Restaurant Best Practices for Email Marketing Engagement

When you consider that 91% of all U.S. consumers use email every single day, and that emails prompt purchases 3 to 1 over social media, there’s no doubt that email marketing remains a powerful tool for restaurant businesses. That said, there’s an art to sending emails that your restaurant customers will actually open. Here are a few tips for creating engagement with your consumers through your email marketing campaign.

Tailor Restaurant Emails to the Individual Customer

The first and most important aspect of a successfully engaging email campaign is making your messages custom-tailored to the specific individual you are messaging. This is more than just including his or her name in the subject line. This customization also includes different messages and layouts based on factors such as age, gender, purchase history, click-through behavior and location. A recent survey reports that segmenting emails increases open rate as much as 39% and decreases unsubscribes by an average of 27%. Today’s email programs make it easy to segment your marketing messages, and given the advantages of doing so, there’s no reason not to include this level of targeted marketing in your email campaign.

Design Your Emails for Mobile & Social Compatibility

A second major factor that makes or breaks customer engagement in terms of emails is whether or not the email is mobile-friendly, easy to use and easy to share on social channels. Avoid large graphics that don’t render well on smartphones—especially if those graphics contain key details of your advertisement. Make your content clear and to the point. If there is action that can be taken (getting the customer to click-through somewhere) ensure that the bugs are worked out, the process you’re asking them to do is seamless and simple and that your message is easy to share with their friends. Even better—offer an additional incentive for sharing the offer with their own contacts.

Analyze Your Metrics to Fine-Tune Your Restaurant’s Email Marketing Campaign

You’ll hear it everywhere you look in the business world: analyze your metrics. Email marketing is no different. The only way you’re going to be able to tell which messages are working for you is to analyze your data. Use the information that you garner to fashion even better, exclusively targeted messages to your customers. Find ways to alter your approach to those segments that aren’t performing as well. Remember that open rates are just the beginning of understanding your numbers. Technology now enables us to follow the effectiveness of our email offers all the way to restaurant visits.

There’s no doubt email marketing can be a great way to drive revenue and customer engagement while having a high return on investment. Ensure that the emails you send are relevant to the consumer and sent at a frequency that makes sense for what you’re offering. Remember that being inundated or bored are the top reasons people leave mailing lists. Keep your messages targeted, timely and valuable to the consumer. Engagement is key to email marketing success.

3 Key Steps to Operational Excellence in the Restaurant

When you consider how much time you spend correcting or minimizing the repercussions of mistakes made in your restaurant, finding a way to guarantee that processes can be run correctly 100% of the time is appealing indeed. Just think what it would do for your business in terms of profitability, reduced cost and hassle, repeat business and customer delight if your patrons could expect to get the same high quality product or service every single time they visit.

The value of operational excellence, or providing the product or service right every time, cannot be underestimated. Same-store sales increase over businesses whose operational excellence is merely average. Even better, increases in operational excellence can often be achieved with little or no capital or ongoing investment, which makes striving for it a no-brainer. Here are three key steps you can employ in your restaurant to achieve the best standard of operational excellence possible.

Design for Quality in Your Restaurant Processes from the Start

The first and most important factor in improving operational excellence is to ensure that the products and services you create delight your customers. This may seem obvious, but all too often businesses start tweaking their procedures for efficiency without taking the time to ensure that those processes first meet customer requirements. Without ensuring that what you are offering is above and beyond a customer’s expectation, you risk too many “me-too” products which do nothing to set your brand apart from the crowd and appeal to your customer base. Once you’re sure you know how to delight your customers, designing quality into your processes is the next step.

The most significant difference between ordinary restaurants and high performers is that quality is designed into their processes from the get-go. These restaurants strive for implementing processes that create 100% success, every single time. For example, if you design a recipe and its instructions for excellence, the final product should always have the same great taste, regardless of who is in the back of the house.

Strive for the Perfect Process in Your Restaurant’s Procedures

Once you’ve designed your process for excellence, it’s time to run pilot tests and refine the procedures based on the results of that data. Test the procedure against multiple equipment configurations, a full range of employees’ and customers’ demands, to ensure that the process is as close to perfect as possible. Once you’ve got a process that can be replicated perfectly every time, document the steps in detail and develop your training materials.

