Digital menu boards have been proven to be a success. They look better, are easier to operate, and they give much better results than regular menu boards. Once you know what these tools can, do it is hard not to want them in your restaurant. The digital menu boards are versatile; you can use them to display content in different ways to achieve whatever your goal is. The menu boards are also more entertaining and easier on the customers' eyes. Regular menu boards pale in comparison being able to accommodate the updating of the menu on a daily basis. Electronic menu boards are not only information providers, but they are also marketing tools among other things. If you want to boost the performance of your restaurant, facilitate a pleasant experience for your customers and be able to display your menu in creative ways, then these are your best bet.
The Benefits of Having Digital Menu Boards in Your Restaurant
The digital menu board is unlike any other menu boards that have been conventionally used. They make the entire restaurant light up, and they display the meal options in a much more exciting way than we have been used to in the past. The appealing look that they give your menu options helps to convince customers to spend their money. We all know that food has to do with what you see, smell and taste. Therefore you want a method that will influence sales by appealing to the senses; digital menu boards are the perfect tools to achieve this.
They not only provide the customers with information. They also add influence to the information process. Merely looking at an engaging display to see the menu will do a great job at subconsciously affecting your decisions. They also help to decrease customer wait time by making decisions easier for them which makes the order process quicker and the order lines shorter. Finally, they improve the ambience of your restaurant which goes a long way in creating recurring customers and making customers want to sit in your restaurant for more extended periods. The more time that a customer spends in your restaurant is the more potential that there is in upselling to that customer.
Ways to Use Your Digital Menu Boards
Use your menu boards to share new products
New products are an excellent way to keep your restaurant relevant and thus increase revenue. You can choose to offer new menu items that are for a limited time or decide to make it a permanent item on your menu. Either way, once you start offering a new product, you will need to promote it to your customers for it to be a hit. For some customers, new products seem exciting, and they want to give it a try right away. However with some customers, new products are sometimes difficult to pitch to them, they need a little more convincing and some influence. There is no better method to influence a customer to buy food than displaying the information on a digital menu board. The electronic menu boards will not only make the food seem like a must-try, but they will also be the best option to bring attention to the menu item in the first place.
Use it to upsell
On any given day you want to make the most money that you can get from each customer. For many restaurants, one strategy to increase customer spending is through upselling. Upselling is a method in which you attempt to influence the customer to spend more money than they planned to. The customer is usually advised to either get extra menu items like a side dish or get a larger version of what they are buying.
Usually, the persuasion of the buyer is left up to the employee with whom they place their order. Many cashiers and servers are advised to try to upsell products to customers all the time as a part of the company practices. However, digital menu boards can do this task more efficiently than the employees themselves. The digital signage can be used to propose to the customer that there are purchases that offer higher value than others and it can display what those options are. The display does it in a much more straightforward and yet more compelling manner.
Use it to share daily specials
Daily specials serve many purposes for your restaurant. This is an advantageous strategy to try when you want to make good use of excessive inventory or when you want to bring something dynamic to the table for your customers. Whenever you have specials for the day, the aim is to get as many responses as possible by way of sales. Digital menu boards can help you to achieve this. Digital menu boards can help to capture the particular nature of the menu item by highlighting it and setting it apart from the rest of the options. You can use the menu board to promote the item throughout the day to influence customers that it is a must-try.
Use it to display different menus throughout the day
If your restaurant has breakfast, lunch or dinner as separate menus, then digital signage is the perfect solution for your restaurant menu board. The great thing about the digital menu boards is that you have the luxury of changing the menu throughout the day quickly or setting up a system to have it updated throughout the day automatically. You can make these changes within minutes because of how easy it is to get done. Consequently, the restaurant's daily transition from one menu to the other will happen smoothly, and this improves efficiency.
