Limited Time Offers and Their Benefits

As we head into autumn, some of the quieter months of the year for most restaurants, restaurant owners and managers are trying to map out how they’re going to drive sales and hit their targets for this period of the year. Limited Time Offers, or LTOs, are a great way to tempt new and regular customers into visiting your location during these quieter periods of the year, helping you keep your revenues, and thus your business, afloat.

LTOs are successfully utilized year round by major restaurant chains with big advertising budgets, however small establishments seriously under utilize LTOs, mainly because of their fear of it not being successful, because of a lack of reach, and it turning into wastage. Whilst big chains can use national platforms to shout their messages from the rooftops, smaller business can now shout their’s from their rooftop to their local customers, using Facebook, instagram and Twitter to get their message out to their loyal customers and other potential customers visiting their area, increasing their reach and, potentially increasing their sales.

Food menus are often seasonal, and dishes regularly change to suit the foods of the season and to follow trends. Although these menu changes may not be considered LTOs they are still time sensitive and will be removed from your menu at some point. Therefore, it’s important that you get the message out to your customers that you’ve updated your menu and that they should come in and try it.

Beverage menus have, also, slowly become much more seasonal, introducing different flavors to fit with the season at hand. These are much less advertised than our seasonal food menus mentioned above. This is a grave mistake that won’t necessarily cost you money, but getting the message out there that you’ve updated your beverage menu could mean that you see and increase in customer count and overall revenues.

Customer drinking habits are changing, they are more open to experimentation than ever before and more and more people are seeking quality over value; the opposite to what the majority did before. On the back of that, it’s easy to see how not publicizing and getting the word out about your newly craft seasonal beverage menu can cost you valuable sales in these quieter months.

LTOs don’t have to be menu based, they can be run, and advertised as specials on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. Many restaurants will have a Cocktail of The Day program, and many others also run food specials. Ensuring that you advertise these items is key. Use all the resources available to you, from boards outside your location, to your staff telling every customer what specials you have on offer that day, to getting the message out with photos on Instagram and posts on Facebook, WeChat, or whatever other platforms you may use to communicate with your customers.

Many locations will use LTOs to test out items that they are thinking of putting on their next menu. LTOs also allow your bartenders and cooks to propose ideas for you to test, letting their creative juices flow and allowing them to feel like they’re a larger part of your establishment than just a simple cog in the machine. Don’t underestimate what benefits LTOs can bring to your location and your staff on a year round basis.