Are you aiming to elevate your restaurant’s performance in the competitive UK market? It might be time to consider the role of analytical tools. These tools provide invaluable insights into the data propelling your business, offering a deep dive into sales trends, customer behaviours, and dish popularity.
By tapping into the capabilities of these analytical platforms, restaurateurs can derive actionable intelligence to refine their operations.
This could mean anything from decreasing wait times to spotlighting top-performing menu items. Additionally, such tools can highlight areas where staff training might be beneficial. In this article, we’ll explore some of the leading analytical tools that are reshaping the UK restaurant landscape. So, prepare for a hearty serving of knowledge!
The key areas of restaurant performance
A few key areas can make or break your restaurant’s performance. These include parameters like food wastage, preferred payment methods, waiting times, customer reviews, and more. But how can you leverage this meaningful data for your restaurant?
The answer lies in restaurant analytics. They weave all of the above key performance indicators together. In this way, they help you identify blind spots in your eatery. Following are a few more restaurant operations that can benefit from analytical tools:
- Payment experience
- Customer insights
- Discounts and voids
- Inventory control
- Staff performance
- Profitable menu items
- Staff scheduling
These analytics can be utilized to spot trends and discover missed opportunities. However, restaurant analytics is not only about numbers and stats. They help you understand your visitors on a deeper level.
By gaining an insight into your guests’ preferences, you can tailor their dining experience. How about a free dessert on their birthday or providing customized food recommendations? All of these little steps make a huge difference in customer loyalty. Utilizing restaurant analytics is a long-term strategy that helps you create detailed customer profiles. It also helps you optimize your restaurant design, plan your menu, and optimize inventory accordingly.
Detailed overview of the top analytical tools
1. Grafterr
Grafterr is a comprehensive tool for monitoring your data analytics in restaurants. Hailing from the UK, Grafterr offers a revolutionary Electronic Point of Sales (EPOS) system. It empowers restaurateurs with complete control over their operations, all from a single interface. With Grafterr at your disposal, you no longer need to juggle through multiple systems since it simplifies restaurant management and top-ups your operational efficiency.
This restaurant data analysis tool comes with various ordering systems that offer incredible flexibility to your guests. These include web-based, mobile app-based, and QR code ordering. The result? Faster order processing and improved table turnover rates! Grafterr also has a powerful booking platform integrating reservations, order management, and intuitive calendar displays.
Crafting an intelligent menu has never been easier, thanks to Grafterr’s interactive menu builder. It incorporates modifiers, variants, and customizers to offer an immersive experience for restaurants like yours. Moreover, you don’t need to subscribe to a separate HR platform since Grafterr also takes care of your staff!
It enables you to build employee profiles, create rotas, track payroll costs, and monitor your team’s productivity. And with intuitive productivity tracking, this tool provides the best restaurant analytics and helps you gain insights into the top sellers on your squad.
2. Square for restaurants
Square is a top restaurant data analytics tool providing detailed insights to optimize your performance. It utilizes a cloud-based POS system for dine-in, pickup, and delivery operations. You can also take advantage of floor plan customization, monitoring covers, and table turnovers. Moreover, Square makes it easy to accommodate last-minute changes in orders and pace control for meals.
It also allows you complete control over your offerings by curating different menus for various occasions and locations. With Square, you can assign specific roles and permissions to your staff members while controlling the data they can access. When it comes to back-of-the-house management, Square is a pro. It allows you to handle menu changes, customer relationship management, and payments.
Not to mention, it comes with offline payments too! You can efficiently take care of everything from discounts and refunds to employee management. What separates such restaurant data analytics solutions from the crowd is their reporting feature. This feature gives you an actionable and detailed insight into daily sales, labour costs, employee performance, and more. However, Square is not perfect. You may face fund holds at times, and the tool comes with limited support options for times when you need a shoulder.
3. Lightspeed
Lightspeed Restaurant is a powerful cloud-based point of sale (POS) tool. It serves as a game-changer for full-service restaurants, cafes, bars, and more. With Lightspeed, you can create and update menus effortlessly with tempting photos and detailed descriptions. All of it is supplemented with an intuitive system calculator that factors in all the costs to keep your inventory balanced.
Plus, the real-time communication between the kitchen, waitstaff, and hosts means that your operations run smoothly. You can even closely examine your restaurant with sales reports and customer behaviour tracking. And if you want to spot the most efficient performers on your team, Lightspeed also lets you do that! If you’re impressed by modern dining trends, don’t forget to leverage its various ordering options. Your tech-savvy customers can use online, tableside, and QR code ordering to book their orders.
Managing multiple branches? Not a problem anymore with Lightspeed. Now you can integrate with hotel PMS systems and leverage partner API access for more possibilities. However, Lightspeed comes with its drawbacks. The payment processing doesn’t allow a partial refund, and you don’t get smooth gift card management here. Also, it may not be possible to enter new products on-the-fly, and some users may struggle with the learning curve.
Tips for choosing the right analytical tools
Choosing the right analytical tool for your restaurant is the real deal. It is like a secret recipe that helps you understand ways to put your restaurant at the centre. Let’s explore some ways to find the right tool for your business.
1. Know your needs
Think for a moment and figure out what data you want to track. Do you want to analyze sales or understand customer feedback better? Or would you like to have better management for your inventory? Once you have a clear picture of your objectives, it becomes much easier to find the right tool for data analytics in restaurant industry.
2. User-friendliness
It is common for restaurant analytical tools to have a steep learning curve. However, you don’t want to spend ages trying to learn a tool before you can implement it. Look for something intuitive with a simple interface that you and your staff members can quickly grasp. Grafterr can be your secret sauce in managing reservations, tracking inventory, and analyzing customer feedback. So no more juggling back and forth between unreliable tools. Grafterr brings all the restaurant management solutions under one roof!
3. Compatibility
Ensure the tool you choose works well with your restaurant’s existing systems. You don’t want a chaotic tech setup that’s more trouble than it’s worth.
4. Reports
Reports are the crux of the big data restaurant industry. They give you all the insightful details that help you manage your restaurant better. So, find a tool that provides clear and easy-to-understand reports.
5. Reliability
Everyone prefers a tool that won’t leave them lost in the middle of service. Check out reviews, ask fellow restaurateurs for recommendations, and make sure you can rely on it daily. Also, what if you hit a snag or have a question? A tool with great customer support can be your lifesaver.
Conclusion
Harnessing the power of restaurant data analytics can amp up your UK restaurant performance. Analytical tools provide valuable insights into customer preferences and operational efficiency. By incorporating data-driven decisions within your management, you can make informed decisions. As a result, you will be able to tailor your menu and streamline operations. In this way, utilizing analytics not only helps your culinary landscape grow but also differentiates it from the competition.
If you’re a UK restaurant owner seeking to enhance performance, look no further than Grafterr. It is the perfect analytical tool to help you improve customer experience and exceed expectations. Its comprehensive Electronic Point of Sales system simplifies restaurant management and helps you stay on top of your operations. So, take that leap and let data be your guiding light to success.
