Push notifications are not a new technology but it’s surprising how few hospitality businesses take advantage of their power.
Push notifications are like text messages, sent from your app, to your customer’s phone in order to bring something to their attention. Whether it is an order update, or a reminder from a calendar, they highlight a specific detail that you would like your customer to pay attention to.
Imagine you are a restaurant owner, taking online orders, and you want to tell certain customers about a flash offer on your menu. Direct mail is too slow and marketing emails may not be seen in time. The happy middle ground is a push notification. It is instant, free, and done correctly, engaging.
Push notifications are easy to personalise with the aim of engaging or re-engaging a customer and can be sent to specific segments of your audience. And the great news? If you work with a company like Preoday for online and mobile ordering, you’ll find push notifications built into your package, for free. Even better, because Preoday gives you complete access to your customer’s data, sending those personalised, timely notifications to select customers is as effective as it is easy.
Content is key. Try and be personal, use the customer’s forename, be friendly and if you are looking to entice a person back after a period of absence, give them an offer on their favourite meal.
Timing is everything. If someone hasn’t visited in a few weeks, but when they have ordered in the past, it’s been around 5pm, then programme your push notification to be sent at 4.45pm for example.
Be relevant. Only send someone reminders if they are true to the customer. You wouldn’t send an update to theatre goers in London about a show in Glasgow if they aren’t likely to attend, would you? If you’re a restaurant, notifying someone that normally orders from a vegetarian menu about ‘Steak Tuesday’ may not be the best course of action.
Make the customer feel special. Send messages that make your offer sound exclusive to them. For example, send a special one-off offer for your most frequent spenders to have champagne with their next visit as a reward for their custom. This can make a huge difference.
Of course, push notifications aren’t always about the marketing message, they are also useful for improving customer service. You can, for example, use notifications to remind a person that their order is ready to collect. When sat at the theatre with a loved one, being able to nip up to the bar, not queue, and collect your food and drink when ready, can truly boost a night out.
Consumers feel very comfortable with push notifications, they welcome them. But there is an art to maximising their impact. Thankfully Preoday’s in-house marketing team is poised to help its clients master that art. Before you know it, you’ll be using push notifications to engage your customers, improving loyalty and bringing in more business than ever before.
If you’re a Preoday client looking to get the most out of push notifications, or a business interested in the Preoday technology platform, get in touch today.
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