The constant tug-of-war fight between the old and the new is a familiar feature of the 21st century. The newest addition to this debate is the digital versus paper menu dispute.
A digital menu is convenient, easy to maintain, and combines all your needs in one place. However, some customers might prefer using traditional menus because of its familiarity.
As a restaurant owner, it can be hard to decide if you should switch to digital or stay where you are. Here are a few ideas that might help you make the decision.
Digital Menus are Easy to Customize
Paper menus are tedious.
Making changes to a paper menu is slow and expensive. As a restaurateur, if you want to edit your menu, you will probably have to print new menus. This can end up being very expensive. If you’re like a few other restaurant owners, instead of printing new menus, you might decide to cross out the item from all of your menus at the cost of seeming unprofessional.
If you decide to do none of these, then you’re probably on your way to crush your customers’ hearts when during the ordering process, you tell them that the double cheeseburger they specifically came for is no longer served at your restaurant.
Digital menus are very effective alternatives in this regard. It’s easy to remove and add things to your menu. This is very helpful in the long run, so you can avoid having to reprint all of your menus.
Additionally, it is a great asset in terms of day-to-day functioning. You’re out of vanilla ice cream for the day? No problem! Just remove vanilla ice cream from your menu with a click.
Leverage Effective Upselling
You can automatically upsell food items to your customers based on their clicks and items that are already in their cart. Automated upselling has shown to increase sales by 12-22%.
Algorithmically calculated suggestions will give your customers the final push they need to purchase that double chocolate brownie they were previously debating about for several minutes in their head.
Design Your Food to Look Better
With a digital menu, you have the option of adding mouth-watering pictures with every food item. Pictures serve two important purposes.
One, they make it easier for the customer to visualize what their order will look like, which accelerates the ordering process. Customers know exactly what they’re ordering and consequently know exactly what to expect.
Second, attractive pictures of food can tempt your customers to buy more. Visual cues are really important to the ways humans conceptualize the world. So, adding photos of specific food items will trigger the desire for these specific dishes in your customers’ minds.
Know Your Customers Will Adapt
One of the biggest concerns that come with transitioning to digital menus is your customers’ ability to use them. This idea stems from this misconception that the older generation will have trouble navigating these menus. However, a study has shown that almost 70 percent of people ages 65 and older are connected to the Internet.
In addition to this, most older people have access to smartphones and televisions. These types of technology are making these generations more comfortable with using technology and working with digital screens.
Do not underestimate your customers! Our seniors are adapting to the new way of the world, and so should you.
Digital Menus: The Winner
In this battle of traditional versus technology, digital menus offer a variety of advantages that are almost impossible to attain with traditional paper menus.
Digital menus are a clear winner in this race.
