Trying to understand customer acquisition in any business is probably the biggest challange you can solve. Once you understand how to acquire customers you are able to scale that process and drive real growth. In the hospitality industry this is even harder with the introduction of the ‘mobile food revolution’ that seems to be hitting every street corner.
What is customer acquisition?
Customer acquisition is the process of acquiring a customer. The journey they took to find your cafe or restaurant and what they used to find you. 10 years ago the landscape looked very different to what it does today. Traditional forms of media were the only way to acquire a new customer such as newspaper, letterbox drops, radio or even TV. With the mass introduction of the internet and social media (Facebook and Instagram) we’ve become a heavily mobile device society.
Competition for screen-time has become so incredibly hard with everyone trying to acquire new customers via Facebook and Instagram that its now a real challenge to gain new customers.
How do i find out how my customers found my venue?
There are many tools now that are digital tools that track your social profiles / website and can give some basic data on how people found you. But that’s your website or social page not your actual venue. The most priceless way to understand your ‘real’ customers is just ask them. Ask them when they are dining, but in a suble way that works with their experience. It doesn’t matter if you are a takeaway only venue or if you have a 300 seat dining venue. If you have a great product (food) and your service is on point than you should be confident to hand our survey cards, or have a survey app and even look to run small promotions to give incentive for customers to give you that valuable feedback.
It doesn’t have to be a 100 question essay, just one simple question… How did you find out about us? When you have this information there is a good chance that there is a POT of quality customers who you’ll be able to target with the very same method.