Replicate and Refine the Restaurant Processes that Near Perfection

If your data shows that the process can be operated properly 100% of the time and is an improvement over an existing process, it’s time to mandate implementation throughout your organization. Standardization in the quality of products and services you offer is a critical factor to the overall success of your business. Effectiveness is always ahead of efficiency. Is it truly possible to make your processes so flawless that they can produce perfect products and services every time? Maybe not. But, if you focus on quality; carefully design your procedures so that they can be replicated as perfectly as possible, and have a goal of achieving outstanding operational excellence, you will get as close to perfect as possible.

How the New IRS Rules Regarding Group Gratuities Could Impact Restaurants

For years it has been common practice for restaurants to add a fixed gratuity to parties of five or more. As of the beginning of this year, however, how restaurants handle tips for large parties is going to have to change. The IRS came out with a new ruling this year that draws a more distinct division between what are considered tips and what are considered service charges. From here on out, it will no longer be legal to require a tip and still call it a tip. If it’s a mandatory fee, it is now called a service charge, which changes how restaurants can handle payouts for bonuses.

It used to be that cash tips generally went unreported, though both tips and wages are technically taxable. Those days are mostly gone now, what with credit cards and more stringent reporting and tracking requirements. This change in what constitutes service charges vs. tips comes on the heels of a larger effort by the IRS to crack down on tip reporting in general, though many feel that this added ruling isn’t going to turn up much in terms of unreported income.

What Restaurants Can Call Tips Versus What Can Be Called Service Charges 

In order for something to be considered a tip, it must be voluntary. The customer has to decide who gets the money. It must also be for an amount entirely set by the customer, not dictated by a company policy. If it is a mandatory fee such as a fixed gratuity, it is considered a service charge, not a tip, and therefore must be processed through payroll rather than being paid out to the server that day.

The Biggest Effects of the New IRS Ruling on Restaurant Operations

The biggest effect of the new IRS ruling is that it will complicate payroll accounting. Larger restaurants may already have the infrastructure to deal with the additional accounting, but smaller establishments may not. Employees who are used to cashing out their tips each day will also be affected, since they will now have to wait until payday to get their bonuses for the larger tables they served.

Some restaurants will deal with the additional accounting and maintain their fixed gratuity policy. Others will do away with a fixed gratuity entirely in favor of a gentle reminder encouraging patrons to tip by putting a “suggested amount” for the tip on the receipt instead.

How Restaurant Operators Should Handle the Policy Change

The best thing you can do to handle this new IRS ruling is to simply talk to your employees. Let them know about the details of the new rule and that it’s coming from the government, not you. Ask for their feedback about what might be the best way to handle gratuities for large parties, now that fixed gratuities are no longer allowed to be considered tips. The choices are to either keep letting servers take home large party tips that same night (but let them risk getting under-tipped), or to keep the fixed gratuity as a service charge that then doesn’t allow employees to take home the bonuses until their next paychecks. Talk over the options with your staff and see how they feel about both choices before making a decision.

Legal Tips for Restaurants Who Wish to Donate Surplus Food

As a restaurateur, you’re well aware of the massive quantities of food that can go to waste at the end of each work day. Aside from the benefit of not letting food go to waste, implementing a food donation strategy can work nicely as a part of your overall charitable works program – giving “feels goods” to you, your consumers, and the community at large.

That said, if you wish to donate excess food from your restaurant, you’ll need to follow specific procedures to do so. It also helps to know the laws which protect and help you. Here are some tips to assist you along the way.

Good Faith Food Donors are Protected from Liability

Millions of pounds of food and groceries go to waste every year. The Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act was signed into law in 1996 to protect would-be food donors from liability so that food can go to people rather than landfills. The law specifically protects you from liability when you donate to a non-profit organization and from civil and criminal liability should the product donated in good faith later cause harm to the recipient. The only exceptions to this protection occur in cases of gross negligence or intentional misconduct.

Restaurants can Donate both Perishable and Non-Perishable Foods

While it’s no surprise that unopened or canned food can be donated to food banks and distribution centers, you may be pleasantly surprised to know that prepared perishable foods can be donated as well – as long as appropriate steps are taken. Those appropriate steps include proper handling according to the U.S. Food Code and ServSafe practices and must address restaurant handling, food rescue transportation, and recipient agency storage with regards to thawing and reheating requirements.
As the donating restaurant, your job is to hold the would-be food donation at a temperature higher than 140 degrees until it is ready to donate. At that point, it must be stored in food-safe, sanitized plastic bags or containers, labeled with the date and time of storage, and rapidly cooled to under 41 degrees.
Frozen prepared food should be donated within a week, whereas refrigerated food should be donated within 72 hours. There are a number of food-rescue programs whose sole purpose is to fetch such food from restaurants and distribute it to the appropriate centers – making food donation in the restaurant that much easier.

