In our last post, we took the opportunity to speak to a different side of operating a restaurant. At least, we mean different in the sense that we usually are speaking to mobile ordering operations and the like, seeing as how we at Online Orders Now are providers of an innovative online food ordering system that continues to lead the industry in practical benefits.

We’ll discuss some of the many benefits of our online ordering software for restaurants below, but before we do, we’d like to point out that this is part two of a two-part series in which we are taking the time to offer up some tips for restaurant managers looking to effectively manage their staff. Between the natural intensity of the workplace and an all-too-common occurrence of dealing with heavy turnover year over year, it can be difficult to establish a healthy culture. After we highlight a handful of benefits of our mobile food ordering system, we’ll cap off this series with some insight we’ve gained from our vast experience working with restaurants, in addition to looking at what some other resources have to say about effectively managing a restaurant staff.

Let’s get going!

Our Restaurant Ordering System And Its Benefits

Below you’ll find a few of the most fundamental and beneficial features our online ordering system for restaurants provides. At the end of the day, every single feature we have included is designed to help your operations run more efficiently, to increase profits, or both.

• Unlimited Transactions – Irrespective of your monthly order volume, you’ll pay the same monthly rate, with no fees or limits based on volume. Many of our competitors charge upwards of 30 percent fees on each order. We think that money should stay with you.
• First-Time Customers Emailed – When you receive a first-time customer, we’ll notify you so that you can inform them of what sets you apart from your competition, aside from your delicious food and robust website that the designers at Online Orders Now have custom-made for you, obviously.
• External Delivery Service Email & Fax Notification – If you work with a third-party for deliveries, part of our food ordering system involves automatically sending them a copy of each delivery order either by fax or email to effectively “close the loop.” We make sure you have a paper trail, leading to fewer mistakes and better organization.
• Administration Back-end – We provide a full-service restaurant online ordering system, meaning we do all the work for you. But for restaurant owners who prefer to utilize a more hands-on approach, we offer a full-featured administrative web interface so you can make real-time changes in areas that include delivery times, descriptions, business hours, holidays, pricing, and more. We have made sure that making changes is intuitive, so that you don’t have to call us in order to make basic (or even not-so-basic) changes to your menu. However, our customer service specialists are on-hand and ready to help you with whatever you might need!
• POS-Integration – Our online ordering software will automatically input the order into your Point of Sale system and print out the ticket while the customer is still online. It’s essentially like having an invisible cashier that never makes a mistake taking your orders. Except this cashier needs no tips and never gets sick!
• 30 Percent Larger Tickets – Did you know that customers order an average of 30 percent more online than over the phone or at the counter? It’s not too complicated to figure out why, either. Customers simply feel more comfortable being able to take their time and fully browse your menu. Plus, with “My Way,” our mobile ordering system will remember the custom preferences of each customer while also including special upsell suggestions before the customer checks out. This, naturally, leads to larger tickets. But it’s also great because restaurant owners can tailor which menu items are suggested by their online ordering system based on other selections the customer has already made. We give you all the control!

Managing Your Restaurant Staff

In part one of this series, How To Manage Your Restaurant Staff, we took a look at a few of the most important traits a successful restaurant manager should have. We encourage you to look back and read that post if you haven’t already (not that we are biased as the author of the post or anything), because we touch on a few vital points. Among them are the facts that an effective manager needs to be mindful of their attitude, how they treat others, how they respond to difficulty, and beyond. We also touched on the importance of communication, transparency, and having your staff’s back, even if it means siding with them over the customer.

The long and the short of it is that, while we certainly want to provide as much value to our restaurant-owner customers as possible, we want to be sure to emphasize the point that managing a restaurant staff is far from the easiest job in the world. Throw in the fact that restaurant owners need to manage much more than only their staff, and it can be pretty difficult to find someone who can successfully juggle all that they need to. The purpose of today’s post is to help you stay on track with managing a staff, so below you’ll find a few more tips we hope will assist you in accomplishing exactly that!

Lead By Example

Akin to some of the points we made in the first post on this topic, a great way to think about remaining positive, having effective communication, and really, maintaining a great staff is that you need to lead by example. Holding your employees to standards that you yourself aren’t reaching is a quick way to breed resentment and have your staff turn on you. You don’t want to be the bad guy, and you don’t have to.

This is good news, folks. You can set the standard at your place of business — in a variety of ways. How you treat customers will be reflected by your staff. How you treat your coworkers will be reflected by your staff. If you are lazy, your staff might start to cut corners. If you are a tyrant, your veterans might feel they have the license to treat your newer servers, bussers, or hosts like they are hot trash. That’s not a good look.

So where is the good news? Just flip that principle on its head, and you’ve got a great foundation for a healthy staff. Lead by example.

Be Generous

Again, we touched a little bit on this point in the previous post, but it’s important to treat your staff like an investment. When you go out for company functions, don’t be afraid to buy a round or two, or pay for the whole thing. Of course, this point presupposes that you are actually taking your staff out to events every once in awhile in the first place, so maybe start with that if you haven’t yet! Even if you aren’t toasted to for your generosity, your staff will notice, and it’s important that they believe they are working for a quality individual. Their effort and attitude will ultimately reflect that.

Likewise, it’s worth kicking around the idea of providing staff meals during shifts. Rather than having them leave your establishment to have them eat somewhere else during your break, you can offer everyone a shift meal that is deductible at cost for the restaurant. This isn’t considered taxable income for your staff, and it’s a simple way to show your employees that you care about them — one that won’t cost you an arm and a leg either.

Learn More About Online Order Now

We hope you’ve found these tips practically beneficial. We are all about practically benefiting our clients here at Online Orders Now, whether we are talking about our food ordering system for restaurants or ways managers can better relate to their staff. If you are ready to learn more about how we can optimize your delivery ordering system, reach out to us today!