3-minute read ---
​
Restaurant owners may struggle to generate customer traffic during the rainy month of April. However, customers always enjoy having something to celebrate. By engaging your customers with clever marketing opportunities this April you can effectively promote your restaurant and encourage repeat visits.

Here are 5 engaging marketing opportunities for April 2023:

​3-minute read ---
As a restaurant owner, you are always looking for ways to attract new customers and keep your regulars coming back for more. One way to accomplish this is through the implementation of a loyalty program with one or several campaigns. A loyalty program rewards customers for their repeat business, which leads to increased customer retention, increased customer satisfaction, and ultimately, increased revenue. In this post, we will review 5 steps to successfully implementing a restaurant loyalty program and how you can make more money with restaurant loyalty programs.​

Step 1: Identify Your Goals and Objectives

Before implementing a loyalty program, it's important to identify your goals and objectives. What do you hope to achieve by implementing a loyalty program? Are you looking to increase customer retention, boost customer spending, or both? Once you have a clear idea of your objectives, you can begin designing your program.

3-minute read ---
​
Aldelo Express is a point-of-sale (POS) software designed specifically for restaurants. It provides restaurant owners with an array of features to manage their business, such as menu management, table service, order management, and inventory management. One of the features offered by Aldelo Express is a complete gift card program available through the Masa+ Digital Payments solution. In addition to being available to Aldelo merchants at zero additional cost, in this blog post we will discuss what a Masa+ Gift Card program offers a restaurant.

​3-minute read ---

​There are many reasons why restaurants should purchase a point of sale system (POS). One is that a reliable point of sale solution will actually help a restaurant increase their sales and bottom line profits by effectively controlling the three “P’s” of a business: People, Payments, and Products. Systems like Aldelo Express POS help restaurant owners increase sales by stopping theft, enforcing proper pricing for each menu item, and encouraging customers to return to the business with integrated Masa+ Gift Card and Loyalty programs.

​Here are the top 5 ways Aldelo Express POS can increase sales for your restaurant:

3-minute read ---

Restaurants have a lot of competition in the market. Increasing gift card sales can be an excellent way to serve existing customers and attract new customers. Gift cards can help restaurants generate revenue in advance, interest-free, and create loyal customers who keep coming back. Here are some key ways that gift cards will increase revenue for your restaurant.
​
1. Promote Gift Cards In-Store and Online

One of the easiest ways to increase gift card sales is to promote them in-store and online:

• Have gift card signage prominently displayed at the point-of-sale
• Make sure that physical gift cards are visible and easily accessible to customers
• Promote gift cards on your website and social media channels

2-minute read ---
​
Restaurants that enable physical and/or digital Masa+ Gift Card programs instantly offer flexible, easy-to-purchase, and easy-to-use gift card solutions that can be used at multiple store locations, increasing customer satisfaction and guaranteeing additional revenue for the business. As a native integration to the Aldelo Express POS platform, restaurants that use Masa+ enjoy a seamlessly integrated gift card solution available at ZERO additional cost with Aldelo Pay or approved third-party merchant services.

​Here are 3 reasons to immediately implement Masa+ Multi-Store Gift Cards:

4-minute read ---
​
​The end of the year brings increased business and excitement as restaurant owners and staff work hard to serve an influx of customers and prepare for the coming year. For business owners, reflecting on the past year and writing down specific and measurable goals for their business makes them more likely to succeed in the coming year.

Aldelo is committed to helping merchants succeed. Unlike some point-of-sale software vendors whose direct contact ends after the system is installed, Aldelo supports restaurant owners throughout their initial year of use and beyond. Aldelo does this to ensure that merchants utilize the Aldelo Express native POS solutions, modules, and features that help their business thrive and grow. Plus, Aldelo merchants receive unlimited software updates and feature releases year-round, ensuring they are always operating with the latest-version POS software.

​Here are 5 considerations for restaurant owners as they prepare for the coming year:

2-minute read ---
​
Masa+ provides restaurants with several secure digital solutions that help restaurants generate additional sales revenue. As a browser-based extension of the Aldelo Express POS platform, Masa+ supports multiple customer-driven ordering and payment solutions, including:

• QR code-based digital menus
• A Masa+ Online Storefront unique to their restaurant
• Secure digital wallets that store personal credit cards, egift cards, loyalty, rewards, and coupons
• QR code-based digital transactions, including Scan & Pay via customer receipt
• And more

Advertising In-Store via QR Codes

QR codes are a great way to promote your restaurant’s Masa+ Online Storefront. Merchants can either download a unique QR code that links to their restaurant through their Masa+ cloud back-office environment (pictured below), or generate and link their own QR codes to Masa+ online solutions via the following instructions: www.aldelo.com/marketing-qr-setup.html

2-minute read ---

The holiday season is upon us, providing restaurant owners several opportunities to engage customers with holiday themed promotions and campaigns. In addition to Hannukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and New Year’s Eve, December is host to several festive ways to promote your restaurant’s products and services.

