“We believe that a restaurant's database is more than just a list of names—it's a recipe for success. By harnessing the power of data, restaurants can personalize their marketing, drive customer loyalty, and stay ahead of the curve in an ever-changing industry.”

- Quad J Creative Group

Recipe for Resilience

In the fast-paced world of restaurants, success often hinges on staying one step ahead of the competition. While delicious food and top-notch service are essential ingredients, there's another element that can make or break a restaurant's success: a robust customer database.

Why Are Restaurant Customer Databases So Important?

Simply put, having your own customer database to market to means you don’t have to pay for – or rely on – someone else’s email list or advertising platform.

Without your own list of customers, if you need a boost in business you are going to have to rent an email list or pay for advertising.

While this seems like a viable alternative, these lists can be shockingly expensive.

Likewise, you’ll have to pay them again to send more messages. If your business is already in need of more revenue, this option just doesn’t make sense.

Also, many of these lists are built without receiving permission from the contacts themselves. They have not “opted in” to the list.

Sending a message to a list like this can land you and your business in a bad position. These contacts will be much less likely to trust your restaurant.

With business reputation so important in today’s restaurant industry, taking any type of hit in terms of reputation can directly correlate to a decrease in revenue.

They also often report your mail as spam to your email provider. When this happens, your email provider may suspend emailing from your account.

On top of sending unwanted emails to an expensive third-party list, having your own customer list will save on advertising costs. If you have your own (free) list to market to, you won’t be forced to pay for advertising online, or in your local offline community. 

How Can a Restaurant Customer Database Help When Times Are Tough?

As discussed above, having your own database of customers can save on costs. Likewise, it can also become a powerful security blanket during tough times.

Sometimes government regulations can create a tremendous burden on your business. Other times the economy is simply down, and consumer spending declines.

Whatever the reason, there will be times when you need to get your brand in front of your customers’ eyes.

For instance, when the Coronavirus outbreak occurred, restaurants were forced to close their doors to on-premise dining. Those with a large restaurant customer database were able to quickly pivot their messaging to delivery and curbside-related marketing. They were able to let their customer know that they were offering free delivery, curbside pickup or packaged meals for freezing, or even a free roll of toilet paper with every order.

This allowed these restaurants to maintain a revenue stream while countless thousands of other restaurants were closing for business.

Let’s discuss exactly what a customer database is and how it can be used whether times are tough or not.

What Is A Restaurant Customer Database? 

Restaurant customer databases are digital lists of customer names, email addresses, phone numbers and even postal codes. Each individual customer’s collection of information is referred to as a customer profile.

They can also include demographic information such as age, birthday, and gender. Additionally, they can include customer behavior data and spending habits.

Traditionally, building customer profiles was a time-consuming process. It involved customers filling out customer comment cards or having wait-staff collect the information one person at a time. Building a customer database was slow, expensive, and many times contained incorrect information such as wrong email addresses.

Most restaurant owners and operators simply gave up.

Fortunately, there is a solution that will completely automate your customer profile data collection.

Without lifting a finger you will be generating a huge customer database you can use for restaurant marketing campaigns.

And it can be an invaluable tool in emergency situations or when times are tough. More on this below.

What Data Is In A Customer Database? 

Restaurant customer databases can only be as effective as the data contained in each customer profile.

In other words, if you only collect names and email addresses, your marketing campaigns will be very limited in terms of segmentation, targeted messaging, and ROI.

On the other hand, if you know a customer’s birthday, age and gender, you can send them much more appropriate messages that are more interesting and engaging.

Likewise, if you know their behavior data, such as what times or days they visit your restaurant, you can target your messaging even further.

Compared to mass-messaging, targeted and personalized messaging has proven to be much more effective. The more targeted, the higher the ROI.

Here are the data that the QJCG SaaS collects for you.

Demographic Data

• Customer Name – with the customer’s name, you can personalize your messaging. For instance, instead of starting your message with “Hello!” you can say “Hello James!” instead.

• Contact Information – this is obviously the most important of the data points. With an email or phone number, you can send emails and texts with your targeted messages.

• Age, Birthday, and Gender – this data will allow you to further target your messaging. For instance, you can send a promotional message to women over 35, while sending a completely different message to men under 35. Likewise, you can automate the sending of a birthday message.

The Importance of Why a Restaurant or Any Business Should Have a Database

To keep track of customer data It is essential to have a database to keep track of customer data. This data can include contact information, preferences, bookings, and payments. A well-structured and managed database allows organizations to provide better customer service by having all of this information readily available. Additionally, databases can help organizations implement target marketing and promotional activity more effectively. To help businesses run more efficiently Having all the relevant information stored in one place allows staff to access it when needed quickly. This can save time and effort, especially during busy periods. In addition, databases can help to automate tasks such as reservations and payments, and improve operational efficiency in order to make better decisions.