Tax Deductions for Restaurants Who Donate Food

According to the Internal Revenue Code Section 170(e)(3), you are entitled to a deduction for a contribution to a charitable organization. The Federal Tax Code also provides that wholesome food which is properly saved, donated to a qualified non-profit organization, and accurately documented may be eligible for an incremental deduction (typically the lesser half of the food’s appreciated value). This law is permanent for C-corporations, but has to be extended every two years for non-C corporations.
It’s important to remember that the above information is intended for informative purposes only, and you should definitely consult your attorney to discover any additional information pertinent to your individual situation prior to implementing a food donation program.  That said, it can be done, and if you’re the sort of person who would rather see good food go to people rather than to waste, it’s well worth the time it will take to investigate any additional details.

Methods of Communicating With and Luring In Cautious Customers

Our economy over the last several years has created a lot of fear and anxiety for both customers and businesses alike. That said, as a restaurant owner it’s important not to cut back on your marketing budget, but rather to simply shift the types of marketing messages you are putting out. Doing so will not only help your retain your customers when the economy shifts, but can actually go a long way toward branding yourself as a positive, responsible establishment which people truly enjoy patronizing.

Shift Your Marketing Message to Reflect the Minds of Your Customers

Even after the recession lifts, customers are unlikely to return to the willy-nilly spending habits of years gone past. That said, a reduced price on your menu items is far from the only (or even the best) way to catch your customers’ attention. In fact, you need to be careful about marketing based on discounted price points, or you may forever relegate your establishment to being associated with ‘cheap’.

A smarter way of marketing to your more cautious customer base happens when you not only acknowledge their mindset, but also give messages that resonate with them in a positive way. Rather than making your message just about price (which can inadvertently remind customers of how hard up they feel), it’s smarter to emphasize value.

For example, you could draw their attention to menu items which could serve as two meals allowing them the convenience of not having to deal with tomorrow’s meal prep. Or, you could emphasize the opportunity to spend more quality time with the family by eating out, rather than having to waste that time on shopping, cooking, and cleaning.

Emphasize Responsibility in Your Marketing Messages

Given our economic circumstances, the word ‘responsibility’ is particular resonate with the average consumer. Gone are the days of gaudy extravagances and in their place consumers want less excess and more discipline and sustainability from both themselves and the businesses they patronize.

When you consider a ‘marketplace of responsibility’, picture upscale styles and experiences delivered with moderation and class. Going ‘local’ is one way to demonstrate your commitment to responsible practices, and is something that many consumers consider when making their choices about where to eat and shop.

Get Creative with Your Marketing Appeal

There are numerous ways that you can creatively appeal to your newly cautious consumers. Aside from simply providing positive (don’t remind them of the bad times), responsible and value-based marketing messages, you can also appeal to your customers’ need to have some control in terms of both finances and food choices. Letting customers order the portion sizes they want, being flexible about what they can substitute, and showing them how to find better value in your menu all serve to give customers feelings of comfort and control and end up creating loyalty to your establishment.

The take home message here is that while today’s economic situation does dictate some changes in behavior, the opportunity to attract more cautious consumers still exists through the appeal of value, experience, and quality.

Innovations in Chicken Wing Processing

Whether you call them hot wings, Buffalo wings, or simply plain old chicken wings, these tasty treats are absolutely a staple of the American diet – especially in the casual dining and retail ready-to-eat sectors. Just to underscore how truly popular chicken wings are with the populace, one only has to take a look at how many chicken wings are consumed during, say, the Super Bowl.

It was estimated that during the last Super Bowl event, Americans consumed a whopping 1 billion chicken wings over the course of the weekend alone! Wings also happen to be the priciest part of the chicken, up 14% since 2011.

Improvements That Make Offering Chicken Wings on the Menu More Lucrative

The last few years have marked vast improvements for the poultry industry. Along with increased efficiency and better management practices, carcass sizes have vastly increased due to improved genetics. Predictably, chicken wing sizes have gotten bigger and meatier as well. In fact, it is estimated that more than 30% of the market is harvesting chickens over six pounds – with 18% over eight pounds.