December 9 - National Pastry Day

Pastries are a category of baked desserts that feature fluffy or flaky dough, fruits, and custards. Popular especially in European cuisine, pastries are a perfect addition to a morning coffee or as an after-meal sweet.

​This National Pastry Day, enhance your holiday campaigns by providing customers special offers for pastries bundled with qualifying food, drink, or gift card purchases, or as a “thank you” to customers who spend over a specified amount in-store or through your restaurant’s Masa+ Online Storefront.

2-minute read ---
​
With eight out of ten customers carrying a smartphone in their pocket, businesses are realizing daily the benefits of offering QR code-based digital services in their restaurant. Whether enabling customers to order and pay from QR code-based digital menus, expanding their customer network through QR code-based digital gift cards, or enhancing promotions with QR code-based loyalty, rewards, and digital coupons, restaurant owners that use Masa+ QR code-based digital payments seeing greater operational efficiency by utilizing QR codes especially during busy periods.

One popular way restaurants are using QR codes to streamline everyday restaurant transactions is enabling in-store customer-driven payments through QR codes printed on physical receipts. By allowing their customers to pay for their order directly from a personal smartphone on-demand, restaurants immediately eliminate the back-and-forth routine traditionally required by wait staff who must deliver a receipt, pick up a payment tender, process the payment, and return a card and customer receipt for payment signature and completion.

2-minute read ---
​
Thanksgiving Day is one of the most popular U.S. holidays. Each year on the fourth Thursday of November, millions of Americans travel to share a meal with their family and friends. In the days surrounding Thanksgiving Day, many customers turn to their favorite local restaurants for convenient and complimentary food and drink items that save them time – and spare them additional kitchen clean-up. As a result, restaurants can gain additional customers by promoting their restaurant’s online ordering, takeout, and delivery services this November.

Aldelo Express POS is a E2E cloud-based restaurant technology platform that supports both in-store and off-premises restaurant services. Using iPad and Android-based point-of-sale hardware, merchants choose from a variety of merchant-facing and customer-facing ordering and digital payment solutions that work together to run a complete restaurant operation. This includes several native cloud POS modules and features such as:

• Delivery Module, including Order Dispatching, Driver Tracking, and Digital Mapping
• QR Code-Based Masa+ Online Ordering and Digital Payments
• Native Inventory and Recipe Module
• “Matrix” Menu Module for Creating Hundreds if Menu Items in Minutes
• Advanced Pricing Module for Easy Digital Menu Management
• Third-Party Integration Solutions
• And More

3-minute read ---
​
When first introduced, gift cards were distributed and owned by major credit card companies. Eventually, developers in the point-of-sale industry began offering gift cards as an integrated POS solution to enable business owners greater control maintaining gift card programs, campaigns, and protecting gift card cash infusions exclusively for their store(s). Today, gift cards are a billion-dollar industry that generate a massive amount of revenue for restaurant owners each year.

Aldelo was one of the first point-of-sale developers in the industry to introduce an integrated digital gift card solution into its cloud-based Aldelo Express POS platform. For restaurant owners, this meant eliminating costly per-swipe and related fees owed to their credit card processor.

​There are many third-party open-loop (open market) gift card solutions available in the market with varying business models and associated consumer rewards. Participating in these gift card programs provide restaurants with some additional exposure but carry added costs and offer limited control. Restaurant owners have learned that by having a native POS closed-loop (specific to a restaurant or restaurant group) gift card solution they gain complete control over an important revenue stream for the business.

3-minute read ---
​
Restaurants not utilizing gift card programs are missing out on additional revenue. Gift cards have the ability to generate hundreds if not thousands of dollars of additional sales each year that acts as another revenue stream that helps restaurants sustain the business during slower periods.

Masa+ is a full-featured online ordering and digital payments platform that includes:

• Multi-Store QR Code-Based eGift Cards
• Text-Based eGift Card Sharing
• QR Code-Based Digital Menus
• Secure Personal Digital Wallets
• Loyalty, Rewards, and Coupon Programs
• And more

Here are the top 5 benefits of the Masa+ eGift Card Program:

3-minute read ---
​
The month of October is famous for Fall Harvest Festivals, pumpkin patch trips, the Major League Baseball Post-Season Playoffs, and Halloween. Each one of these October activities provides restaurant owners an opportunity to encourage new and existing customers to visit their restaurant by incentivizing menu purchases via gift card, loyalty, and rewards-based promotions.

