Top Tips to Get Your Restaurant off to a Flying Start
Phew! The madness of Christmas and New Year has subsided, and you’ve finally got time to think. The new year is here, but with it comes new challenges, such as soaring energy prices, rising food bills and customers tightening their budgets.
It’s easy to focus on the negatives at the moment and get disheartened about what lies ahead – so we’re here to remind you of the positive steps you can take to get your bar, cafe, hotel or restaurant off to a great start this January, and set you off on the right foot!
Our Top Tips for 2023
Set Your Goals for the Year Ahead
Goal setting will help to focus on what’s important to you and your business – and help keep you on track! Want to branch out with a take-away menu or create an outdoor dining space? Perhaps you want to become a music venue or start an open mike night? Perhaps this is the year you launch your wedding and events packages?
Whatever you aim to do, make sure you plan it in advance. Research the competition, get an estimate of costs for activities you will need to do and review your staff requirements and sales targets. Making sure your goals are SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and have a time frame) will give you a much better chance of success.
Review Your Menu
And we don’t just mean adding vegan dishes and mocktails for January! Look at your menu – what are your most popular dishes, and what is your least popular? How can you freshen things up? Look at current trends – what’s popular in your area right now? Adding in some lighter dishes or a special order menu can add variety and will appeal to your customers at this time of year.
Reviewing your costs is also important – make sure your changes are profitable and aren’t putting too much strain on your kitchen. EPOS stock management apps such as Langley’s can help you review the commercials to make menu decision making much easier.
And don’t forget to train your staff on any dishes before they launch!
Start a Customer Loyalty Programme
When the nights are dark and cold, your customers may need a bit of encouragement to get them out during winter. What better incentive than to set up a customer reward programme? Whether it’s a stamp card or a branded digital loyalty card, like the ones offered by Langley Business Systems, it’s a great way to reward loyal customers and give them a little something back.
Set up an On-Line Ordering Service
If your customers really are in hibernation mode, make it easy for them to order their favourite dishes for collection or delivery by setting up on-line ordering. Once set-up, you can also use it in-house to help manage service and make things easier for your customers. Speak to your EPOS provider for advice on how to get things up and running.
Master Social Media
We know! There aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything on your to-do list , let alone becoming social media maestros – but investing a little time now could really pay dividends later.
If you’re not already on social media, then you should be – because your customers are. Facebook and Instagram are probably the best options for beginners, but if you’re attracting a younger crowd then TikTok could be a winner.
Just focus on the basics to start – make sure your address, opening hours and contact details are up to date and clearly visible. Add in plenty of external photos as well as some nice interior shots. Make sure your current menu is available, with some images of food and drink to entice your customers. Around your venue, make sure you clearly communicate that you are on social media and ask your customers to follow you – it’s a fantastic way to build a relationship with them.
If you need a bit of help, there are some great free tools available. Canva is a free solution for creating social media graphics and images, and Hootsuite and Buffer are free tools that allow you to schedule your posts in advance, freeing up time to focus on your customers.
Review Your Payments Provider
Are you still getting the best deal from all of your suppliers? With rising costs, it’s always a good idea to check your contracts regularly to make sure you are still getting value for money! Does your payments solution provider offer super-fast transactions, low rates, 24/7 support and next day payments? If not, it’s worth shopping around.
Langley Compass Group offers a range of solutions from entry level mobile POS handsets to fully integrated business solutions, including a real time sales data app. Why not give us a call to see how we can help your business?
So there you have it – our top tips on things to get you started this January, we hope you’ve found them useful. Please share them with your friends or colleagues, and let us know your tips this year – we would love to hear from you!
On behalf of all of us at Langley Business Systems, we wish you a VERY successful, productive and prosperous 2023. Here’s to a bumper year!
If you are looking for advice on online ordering systems, new EPOS systems or customer loyalty schemes please get in touch. Our EPOS systems provide everything you need to offer an unbeatable customer experience. For more information please email: sales@langleybusinesssystems.co.uk.