Aside from the increased quantity of meat that these larger chicken wings produce, the increased sizes have the added benefit of allowing the use of more efficient and automated processing technology as well. The larger size of today’s modern chickens allows the wing to be cut into three sections (the tip, mid-section, and the drumette).

The ability to segment wings in this way is particularly beneficial to restaurants, who typically serve wings by the piece rather than by the pound. As a result, the segmentation process is something most restaurants are willing to pay a little extra for.

Differing Types of Innovative Processing for Chicken Wings

Segmenting the wing into its three key parts can be done through a variety of different automated processing techniques. One style is the overhead in-line wing cutting system. The wings are first stretched and cut into sections before the rest of the carcass is cut up. This system has the added benefit of creating very uniform cuts. The downside of this style is that removing the wings doesn’t leave anything for the machine to grab on to in order to chop up the rest of the carcass.

Another style of automated wing segmentation is the wing portioner. This is a small, stand-alone system that requires manual feeding and positioning of the wings into the machine. The circular saw then portions the wings into its segments. This is a very space saving option, but has the downside of needing the handler to position the wings properly in order to get the right cut.

Problems to Watch For as a Result of Wing Segmentation

There are a few issues to watch for if you opt for wings which have been segmented in this way. The first is that if the wing is not positioned properly in the machine, bone and bone marrow end up getting exposed. If the bone cap is removed, the meat ends up shrinking around the bone during cooking and can result in a health hazard to the consumer.

The other problem with bone marrow is that it contains a lot of heavy metals such as iron.  These heavy metals can cause increased rates of oxidation (even in frozen wings), thereby reducing shelf life.

The final consideration in all of this is the need to buy wings which are uniformly sized in order to avoid a potential health hazard, since different sizes demand different cooking times in order to destroy pathogens.

The end result of all of the innovations in processing and segmenting technology is quite simply to supply the public with the copious amounts of chicken wings that they demand. Restaurants should consider wing sizes as an important factor in being able to serve the public with their insatiable appetite for chicken.

Savvy Cost Control for Restaurant Operators

As a restaurant operator, you are well aware of the sometimes too narrow profit margin that exists in the food service industry. With rising costs of food and transportation, it’s more important than ever to control your costs wherever possible. Fortunately, there are several savvy strategies you can employ to do just that. Here’s a sample of what other restaurants around the country are doing to help them manage their bottom line.

Control Costs by Managing Your Workforce more Effectively

Aside from the cost of your goods and merchandise, payroll and management of your employees ends up being one of the biggest operating expenses. Fortunately, there are several things you can do to cut costs in this area. For example, setting time standards for your kitchen, bar, and serving staff can go a long way toward making the valuable ‘third seating’ available and turning a profit. The ideal is for customers to be seated, fed, and exiting the establishment within a 45 minute to one hour time frame.

Being clear about your expectations with your staff regarding how much time they have to fulfill their duties ensures smooth operating and increased revenue. Cross-training your staff wherever possible is useful as well because it not only enables your employees to fill in for each other and avoid backlog, but it also builds appreciation for their co-workers’ jobs.

Last but not least, consider moving your hiring process online. Doing so reduces both hiring costs and the amount of paperwork you have to deal with. You can pre-screen employees, have them fill out and sign all paperwork electronically, and even see if they are eligible for a federal tax credit.

Monitoring Energy and Resource Use Cut Costs Drastically

One of the easiest areas to control costs lies in the implementation of energy and resource efficient equipment and practices. For instance, replacing all of your electric kitchen equipment with gas equipment alone can save you hundreds of dollars a month. Low-flow toilets and faucets will cut your lighting bill, LEDs in place of incandescents will lower the cost of electricity, and smaller portion sizes not only cut your food costs, but serve to reduce waste as well.

Utilizing a company that provides energy conservation technology can make a major difference as well. You can have a wireless system installed that monitors your lighting, HVAC, refrigeration, and power consumption and sends you text messages if it notices even the slightest degree of alteration, allowing you to catch a failing refrigerator for example, before any food spoils.

Looking for Other Innovative Ways to Control Your Restaurant Costs

Spending a little time thinking of creative ways to control the cost of doing business can have great pay-offs as well. For example, say you haven’t been able to take advantage of bulk liquor costs because you don’t have enough storage space to hold it. Run the numbers and see if perhaps renting a small additional storage space nearby would allow you to take advantage of bulk pricing and still make a profit.