Here are a few ways restaurants can engage their customers this October:

3-minute read ---
​
​Largely ignored in the US for years, QR codes are proving daily how much of a productive and trusted asset they are to business owners in today’s unpredictable market climate. As restaurant owners continually adjust to the contactless and digital market, utilizing QR code-based access to native and third-party online ordering and digital payment integrations help staff and customers increase operational efficiency, reduce order errors, and improve overall customer service levels and satisfaction.
​
With eight out of ten people carrying a smartphone camera in their pockets, unique QR codes enable restaurants to put ordering and payment capabilities into the hands of their customers, including:

• Paperless menus
• Place online orders
• Scan-and-pay at the POS
• Web-based digital payments
• Leave cashless tips
• Receive paperless receipts
• Gain loyalty points
• Trigger curbside pick-up
• Digital restaurant storefronts
• And more!

3-minute read ---
​
The school year is back in swing, which means restaurants are engaging schools, students, and school groups in their local communities. For many customers, their daily schedules are prioritized around their childrens’ school, extracurricular activities, and their local social network. By supporting students’ success while encouraging new and existing customers to return the favor through support of their business, restaurants successfully increase customer traffic this fall and throughout the school year with back-to-school themed campaigns.

Here are three ways to engage your local customer base with back-to-school themed campaigns and events:

Homecoming Catering and Promotions

Homecoming is an exciting time of year for students, families, and their communities. With homecoming float-building, dances, and football games occurring throughout the fall season, restaurants have a unique opportunity to support local schools with homecoming-themed catering and promotions. Examples include:

5-minute read ---
​
For millions of Americans, September marks the end of summer. By the end of August, summer tourists, campers, and out-of-towners are going back to their school year routines, making September a challenging period for many restaurant owners who are at risk of losing new summer customers. As a result, one of the best things a restaurant can do is target their customers with integrated loyalty and rewards incentives so they will be reminded of their favorite “summer stop” throughout the school year. When successful, these restaurants not only maintain a growing customer base, but present their restaurant as an ideal vendor for fundraisers, sports team gatherings, homecoming catering, and more.

One of the best ways restaurants can strategically compete in the growing loyalty market is to reward customer purchases and influence return visits with unique customer promotions. These help restaurants increase customer traffic and earn additional revenue that is often essential for sustaining the business during slower periods.

5-minute read ---
​
In today’s digital, customer-driven market, the best investment restaurant owners can make today is selecting a complete restaurant technology platform that allows them to simplify and streamline in-store and off-premises operations. That is why modern restaurant operations are utilizing cloud-based restaurant technology that allows the business to monitor and manage single and multi-store restaurants from a single back-office environment. Restaurant owners utilizing Aldelo Express POS are finding that it not only secures their business and simplifies operations, but saves them hundreds of dollars per month compared to their existing solution by operating on non-proprietary hardware and providing access to the full-featured Aldelo Express app marketplace and zero additional cost.

Here are five additional reasons why restaurant owners prefer Aldelo Express POS:

3-minute read ---
​
Despite increased wages and a massive amount of job openings for all positions, labor shortages, continued supply chain costs, and increased costs continue to affect the restaurant industry at unprecedented rates. When restaurants find themselves short on staff, owners and operators respond by adjusting their hours of operation or dedicating extra hours and taking on a variety of job functions to personally fill roles previously managed by hostesses, servers, kitchen and support staff.

In addition, many businesses are leaning on customer-facing restaurant point-of-sale technology for relief, generationally changing the landscape of restaurant operations and related customer self-service options.

​Aldelo offers a variety of products and solutions for conducting complete and customer-driven transactions…

2-minute read ---
​
Red wine is one of the most popular alcoholic beverages among U.S. consumers. This means that National Red Wine Day (August 28) offers restaurants and bars a unique opportunity to promote new and existing partnerships with local wineries, tasting rooms, and restaurants through cross-pollination advertising and collaborative campaigns.
​
For example, a restaurant and tasting room partnership can use National Red Wine Day to encourage customers to purchase their favorite food and drinks in a tasting room environment, or purchase locally-made wines with their meal on a restaurant’s premises. Partners can offer their menu items in promotional bundles or through limited-time discounts. In both scenarios, business owners and operators make customers aware of existing collaborations, influence guests to place orders for additional items, and can generate future visits with limited-time gift card, loyalty, and rewards offers.