There’s no industry quite like the restaurant industry. The social skills, work ethic, and speed that come with being a restaurateur is a job in and of itself. And to increase restaurant sales, you also have to constantly be aware of your bottom line – the number itself, and what’s contributing to that number.
In 2024, industry innovations like delivery represent both a new expense and a new opportunity to increase your sales & revenue.
Delivery platform commissions have become a hot topic over the course of the past year. Managing high commissions on tight margins can feel overwhelming. Fortunately, we’ve begun seeing major delivery platforms restructure commissions in support of restaurants via tiers, sliding scales and more.
The cost of working with third-party delivery platforms is constantly evolving and will likely continue to do so in the future. But as customer behavior shifts towards ordering more food through delivery, it’s an important channel for restaurants like yours to take advantage of.
Delivery is an investment worth making based on recent & continued growth in the space, but if you’re going to commit to delivery, it’s worth optimizing to make your performance as successful as possible.
Increase restaurant sales by leveraging performance data insights
As a restaurant owner, making decisions is a big part of your job, but how many of them are based on data? Let’s think about this: if your restaurant offers delivery, you're already collecting hundreds of pieces of data every day.
You know what your customers order most, you have insight into your average ticket size, peak hours, and more. But to date, you’ve only been able to see a platform-by-platform view. Interesting? Sure. Actionable? Not really.
Say goodbye to spending hours downloading spreadsheets and searching for ways to optimize performance across multiple delivery platforms. Say hello to actionable, holistic, and to-the-point data.
How Otter Analytics can help you grow your delivery business
Otter Analytics turns your performance data from a complicated pile of spreadsheets with conflicting numbers into a visual, actionable dashboard you can access from anywhere at any time.
Think of our Analytics solution as the command center for your delivery business. This tool allows you to track the performance of all your delivery orders across partners in real-time. Simply connect your delivery services, like Uber Eats, Grubhub, and DoorDash, and Otter will unify all your data into a single, easy-to-understand place.
Forget about pulling individual spreadsheets from multiple platforms: now you can get a more holistic, actionable view of your performance to make decisions based on data in the most efficient way possible.
5 reasons you should track your restaurant’s performance… and how Otter can help
Collecting your performance data across locations and platforms is the first step. But growing your business based on that data requires a level of insight that can feel complicated and time-consuming. Otter's Analytics solution is built with restaurant owners in mind! Read on to learn the top 5 ways Otter Analytics can change your business in just a few clicks.
1. Make sure that your investment into multiple delivery platforms results in sales
ROI (Return On Investment: how much you spend versus how much you earn) is one of the most popular metrics in our Analytics solution. Located on the main screen of the platform, restaurants use our ROI tool to gain insight into total sales across multiple delivery platforms, stores, and brands. Delivery’s an investment, we’re here to help you make the most out of it.
2. See what your customers are loving – and not loving – with Menu Management
If you’re offering delivery, you can see your order history. But drawing conclusions from platform-based data alone can be messy and inconclusive. Our Menu Management solution makes tracking menu item performance simple. Menu Management lets you see your most popular dishes based on both total sales and number of orders. This information reveals potential updates you can make to your menu to get more orders.
Perhaps your chicken sandwich isn’t ordered often on-premise, but it's a favorite on delivery. Why not edit your menu to offer a spicy chicken sandwich, chicken sliders, or other variations of the item? Maybe when summer arrives, your caesar salad is ordered more often than your chicken sandwich. No problem! You can easily adjust your menu as things change with a few simple clicks.
3. Gain insight into mistakes that occurred today, so you can minimize lost revenue tomorrow
You’re busy. You’re aware that you had errors or cancelled orders throughout the day, but by the time you get home, you’re more focused on tomorrow than today. We get it. With Otter Analytics, checking your order history has never been easier. Learn why, when, & where you lost money on order errors or cancelled orders at a glance to decrease your lost revenue in the future. Knowing when, where, and why you’re losing money is good for your bottom line, but it’s also beneficial for your ranking on delivery platforms. Delivery platforms use metrics like order errors and cancellations to decide just where you rank within their app. Knowing that 80% of customers place a delivery order from the platform's homepage is worth a look!
4. View your performance in the way that makes the most sense for your restaurant
Data isn't useful unless you have the power to sort and view it in the most impactful means possible for your business. Otter Analytics lets you filter your performance across multiple parameters so you can dig into what’s working and what isn’t.
Do you work with DoorDash, Uber Eats, and Grubhub? Filter your data by platform to review your performance on each individual platform. Do you have multiple locations? Filter & compare performance by location. Want to know if it would be a good idea to offer a brunch menu? Filter by days and hours to identify when you see the most orders and when you could use some new traffic.
Otter's filters allow you to explore performance across delivery platforms, sales, locations, menu items, and more, so you can use your data just the way you need it.
5. Grow your reach and revenue through virtual brands
Now that you have access to all your key data, it's time to make decisions that will help you grow your sales.
Virtual brands are a great option to increase revenue with the resources you already have. You can add virtual brands to your storefront with just a few simple clicks in Otter.
Maybe you offer a couple of vegetarian dishes on your menu that have been very well-received; how about creating a separate vegetarian virtual brand? Perhaps your desserts are very popular and could have their own brand. If you get a lot of orders at dinner but very few during the day, you could consider offering breakfast on weekends or lunchtime menus for local offices.
With Otter, it's easy to experiment with more than one virtual brand to get the most out of your kitchen.
Get started with Otter Analytics
Restaurants, taking advantage of your performance data doesn’t get any easier than with Otter’s Analytics solution. Say goodbye to endless spreadsheets, hours of analysis, and inconclusive reporting. Start improving your delivery performance from a single dashboard today!