Sourcing your local community for goods can help cut costs as well – you can often get a better deal from a small, local provider than you can from your corporate standbys.

The important thing to keep in mind when looking for cost-cutting options is not to trim costs in areas which affect guests, but rather to look for behind the scenes opportunities that save your pennies but don’t affect the quality of your guests’ experience in your establishment.

Restaurant Profits: How Close Are You Watching Your Numbers?

Although your restaurant’s food, services, and location certainly factor into its success, what ultimately determines whether it lives or dies is whether it does or does not make a profit. Now, this may seem an obvious statement, but it bears consideration.

The skills that are required to run a successful restaurant are quite different from those needed to create a successful business. The operators who measure and monitor their costs and profit margins closely, on top of maintaining a high quality of food and service, are the ones that end up succeeding in the restaurant industry.

It’s Your Numbers More Than Your Food, Which Determines Your Restaurant’s Success

Regular review of essential metrics such as your profit-and-loss (P&L) statement, your balance sheets, and your cash flow statements is what will tell you whether or not you are truly making money. Keeping a careful eye on these reports also has the added benefit of drawing your attention to areas in your operations which may need tweaking and gives you the opportunity to make needed changes before these misalignments become real problems.

Aside from showing you how well you’re doing, analysis of your numbers is also the only way that you can hope to control your costs – which is fundamental to success in today’s business environment.

How Weekly Review of Your P&L Summary Can Make All the Difference

Of all the metrics available, the P&L statement could be considered the most valuable because it represents the end result of all of your efforts – from operations to marketing to controlling your costs. Many operators find it instructive to review a summary P&L every week so they can see at a glance how the restaurant is performing and take quick action is anything is amiss.

The four key numbers to keep a watch on are your sales, prime cost (total cost of food/beverage/merchandise plus payroll), controllable income (sales minus prime cost and any other controllable expenses you may have), and net income. How a restaurant manages their prime cost in particular often indicates whether the business will succeed or fail, and as such, it can be additionally helpful to break your prime cost into columns of controllable and uncontrollable expenses so that you know exactly where and how you can takes measures to correct problem areas.

Sharing Your P&L with Staff Decreases Food and Labor Costs as Well

Furthermore, a weekly review of your P&L has the added benefit of increasing awareness and accountability of your staff. When everyone can see how they’ve done each week, the kitchen staff becomes more conscious of their inventory levels, management becomes more aware of scheduling staff efficiently, and so on.

Some restaurants have even gone so far as to implement a reward system to their employees for surpassing performance benchmarks, which can be yet another way that regular review of your numbers can serve you.

All in all, the restaurant industry is incredibly complex – it’s part retail, part manufacturer and it’s got a thousand moving parts that all have to work in unison to allow a business to thrive. As a result, generic accounting isn’t going to cut it. With profit margins as narrow as they can be, you’ve got to keep a careful eye on your cash flow to succeed, and to do that, you’ve got to keep a finger on the pulse of your numbers!

What Today’s Consumers Want: Personable, Human Experiences and a Reason to Give Loyalty

Technology can have a wonderfully effective application in the restaurant industry. In fact, we explored a few such applications in a recent post. However, before we get too excited about installing all the latest tech advances, it’s important to keep in mind that technology can also create an experience that is rather cold and impersonal for the consumer, which can actually end up inhibiting your relationship rather than building it.

People Want Personable Experiences, Not Cold Transactions

In fact, according to the Futures Company, 81% of today’s consumers say that companies are becoming too inhuman and impersonal when it comes to connecting with their customers. If you think for a moment about your standard interactions in the checkout line of any given store, you’ll see an obvious example of this in action. How often do you even make eye contact with your clerk, let alone make any personable conversation? Most of us are so busy answering the numerous questions we get from the credit or debit card machine in front of us that we barely even notice the person facilitating the exchange.

The important thing to recognize is that even though people appreciate the conveniences technology has to offer, they still want to make a human connection with the businesses they interact with.

Don’t Let Your Restaurant Fall Prey to ‘Transactional Coldness’

While the restaurant industry has some inherent guards against this phenomenon of ‘transactional coldness’ due to the fact that at least some level of personal interaction is generally required to take orders and deliver food, this effect can still creep in if you’re not on guard. Watch out for over-stressed or under-engaged staff slipping into robotic scripts, even on greetings and goodbyes.

