Navigating the competitive landscape of restaurant delivery services can be challenging for small business owners. Knowing which dishes are popular among customers and using this information to craft an effective marketing strategy can make all the difference.
In this article, we’ll examine how leveraging popular delivery items can improve your marketing efforts, attract customers, and grow your business. Let’s dive in and discover how to capitalize on these culinary favorites to strengthen your delivery service.
The top delivery favorites
A lot of the Big Three restaurant delivery services release year-end reports about which foods are most popular. FinanceBuzz even did a mashup list!
There’s some variation between the lists, but there are a half dozen foods that appear to be consistently popular:
- Burritos and burrito bowls.
- French fries.
- Pad thai.
- Cheeseburgers
- Any variation on chicken nuggets, chicken tenders, and chicken sandwiches.
- California rolls.
As a restaurant delivery service (RDS) owner, there are a few key action items for you here:
Use these lists to target new restaurant partnerships.
Does your RDS deliver every item on the above list?
Take a look at what’s popular and see which of those items you don’t yet offer. You might make it your goal to partner up with a restaurant that specializes in those items.
For example, you might work with three different burger places and not a single Thai restaurant. Find the best pad thai in town and strike up a partnership. (And maybe consider whether you really need to add a fourth burger place to your lineup.)
Pay attention to local preference.
A few years back, Eater released a list of the most popular delivery items in every state. While this list may seem outdated, it underlines the importance of local preferences.
For example, let’s say you are thinking about finding a Thai restaurant to partner with. That may be a great strategy in Nebraska or Oklahoma, where Chinese food is popular. But if you’re in Iowa, your customers might be more excited about gyros.
Build a marketing campaign around these popular items.
The purpose of any marketing campaign is to create demand for something—in this case, restaurant delivery. If you already know what people are most likely to want, the hard part is already done! Now you can just have fun getting people to take one more step toward actually placing an order.
It’s worth taking some time to brainstorm marketing ideas. For example, you could ask people to vote on the best cheeseburger in town. Share your favorite pad thai place. Make a french fry scavenger hunt.
Think about campaigns that have made you smile in the past and what triggers you to buy. Steal that idea and make it your own.
Pay attention to your own best sellers.
You probably have both hard data and anecdotal evidence regarding what’s popular for your RDS. Maybe your customers love something totally different than the majority of Americans. (After all, the good people of Wisconsin order cheese curds more than any other menu item.) When you know what your own customers really want, you can design your business around that.
Social media magic:
Enhance your online presence by sharing appetizing photos of popular delivery items, creating interactive content such as polls, and hosting engaging contests. Your social media engagement will boost brand awareness and get customers craving your dishes.
Tempting deals and promotions:
Draw in customers by offering limited hours discounts or exclusive offers tied to popular delivery items. Creating a sense of urgency can encourage both new and loyal customers to take advantage of your restaurant delivery service.
Team up with local influencers:
Collaborate with food bloggers and social media influencers in your area to spread the word about your service. Genuine content featuring your popular dishes can expand your reach and lend credibility to your restaurant delivery service.
Connect with your community:
Get involved in local events, sponsor sports teams, or join forces with other local businesses to solidify your community ties. Demonstrating your commitment to the area will help build goodwill and bring in more customers.
Polish your online presence:
Keep your website and online listings current and user-friendly. Showcase popular delivery items, use high-quality images, and make sure your menu and contact info are easy to find. Employ SEO best practices to climb search engine rankings and boost visibility.
Launch a loyalty program:
Keep customers coming back by rewarding them for using your restaurant delivery service. Design a loyalty program centered around popular delivery items, like offering a free dish after a certain number of orders, to keep customers hooked.
Refine your marketing strategy:
Regularly track your marketing campaigns’ performance to pinpoint the most effective tactics for promoting popular delivery items. Be ready to adjust your approach based on data, and experiment with new strategies to optimize your marketing efforts and drive growth.
–
Whether you prioritize popular dishes or not, you can count on DataDreamers to make delivery easy. Our premium food delivery software is competitively priced while still providing the features you need to provide a seamless experience. From integrated payment to easy menu updating and current timeline estimates,
To learn more about DataDreamers, schedule a demo >