Designing the content for your menu board
Managing your digital menu boards can be quite an exciting task. It can take a little creativity and good judgment. You will need to make decisions on what kind of content you will need to use to get the best results and how you will arrange the content. Based on what you are displaying on the menu board, some strategies will get better conversions than others. For example, you can always choose between animated boards and still images with food display. They both do an excellent job of attracting customers and sales. However, there might be some differences in the results that each of them offers.
Still Content Vs Animated Content
There are two types of content that you use on your boards. You can either use still images to display the products and the menu options, or you can animate the display in many different ways. Static pictures are simple photos and text. Animated content can also be images and writing, but they can be presented in different ways. For example, you can have pictures, and text that glides across the screen, or you can have a display that has been pre-produced, (e.g. an animation showing the different parts of a hamburger being assembled or ingredients being tossed). Both static and animated content have their pros and cons and are ideal to be used for specific display options.
Still Content Is Simpler To Apply
Many restaurants utilize the digital signage to display still images that show the food and outline the menu options. Static images are suitable for showing the menu list since it allows customers to read it without being disturbed. Other benefits that still images provide is that it requires less energy use and it takes a bit less work to do than the animated content. You do not need to make considerations about the type of animated effect that will fit your needs, you just put the image on the screen, and you are good to go. They also create a somewhat clean and orderly menu board that does not have too much going on that might take away from its purpose.
Animated Boards Give Better Results
Stationary images are clean and straightforward, but they might not be the most compelling approach to get results. They are also not necessary when you are displaying images with short headings or when you are displaying the food alone. When those photos remain still, they might not offer much to the customer. In these cases, you might want to use animated images since they come with a little more dynamic look and so are more entertaining. Overall, animated boards score better when it relates to grabbing the attention of the customer and keeping them engaged. They offer something a bit more special for the menu board and so it will provide better results. Here are some characteristics that give them an edge over the static images.
Animated content is more exciting
Static images are less impressive than animated creation. Movement alone catches the eyes a lot quicker than a fixed feature. We are programmed to be more curious about moving things since moving things seem to have much more happening than an image does. Additionally, staring at a still image is a more passive action, and so a customer is less likely to do this than stare at a moving image. Imagine a person that is looking right ahead of them while standing in your restaurant line. Seeing a movement happening in the corner of their eye will grab their attention whereas a still image will not do the same thing. The more engagement the boards get, the better results they provide.
They have more influence
Animated boards also give better results since they are more influential than static images. Moving images brings more life to the foods being displayed. The more action that surrounds the food display, the more it seems like it is genuinely representative of something that the customer can eat. Moving images subconsciously bring the food one step closer to the real thing for the customer. Therefore they are more likely to trigger a response, and this typically results in a purchase.
They are more versatile
Moving images are more versatile than static images. The animated effects can be customized to suit the product being displayed and to influence the response that you need. For example, if you have a promotion you can flash the product continuously across the screen to affect excitement around the product. To upsell, you can create an animated effect that highlights the side dish or a more significant option to the item being displayed. There are many other ideas of effects that you can create to display your menu appropriately.
They show more items in one area
Moving images also get more done than still photos do. They allow you to use one area and display several menu items one after the other. This method works as if the customers were being shown the many options that they have to choose from in person. This strategy works a little better than giving them a menu to read through or showing only one or two still images of the items that are on sale. It works so well because it is simpler for the customer to take in. Whenever our choices are shown more directly, it is easier for us to come to a decision.
Conclusion
No matter how you decide to use them, digital menu boards are overall the best option that you can think of for your restaurant. They offer too many benefits to pass up, and they will most definitely serve many purposes within the establishment for you to get a fantastic return on your investment in them. When you do acquire them, it is always good to consider how you can manage the content in an efficient way to get the best results and this means that you will need to apply static or animated content where appropriate. Static images are suitable for some content but for the most part, the animated content has an edge as it relates to customer interest and conversions. If you are therefore looking for a solution that can help you keep customers engaged and influences their decisions then adding some animation to your display is the way to go.