QSRs: Turning the Data Deluge into Actionable Insights

Jul 2, 2013


Imagine a future where, as the operator of a quick-service restaurant, you could rapidly adjust menu offerings based on information gathered about drive-thru customers such as car make and model, number of passengers, items ordered or decision times.

While this scenario may still be a few years away, it’s coming, says David Andreadakis, Kobie’s VP of Loyalty Strategy.

Harnessing loyalty program member data to make offers and experiences as relevant as possible has not only been a major topic of discussion among loyalty marketers in the past two years – companies are starting to move from discussion to implementation. But quick-service restaurants face the particular challenge of having to collect data while moving customers in and out as fast as possible.

In a recent video interview with Roger Williams of LoadFactor, David talks about these challenges and opportunities:

  • As the cost of sophisticated point-of-sale systems that include capabilities such as RFID and NFC drops, smaller chains will increasingly take advantage of these technologies
  • The big chains will rely more on data from loyalty programs, brand partners and third-party contractors than specific in-house data gathering initiatives
  • Omnichannel convergence – and the data collected from the various channels – will help QSRs tailor their offerings “on the fly” for particular groups of customers at particular times
  • Large chains will have to balance data’s personalization potential with a level of uniformity that fulfills the brand promise regardless of location

QSRs need to maintain a rapid flow of customers – but that doesn’t mean they can’t take full advantage of data-gathering technologies’ power to enhance the customer experience as David discusses in the video interview, which you can watch here.

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