped inside.
Figure 1. Finding Beauty by Johnny Silvercloud via Flickr
Pre Order Benefit #3 — Boost Drinks Sales
Unless you have the business acumen of a successful advertising consultant, boosting your restaurant’s sales will always be a challenge. It’s a perennial problem: what new methods can help your restaurant boost its indoor revenue?
Thankfully the internet is a massive help and taking your sales online can help ensure the long-term success of your restaurant.
The first point to make concerns consumer psychology. When purchasing things over the web, people are simply less reluctant to spend money when behind a phone screen. Just look at the success of Amazon — on average they make £7,000+ in online sales every second.
The second point relates to convenience, but mainly concerns a key feature of the internet in general: ease of access. Your drinks pre ordering screen displays high-quality photographs of the drinks available on your menu. The ease of paying at the click of a button offers customers who want to buy alcohol online an option they cannot refuse.
Pre Order Benefit #4 — Reach More Customers
Taking your drinks orders online, the digital stratosphere is your restaurant’s limit.
Why are restaurant pre orders important? A pre ordering system transcends demographic boundaries as anyone with a phone can now purchase drinks from your restaurant.
Nowadays, using a pre order app may be a make-or-break situation for many diners. One report found that 71 per cent of respondents said online ordering has affected which restaurant they choose to visit.
Online service broadens your audience. Anyone with internet access can order from your restaurant’s page. So in theory, your customer base becomes limitless; but in practice this ideally only works if you try to imprint your restaurant’s image on the minds of the general public. Social media, for instance, can be a big help, proving useful in increasing your customers.
One report said that millennials are now exerting a considerable influence on today’s culture of eating out. This is the internet generation — people who are accustomed to instant transactions in every other sphere of their lives, from entertainment to retail to supermarket goods.
“This demographic wants to consume their favourite foods whenever they want,” the report said — “as well as order and pay for it with the click of a button”.
This being so, restaurants can now reap the benefits of this growing trend. If people prefer the ease of online shopping in their everyday lives, then surely ordering from a restaurant should be easy too.
Figure 3. Isseya Waiter by iMorpheus via Flickr
Pre Order Benefit #5 — Predict Customer Orders
Overall, a drinks pre-ordering system benefits staff in more ways than one. Your team will also know what orders are coming up, how many drinks to make, and when to serve them. Anticipating demand has never been this easy.
As such, combining drinks pre-orders with free data analytics, Carbonara App helps your restaurant learn about timing.
For example, you can learn more about the drinks people order during the afternoon, or what people order at the beginning of the week versus the end. This helps with predicting what drink ingredients you need available.
It also means you can make in-app recommendations to users. Delivering recommendations can offer your customers a personalised service, securing more sales with little effort. These are a great way to create loyal customers. One report said that when an app delivers on a user’s preferences, 80 per cent stay with it — and recommendations, user personalisation, help to fortify this loyalty from customers.
With Carbonara App, the drinks pre-ordering feature goes hand in hand with its other benefits, such as keeping tables full using digital waitlist management. Now, customers don’t have to wait 30—45 minutes in a queue to be seated. So, the virtual experience benefits restaurants in a two-fold fashion.
Carbonara App is the first-ever truly free restaurant app. Avoid any third-party commission costs, increase your restaurant’s revenue, and enjoy drinks pre-ordering today!
Still figuring out what is pre-order benefits for restaurants? Contact us and we’ll answer anything you’d like to know.
