Find out how data-driven decisions can level up your loyalty systems and online ordering.
Give An Ovation is the podcast where we interview restaurant owners, operators, and experts, to get their strategies and tactics so that youi can deliver a 5-star guest experience. Available on all major podcasting sites.
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The Off-Premise Restaurant
by Restaurant Experts
Olga Lopategui is a restaurant marketing expert with experience as a Marketing Manager at Pizza Hut International and as the Director of Marketing for TGI Fridays. She also holds degrees from Harvard Business School and Georgetown University Law. Olga now works as a restaurant consultant, helping restaurants make data-driven decisions to improve loyalty and online ordering. We were so lucky to have her on!
Here’s one of our highlights from this episode and Olga’s answers to some of our questions:
Featured Takeaway: Reevaluate Your Loyalty System Every Once In A While (4:07)
“The biggest mistake that I see is people start their loyalty programs with a certain structure that they think is going to work and then they never look back as to whether it was the right decision or not…
You set it and forget it. Sometimes it works out great, but very often it totally does not.”
What’s the most important aspect of the guest experience nowadays? (15:26)
“Being frictionless. Being seamless and frictionless because that’s now the expectation. Nobody has time for mistakes, and mistakes are becoming much more costly for restaurants. Because takeaway and delivery are taking over so much more of the restaurant business, what used to be a minor mistake…becomes a devastating mistake.”
What’s something successful you’ve seen or tried lately? (20:30)
Email subject line testing. “I speak about the importance of subject line testing all the time. And it’s really boring. But it really makes a big difference…it’s the most cost effective way to reach your customers. So increasing that open rate by 10% makes a huge, huge difference over time.”
Who is someone in the industry that deserves an Ovation? (22:31)
“El Pollo Loco. I’ve been working with them for the last couple of years, and they’ve been doing a lot of really, really cool stuff. But I think the coolest thing that they’ve done this year has nothing to do with loyalty. It’s the Air Loco program. I don’t know if you’ve seen that… It’s the drone delivery program. And it’s so cool.”
For more, you can find Olga on LinkedIn.
Thanks for reading! Make sure to check out the whole episode, as well as other interviews with restaurant gurus by checking out “Give an Ovation: A Podcast For Restaurants” on ovationup.com/podcast or your favorite place to listen to podcasts.
