Three ways QSR marketers can personalize the omnichannel experience

Quick-serve restaurant customers have an unprecedented number of dining options. More than 30 percent of consumers have between five and eight QSR apps on their phone, along with third-party delivery services that open up even more options. Marketers in this climate are tasked with cutting through the noise by meeting guests wherever and however they browse menus, order food, and ultimately enjoy a tasty meal.

1:1 personalization across email, text, and branded apps ensures that marketers meet every guest with the right content through the right channel at the right time. By offering content unique to each customer, offering real-time order personalization, and creating a consistent journey across channels, marketers can ease the ordering experience while finding new ways to upsell and cater to every guest.

The best omnichannel marketing focuses on the unique needs of every guest, leveraging data to show customers that brands care about their preferences and cater to their desires. 

Below are three ways QSR marketers can infuse personalization into their omnichannel lifecycle with the goal of driving more sales and developing more loyalty.

Create campaigns that understand customer patterns

Most customers have patterns. Joe Park, Chief Digital and Technology Officer at Yum! Brands, told the Wall Street Journal that Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and KFC leverage AI to personalize each brand’s email campaign based on customer preferences. Park says, “We know our Pizza Hut consumers have different frequency and timing of orders. Some consumers will order every few weeks and love exploring our menus while others wait for special occasions like the Super Bowl and typically have large orders.”

The Yum strategy is backed up by research from Deloitte. The consulting giant found that “a well-executed, hyper-personalized marketing strategy can deliver eight times the return on investment and lift sales by ten percent or more.” By offering consistent, personalized experiences across marketing channels, QSRs can increase revenue, build loyalty, and see tangible ROI.

AI-driven personalization allows Yum to take those order patterns and build omnichannel marketing campaigns that reach individual consumers and “engage each (customer) with the relevant offers at the right time.” Of course, relevancy goes beyond understanding ordering patterns. Marketers can leverage 1:1 personalization to customize every aspect of their campaigns, including send times, subject lines, and content based on retention, referrals, and win-back strategies.

Offer real-time menu personalization and upsell opportunities 

Diners now engage with brands across the digital spectrum. And wherever and however customers order, brands can leverage data to offer personalized menus and recommended upsells based on order history. Marketers can also leverage weather, current inventory and ordering method to offer the perfect order every time.

Omnichannel personalization starts with promotional emails and notifications. Brands can send order reminders that coincide with a customer’s usual routines. If a guest is a weekday lunch regular, marketers can nudge customers to head over to the closest store for their favorite foods, displaying vegetarian options or their favorite burger, depending on the customer’s order history.

When customers order online or on an app, marketers can prioritize menu items they routinely order at the top of the order screen, saving them time going through the whole menu to find their usual order. From there, brands can deliver upsell opportunities, presenting an additional menu populated with drinks, sides, or desserts that align with customer buying patterns. 

Offer consistent experiences across channels

Personalization should be consistent across channels, allowing customers to check their loyalty rewards and order their favorite foods no matter how they engage with their favorite brand. If an email is personalized to a guest’s exact needs, the same experience with the same messaging should follow that guest on every channel. 1:1 personalization across every position makes ordering easier for customers and separates a QSR brand from competitors still stuck with batch-and blast digital marketing strategies. 

Omnichannel personalization can now also extend to the drive-through line and kiosk. Brands are now experimenting with personalized kiosks and drive-through windows that make it easier for guests to quickly find their favorite foods, redeem rewards, and enjoy a tailored experience. AI-powered kiosks can now integrate into a QSR’s loyalty program to personalize the last mile of service, ensuring that guests have a consistent experience no matter how they order.

1:1 personalization with AI decisioning 

As QSR marketers create 1:1 personalization strategies, they will inevitably wonder how AI can help achieve their goals. Customers expect their favorite restaurant to understand their needs across every channel. New tools like AI decisioning are bringing marketing into a new era, allowing brands to meet customers wherever they are with unique, individualized experiences no matter how they order. 

AI and machine learning (ML) have rapidly evolved as essential tools in a marketer’s arsenal. One common method of using AI models to personalize are so-called next best action (NBA) models, which combine predictive models and manual testing to predict a customer’s “next best action,” and encode the result as business rules. 

These “predictive models” have their limits. They’re slow, static, and can only find “winners for segments” – they cannot understand customer behavior at an individual level. AI decisioning agents rely on a different type of ML, reinforcement learning, which is best-fit for making 1:1 decisions. An AI decisioning agent chooses the best action to take for each individual, and then autonomously experiments and continuously learns from future customer actions. 

To learn more about AI decisioning, read our whitepaper on personalization trends for QSR marketers.