How to add $200,000 to your restaurants top line with email marketing

Email marketing is the number one way for restaurants to grow their revenue.

Bold statement, right!

But it’s true.

And the reason that restaurants have a big advantage over other hospitality businesses, like many cafes, is their online booking system.

Set up right, and a restaurant’s online booking system harvests the email addresses of their valued customers, which allows you to communicate with them on an ongoing basis.

I’ve worked with restaurants with more than 20,000 people on their databases, just imagine the cost of speaking to 20,000 people back in the days of paid advertising.

But despite this, restaurateurs still struggle to see the value in email marketing.

But with weekly, well-written emails that give VALUE back to the customer, here is exactly how you can grow your restaurant’s revenue with email marketing.

Let’s say that you’re a restaurateur and your average cover is $85 a head…stick with me here, this is a journey.

You see you have a need period on a Tuesday night, so you send out a last minute value add offer of a glass of champagne with your set menu. 8 customers take you up on that and all bring a friend. There’s $1360. You think, that was nice, I’m going to send a similar offer every time Tuesdays are looking a little sad. Across 10 email sends, you’ve made $13,600.

You decide to run a wine dinner in collaboration with a local winery. You send out an email, 60% of the availability sells out, you bump the same email three days later to those who didn’t open the first email, the new headline catches more attention and you sell out your dinner. With 65 covers at your special event price of $120 per cover, you’ve just made $7 800 in top line revenue. You’re feeling pretty stoked with that and decide to host a bimonthly collab dinner of various themes. Each dinner sells out through your email marketing efforts and you’ve made $46,800 in the course of the year.

You start running a birthday promotion with an enticing offer to encourage tables of 6 or more for celebrations. Throughout the year, 80 people take up the offer, bringing 5 of their friends at $85 a cover and you’ve added $40,800 to your top line. With the right email marketing tech, this email was automated so it doesn’t even count in the 52 emails you were sending this year…winning!

You start building the narrative of your business. The passion and people behind your food. Each time you tell a piece of your personal story, it resonates with 8 people who decide to book a table for them and a friend,. It worked so well you decide to send a story-telling style email 10 times a year. That's 120 covers representing $13,600 in revenue.

You have a photoshoot of your newest dishes, they look so delicious that you send your database an email to tell them about the new menu. 16 people thought they also looked delicious and booked a table for them and a friend, that’s 32 covers. New items appear on your menu monthly, so you send this style of email 12 times a year, that’s $32,640 in revenue.

You put together a corporate lunch menu to encourage Christmas parties. In the lead up to Christmas, you send 3 emails on this topic and attract 6 groups of an average of 14 covers per group. That’s $7,140 in additional revenue.

You bring back an all time favourite dish that disappeared from your menu years ago. People are pumped to see an old fave back and 20 people bring a friend to come and have their fave dish. You decide to do that 3 times a year, that's $10,200 in revenue.

You have a new award-winning cocktail bartender on staff. He creates a new cocktail menu, so you email your database and you land 32 covers. That’s $2720. You decide to shake up your cocktail menu 6 times a year, each time promoting it to your database, that’s $16,320.

You host a popular guest executive chef for a night. Your email database is thrilled to be the first to hear about it, it sells out overnight and fills the restaurant. 65 covers at your event pricing with wine pairings of $160 per cover, there’s $10 400. You do that twice in the year and you’ve nailed $20,800 in topline revenue.

That’s your 52 emails per year, you’ve added $201,900 to your top line.

Sounds pretty good right…