Learn how to keep your restaurant booked from Dina Coventry, an experienced leader in the hospitality industry. She uncovers some {duh} moments that you wish you would've thought of before! These sales management tips are priceless and will help increase your restaurant sales in no time. It's all about numbers right? That is, the number of people you're catering to. Trust us, it's possible to keep your restaurant booked without working any harder!
STEP 1: Use Specialty Menus To Save Time
First things first - Specialty menus. These make your restaurant more efficient and prepared to capture large sales. When looking to improve your restaurant sales management process, this is the number one thing to setup in order to succeed with event planning and/or restaurant catering operations.
STEP 2: Start Allocating Group Friendly Space
Do you have a separate room or a semi private area in your restaurant? If so, this is a great opportunity to improve your sales strategy! USE IT. And don't forget to know your capacities before booking events, as this helps groups decide on your restaurant space with ease. Allocating space in your restaurant for work or family events is a great sales strategy that is often overlooked.
Larger groups = increased sales. It's a no brainer for keeping your restaurant booked.
STEP 3: Make Your Game Plan
It's always important to have a plan in place while improving your sales management and sales strategies.
Step one is consistent communication. For large parties especially, every employee should be in the know. Using a management communication software, like ShiftNote, is a great start to communicate better between shifts when you have group needs. You can communicate anytime, anywhere, and have it all logged to look back on later.
Step two is organization. This means having your menus, BEOs (Banquet Event Orders), and contracts together in an organized fashion. Organization is key to increased restaurant event sales.
Step three is delegation. Get your team together and decide who is going to handle the clients from start to finish. Trust your team will do a great job, you don't need to micromanage every step of the way. Remember, delegating empowers your employees AND takes a little off your own shoulders.
STEP 4: Enlist Help From An Expert
Think about it, you wouldn’t have your hostess fill in on the line. Not everyone has the event planning skills needed to boost your large group or event sales. You need to have the right people, in the right place, at the right time in order to bring in more customers. There's so many factors that go into successful restaurant sales management that hiring an expert is always a good idea. Because of today's technology, you can even leverage a remote sales team to book your restaurant over the phone! A service like Client Concierge provides you with experts who are seasoned in maximizing revenue from your inquiries and soliciting new business to keep your bottom line growing and your restaurant booked.
That's right, you can sit back, relax, focus on other things all while maintaining a completely booked restaurant. Remote sales teams are game changers in the hospitality industry.
Dina's Story - Why She's Right ⬇️
I'm a soccer mom. Yep, I said it. Being in the hospitality industry for over 28 years, I'm the go-to person to coordinate team meals during our soccer travels.
Here's a sadly common experience:
We found one restaurant out of many that could feed the team, we ordered to-go, the wrong address was listed online, and it took an hour longer than it should've just to pick up pizza!
Obviously the kids were starving and acting up. And we had to eat a cold dinner.
The sad thing is - this is common in every city. Restaurants aren't prepared to cater to large groups and their sales are suffering because of it.
So yes, I am a soccer mom. And I'm tired of eating cold pizza. But I'm also experienced in the hospitality industry and have a lot of knowledge to give. My first restaurant job was as a prep cook and office manager when I was 16 years old. I have had the best hospitality sales training in the industry and was lucky enough to facilitate training as well as present sales workshops over the past several years. Having led a team of close to 100 of the industry’s best sales people, I understand what needs to be accomplished in today's sales management operations.
Many restaurants have trouble staying booked and accommodating large parties for events. But thing is, it doesn't have to be more work for you if you follow the steps listed above. So it's time for more restaurants to take advantage of group dining and event planning.
Trust me, your restaurant sales will grow if you take action. I've seen it first hand. This is the beginning of a restaurant revolution, where sales don't have to be stressful anymore.
Why wouldn't you join in?