They say, "So goes California, so goes the rest of the country." This article, from the Silicon Valley Mercury News, addresses the growing regulation of food trucks that are quickly becoming a large part of the dining scene in Los Angeles.

Unlike traditional food trucks that cater to workers while on break, this new wave of trucks park in high-traffic areas and serve a higher quality of food, often with their own specialties. According to this article, some counties have received complaints by restaurant owners that these trucks steal business. Consequently, some cities, such as Rancho Palos Verdes and Palos Verdes Estates, have enacted zoning restrictions on when and where the trucks can operate.

Thankfully, by the end of the year, food truck customers in California can expect to see the same health quality ratings they see at normal brick and mortar restaurants. This doesn’t necessarily “level the playing field” for regular restaurants to compete with food trucks, but will help educate customers about their health quality.

So, how do restaurants compete with this food truck invasion? Some have actually decided to join them – and launched their own food trucks. Others have focused on convenience factors and their communication tactics. For instance, many food trucks rely heavily on Twitter to communicate their daily whereabouts. Brick and mortar restaurants that are inundated by food trucks should step up their Twitter communication and takeout business. Ordering takeout online in advance is definitely a way customers can capitalize on your restaurant’s convenience.

Do food trucks affect your restaurant? Let us know how. Email us at mailto:[email protected]. Does your restaurant operate a food truck? We want to hear your story. Email us at [email protected].

Do you have promotions you only offer to certain customers and others you want to share with the world?

NetWaiter now offers the ability to set promotions as public or private. When creating a new promotion, restaurants can choose to display it on their NetWaiter site. If a new promotion is made public, it will show in the “Available Promotions” section on the restaurant’s site. If the promotion expires, it is automatically removed from the site.

For private promotions, restaurants can simply choose not to display them on their site. For instance, if a restaurant wants to generate a promotion for a select group of customers, they can prevent it from displaying on their site and email it directly to the intended customers using NetWaiter’s Email Marketing System.`

It's common for restaurant employees to be familiar with the daily specials or a new dessert that hasn’t yet made it to the menu, but are you using your wait staff to their fullest when it comes to promoting your online ordering system?

Maybe not.

Make sure that your waiters and waitresses can inform customers about your online menu and ordering site.  Talk about how convenient it is for customers - reduced wait time, greater accuracy, and easy accessibility.  You can even demonstrate it to them at a staff meeting.

Also, make sure your employees are well versed on all of the latest features.  For instance, in the last few months, NetWaiter has added an ordering interface with Facebook, and more recently, the easy ability for customers to order from their mobile phones.  Your employees can help spread the word about new capabilities.

Some employees may be concerned that referring customers to your online menu will reduce their ability to make tips.  This is certainly not an issue.  Tipping is part of the ordering and dining experience.  If they help to create happy customers, they are going to get tips, and online ordering definitely makes for happier customers.

Opportunities are abound with social media. It is truly a fantastic platform to build your restaurant’s brand and communicate with customers. While doing that, however, it is important not to do a couple of things. Here are 3 simple things NOT to do with social media:

1) Don’t Ask For Favors
If you don’t know someone well enough to ask for a cup of sugar, then you don’t know them well enough to ask them to write about or promote your restaurant. Don’t publicly ask for a review. Instead, you can publicly recognize the customers that do review your restaurant with a “Thank You” and a link to the review. Ask them to introduce themselves to the manager the next time they visit. You might be able to provide them a complimentary dessert, or at least, an in-person “Thank You”.

2) Don’t Ignore Your Customers / Be a Jerk
This may sound too simple, but it’s worth saying. You’re using social media to establish relationships and build awareness for your restaurant, right? So – get social! Respond to messages, get involved in conversations, and don’t miss opportunities to communicate with some of your most valuable customers. It is certainly better NOT to use social media than to use it and NOT engage with customers. If customers send you tweets and you ignore them, they will think you’re a jerk, especially while sending out other tweets.

3) Don’t Send Auto-Direct Messages
Using auto direct-messages on Twitter is essentially Spam. Don’t bother someone with a generic direct-message that says: “Thanks for the follow!” or something similar. It’s a very hollow way of thanking someone. If you’re doing this, stop. Don’t take the “social” out of social media. You can lose followers and relationships when they forget why they’re there. People want to interact with you and your restaurant. They are interested in news, updates, and deals – not meaningless auto-direct messages.

A number of articles about tipping, which is one of the most customary practices in U.S. restaurants, have been written to re-examine it at all levels.  This humorous video outlines some arguments against tipping and gives everyone some ‘food for thought’.

Google's Think Insights recently published statistics that reminded us that not only is it important to have a mobile website, but it is also important to have a mobile website that delivers users quickly to what is important.

First, the broad view:

• When they visited a mobile website, 74% of people say they're more likely to return to that site in the future.
• 67% of mobile users say that when they visit a mobile website, they're more likely to buy a site's product or service.
• 48% said that if a site didn't work well on their smartphones, it made them feel like the company didn't care about their business.

Then there is the importance of a functional mobile website.

• 61% of users said that if they didn't find what they were looking for right away on a mobile website, they'd quickly move on to another site.
• 79% of people who don't like what they find on one site will go back and search for another site.
• 50% of people said that even if they like a business, they will use them less often if the website isn't mobile-friendly.

Think in terms of what an online ordering customer is looking for. Menu is at the top of the list. On the mobile website pages NetWaiter makes available for client restaurants, we design them so that the prospective customer is taken directly to the menu.

When designing a mobile  website, make sure a link to the menu is clearly visible on the first screen. 

Here are some tips on how to use Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to increase the awareness of your restaurant and online ordering site.  Most digital cameras have a video function, so consider substituting still photos for video when the opportunity arises.

Show, Don’t Tell - People love pictures.  Ask one of your takeout customers to pose with their order when they come in to pick it up.  Maybe include the employee that assisted the customer too.

New Dishes - Offering a new takeout item on your menu?  Offer it first on your NetWaiter site, and promote it with photos sent out via social media: “Checkout our new dish – available only online!”

Pitch Your Promotions - Offering an incentive for ordering online?  Perhaps 50% off a dessert for orders over $15?  Make sure that gets posted via social media and include a photo of a dessert.

Tip of the Week – A lot of restaurants let their customers in on recipes.  Promote it online (as long as it’s not a secret family recipe).

Updates - New things are always happening at your restaurant.  Talk about them on Facebook and other platforms.

Tell Stories - Catering a special event, or hosting it at your restaurant?  Talk about it online.  Maybe a customer has a special story?  Ask them if you can share it online.

It's a question restaurant owners often encounter from employees.  Here is what we have found at NetWaiter:

1.    Activate the tip field on your restaurant’s online ordering site so customers can leave tips when they enter their payment information.  This makes it simple for customers to leave a tip, and simultaneously benefits your employees.

2.    For online ordering, tipping is done in advance, so it’s important employees live up to (and exceed) the customer’s expectations after they tip.  Since one of the principal benefits of ordering online is customer convenience, it’s important to follow through with that expectation.  The extra TLC is remembered when the customer receives their order and it can impact tips on future orders.

3.    By and large, takeout customers make their decision for takeout/delivery BEFORE they choose the restaurant.  Using NetWaiter, your restaurant is better positioned to win the next question: What restaurant should we choose?  So, not only is online ordering good for business, it’s good for employee relations because it provides them an opportunity to earn tips from orders that might have been placed at a different restaurant.