Digital signage has become a vital tool for displaying your menu items and guiding customer purchases. And the biggest area of opportunity for digital signage right now is in the drive-thru. In December of 2020, drive-thru lanes accounted for 44% of off-premise dining orders, and experts expect that traffic will continue to be high even after COVID-19 vaccines are widely distributed. Drive-thru customers want the experience to be as convenient as possible, and digital signage allows you to better meet their needs.
Bright, eye-catching displays don’t just make your menu items stand out. They also make it easy to change up promotions across locations without an intensive manual effort. As customers seek more personalized, convenient experiences, digital signage empowers you to deliver speedier, higher quality service. The challenge is in implementing it properly throughout your portfolio of restaurants.
The next generation of digital signage is all about personalization
Consumers crave personalized experiences, and digital signage allows you to bring that personalization to the drive-thru. When used alongside mobile apps and artificial intelligence systems, digital signage can offer customers targeted content. Mobile apps allow you to collect user data, including their location (with their permission, of course). With that data, you could serve up targeted ads or display customers’ recent orders when they arrive at one of your locations.
A new approach, known as patron recognition, is pushing personalization even further. Some digital signage can be outfitted with license plate recognition technology that connects to a database containing customer order history. The digital signage can be programmed to serve up their most commonly ordered items and recommendations based on their previous purchases.
Some digital signage technology can also detect the type of vehicle the customer uses. A customer who pulls up to the drive-thru in a minivan, for instance, will see a menu that features the kids’ menu more prominently than someone who drives an expensive sports car.
Implementing digital signage successfully
While a nice, bright display can catch a customer’s eye for the right reasons, a display that’s damaged, out-of-service, or flickering gets their attention for the wrong ones. The combination of hardware, software, and internet connectivity solutions you choose is vital to harnessing the personalization power of digital signage. The signage also needs to be positioned correctly for maximum visibility, particularly if you operate multi-lane drive-thrus. And with every new device you add to your network, you add one potential entrypoint for cyberattackers to exploit.
These aren’t reasons to avoid investing in digital signage. But they are reasons to select your hardware and software carefully, and to have expert installers implement the signage across all of your locations. No matter which location a customer visits, they should be greeted by a similar digital signage setup, even if the displayed content varies by location or region.
You also need an easy-to-use, reliable solution for centralizing the management of your digital signage (if you so choose). When you’ve got dozens of locations across a large geographic area, using the wrong solution can create a major logistical headache. And with today’s connected hardware and software systems, it’s not necessary. With the right fully integrated digital signage system, you can revamp your entire menu, from your POS system to your drive-thru, using a single system.
HonorBuilt understands these challenges. For years, we’ve helped quick service restaurants implement new technologies to provide seamless experiences for their customers. Our team of in-house installers always meticulously stages and tests any new technology rollout before we ever even arrive onsite. From coast to coast, we’ll ensure that your digital signage solution is properly installed, secured, and integrated seamlessly with your systems.
To learn more about our services, get in touch with a representative today.