The pandemic has been rough on many businesses. Quick Service Restaurants (QSRs) and fast-food chains have also suffered greatly because of the pandemic. Covid-19 made it impossible for diners to have a dine-in experience. Restaurants had to come up with engaging ways to keep their businesses alive in this highly competitive market.
Covid-19 gave rise to the popularity of the curbside pickup. It was a lifeline for the restaurant owners to save their business from the pandemic. From the customer’s side, it was a safe, quick, and hassle-free way to get their orders. Seemingly the perfect win-win situation for both restaurant owners and customers.
The technology that made curbside pickup work so well is digital signage. QSRs and fast-food chains relied heavily on digital signage to inform customers about their orders. This signage made it easier for customers to understand the delivery time of their order. Digital signage saved many QSRs and fast-food restaurants from going out of business due to the pandemic.
What Makes Digital Signage So Great?
Because of the popularity of drive-thrus, digital signage was already on the rise before the pandemic hit. More and more restaurants incorporated digital signage and menu boards as using them had a great positive impact on the business. When the pandemic hit, the investment in digital signage went down as restaurants began to operate with losses initially. After the initial shock of the pandemic had surpassed, restaurant owners were quick to realize that digital signage was essential to attract customers and ensure great customer service. Investment in digital signage started increase dramatically.
Modern technology has revolutionized many businesses. Digital signage is something that has resulted in happier customers and ensured more revenue for restaurant owners. Digital signage is great for a number of reasons. Let’s take a look at some of them:
Attract and Inform Customers
Digital signage is great for restaurants to advertise their specials. Restaurants can promote their menus and special offers using digital signage. Digital menu boards do a great job of attracting customers. They are loaded with high-definition graphics and the menu is presented in the best way possible. The menu is made appealing to the customers by using vibrant colors.
It’s also easier for the customers to sort through the menu quickly. In terms of curbside pickup and drive-thru services, it is easier for customers to know about their waiting time. Digital signage takes a lot of guesswork out of the way for both employees and customers.
Quick Flexibility
If you need to make any changes to the menu, you can do so easily by using digital signage. Compare this with the traditional menus. You would have to make the changes and print several copies of it. But with digital signage, all you need to do is change the graphic and load it on the system.
As digital signage is basically a screen, you have a wide variety of options in what you want to show the customers. You can show your menu, specials, or wish a customer happy birthday. Whatever you want to load on that screen, you can do that with digital signage.
For example, there is a restaurant called Matt’s Chicago Dog that uses signage to switch the daytime menu and the evening menu. The signage is programmed to change the menu every day at 4.00 p.m. Isn’t that awesome? That is the power of digital signage.
Saves Money
Digital signage is a surefire way for you to save money in the long run. We have all seen the popularity of tabletop tablets and kiosks. They are a great way for customers to navigate the menu and make an order themselves without the intervention of any live server.
This eliminates your need of having an employee. Another cool thing about kiosks is that customers tend to spend more money when they are ordering by self-service. Kiosks are likely to bring you more revenue and it saves you the cost of an employee at the same time.
Efficiency
Delivery speed is highly important when it comes to QSRs. If you can ensure faster delivery time, you have a clear competitive edge over your competitors. Digital signage is highly efficient. This is the main reason why they are so popular and widely used. It eliminates the need for any human intervention and also results in a better customer experience.
Digital signage plays a great role in guiding the customers to the right counters. They are great for maintaining a steady workstream in restaurants. Customers have a clear idea of where to collect the food and where to pay because of this signage.
Customers love kiosks as it makes the process of ordering easier for them. It reduces the waiting time and it also doesn’t require the customers to stand in the back of a long queue to get their order.
If we go back to our Matt’s Chicago Dog example, we can see that the staff doesn’t need to change the daytime menu to the evening menu. Once the program has been enabled, it will be changed on its own. Changing the menu is one less thing for the staff to worry about.
Digital Signage is Here to Stay
As the sales of digital signage grew with the pandemic, a lot of people may think that this is only a temporary solution for the restaurants to operate their business in the middle of the pandemic. But that is not the case. For all the reasons stated earlier, it is clear that digital signage plays a huge role in improving customer experience and generating more revenue.
Digital signage is going to stay for sure and we will see more and more businesses incorporating them in the future. There are about 235,000 fast-food chains in the United States alone and only a small percentage of them are digital. That goes to show that it is an underserved market and it will be growing in the future.
Digital signage will serve as a great way to gain a competitive advantage over your customers as you can use them to attract more customers, make the ordering process efficient and save money at the same time.