Guests are also getting quite sensitive to being given a ‘sales pitch’ which can feel like you’re just trying to get more money out of them. Instead, upselling is best done only as a result to understanding the needs and expectations of the guest.

This need for a personal connection extends to employees as well. Staff wants to connect with supervisors on a personal level as well, and facilitating this connection drastically improves an employee’s sentiment about the business – which, in turn, facilitates the consumer experience at your establishment.

Technology and Good Old Fashioned Hospitality Should Co-Exist in the Restaurant

While technology can be useful on the levels of gathering better data about your consumers and staying connected with them when they aren’t physically in your establishment, it’s not a substitute for truly listening and learning about the people who are supporting your business. That goal can only be achieved by good old fashioned hospitality techniques such as knowing your customers by name, greeting them with eye contact, a warm handshake, and sincerely trying to make a personal connection with them.

The bottom line is that it is the quality of your interaction with your customer that makes or breaks your relationship with them. The ideal is to have a successful marriage between the conveniences of technology and the personable feeling of warm hospitality. Businesses that can make this marriage successful are then able to leverage the advantages of both worlds.

Leveraging Social Media and Mobile Apps in the Restaurant

Everyone knows that social media campaigns can be powerful tools to build your reputation and brand loyalty. Most people are also aware of the ever-increasing role smartphones play in helping potential customers locate businesses and decide whether or not to give them their patronage.

What many businesses are struggling with is the creation of a successful campaign that harnesses these technologies effectively. Not everyone uses mobile tech yet and social media campaigns can be difficult to obtain meaningful metrics from, making it difficult to determine if your return on investment makes your effort worthwhile. Nonetheless, you can’t afford to ignore the potential that either of these technologies offers in terms of customer engagement and the building of brand loyalty. Here are a few things to keep in mind.

Using Social Media Properly Starts With Understanding What It’s Really For

Getting social media to be an effective tool for your business has a lot to do with how you use the technology. The number one mistake that businesses make with social media is taking too strong of a ‘sales’ approach in their attempts to connect with customers. The key point to keep in mind about social media is that it’s meant to be a social platform.  This means that people are using it because they want to connect and share personal experiences with others; they’re not using it so they can be blasted with advertisements and haggled about buying something.

As a business, the best approach to social media is to think about it as a tool to make friends with your customers. It’s a platform where it’s O.K., even expected, to be less formal and more friendly.  Posts should be value-oriented, delivering information you know your customers would be excited to have.

Your posting frequency matters too. In fact, a recent study in the Restaurant Social Media Index 2012 Consumer Report found that brands who published more than six promotional posts per week, had an opt-out rate of 8% from social customers!

The Power of Images in Social Media

Sometimes one good image can be a far more powerful tool to catch people’s attention than any number of text posts could ever be.  Images also have a longer staying power in people’s minds. Think, for instance, how much more likely you will be to remember that such and such restaurant is running a lunch time special on burgers if you actually see a picture of said burger looking totally delectable beforehand.  Platforms like Pinterest, YouTube, and Instagram can be particularly powerful tools toward this end, since they are image-focused and shares are user-driven. Mobile platforms such as Yelp and FourSquare have recently beefed up their image sharing capacities as well, adding to the increased importance of images in restaurant marketing campaigns.

Mobile Apps That Build Restaurant Loyalty and Engagement

Given the increasing use of smartphones and mobile technology, it would be folly not to at least have a mobile version of your website enabled. Even better, build a free mobile app that your customers can download to their devices to stay in constant touch.

Several restaurants are using this technology is very effective ways. Krispy Kreme, for example, has an app that alerts users anytime their ‘hot now’ sign is on at their favorite Krispy Kreme location, allowing people to know exactly when they can show up and get their favorite doughnuts freshly baked and piping hot. Denny’s recently ran a mobile campaign where they gave users a digital ‘badge’ each time they ate at a new Denny’s location. The first user to visit a Denny’s in all 50 states was given free Grand Slam breakfasts for life.

These are just a few examples of how you can utilize mobile technology to inspire engagement and loyalty from your customers. If social media and mobile technology is not yet a well-developed aspect of your marketing campaigns, now is as good a time as any to leverage these technologies to your advantage.