Full Transcript
[0:00]
Welcome to the 805 Web Minute. And today we're talking about why your restaurant's website is either serving your customers or right now sending them straight to your competition. It's such a critical question, especially here in SLO County. The stakes are just immense when we talk about that first impression. Yeah, let's just paint a picture. Imagine it Saturday evening, maybe 630, a couple just finished wine tasting up in Paso Redelies and they are hungry. They pull out their phones and they're not spending five minutes comparing menus, not a chance. No, they have maybe 60 seconds tops to pick a spot. And here's the kicker. The decision has nothing to do with your amazing chef or your friendly staff or that beautiful ocean view you have in Morro Bay. Not yet anyway. Not yet. They're entire decision hinges on one thing. What their phone loads in the first four seconds after they click your link. And if that link gives them any friction at all, a slow load, a confusing layout, they've already hit the back button. They're just gone. And for restaurant owners here in this tourism-driven area, that online friction is more than an inconvenience. It's a massive revenue killer. Absolutely. Okay, let's get into this because the data we pulled really shows a shocking dependency on that digital front door. Yeah, we have to get past this idea that people just wander in anymore. They just don't. The modern dining experience, it starts online every single time. 100%. Yeah. The perception of your business is formed way before anyone even thinks about making a reservation. Exactly. When we looked at the data, I mean, the numbers are just staggering. 77% of diners visit a restaurant's website before they do anything else. Before they dine in, before they order takeout, anything. So you're being judged by what? Three out of every four potential customers before they've even tasted a single bite of your food. And here's the really scary part. This is why this is a deep dive. The cost of failure here is huge. Get this. 68% of potential customers have been completely discouraged from visiting a restaurant because of the website alone.
[2:01]
Yeah, think about that. They were interested enough to click, but the site itself, its speed, its usability, it just turned them away. I think that is the core insight for every business owner listening. Your website is not a brochure. It is your most critical employee. It's your host stand, your menu board, and your first impression all rolled into one. And if that experience is bad, you're actively telling the vast majority of interested people to go spend their money somewhere else. You're paying to send them to your competitor down the street. What's so interesting is that a hungry person online is incredibly focused. They aren't just browsing for fun. They land on your site with like three simple, immediate questions they need answered right now. Okay, so let's break that down. What are those absolute non-negotiables? Number one, by a huge margin, is the menu. That's why they're there. Of course. But they don't just want a list. They want to see it. Our sources show that 45% of diners are specifically looking for food photos. They're deciding with their eyes. That makes perfect sense. Food is sensory. If you can't hook them visually, the words might not be enough. But what about the menu format? I know we see this problem all over the central coast. We do. And it is a silent killer. We found that 30% of visitors are turned away by menus that are just hard to read. And when you say hard to read, you're talking about those awful PDF menus, aren't you? Nine times out of 10, yes. Yeah. Those dreaded PDFs that you have to pinch and zoom and scroll around on. They never open right on a phone. The text is tiny. They're slow to download. Exactly. It just screams outdated. If your menu is a PDF, you've basically told a third of your audience that you don't value their time. Yeah. It has to be clean, readable text right on the webpage. That's a huge takeaway. Ditch the PDFs. Okay, so the menu looks great. What's the very next thing they need to know? The basic logistics. Hours in location. They need to know, are you open now? And where are you? That's especially critical here, right? A tourist might not know the difference between downtown San Luis Obispo
[4:01]
and being 15 miles away in a royal grande. You have to be crystal clear. The address needs to be right there, ready to open in a map. Don't make them hunt for it. Okay, so the menu is great. They know you're open. The next hurdle is getting a table. Let's talk booking. This is so important. 65% of people go directly to the restaurants website for reservations. So they're not starting on open table or Yelp? No, they're coming to your site because they want to deal directly with you. You own that relationship. So if they're on your site, ready to book, how do you seal the deal? You make it fast. 59% of diners prefer to pick online. Full stop. They really don't want to make a phone call. And if you don't have online booking, then your phone number has to be impossible to miss. And it has to be tapped to call. Because if your host is busy and that phone rings five times, that customer's already on your competitor's site, clicking confirm. You mentioned photos for the menu, but I heard something fascinating. That bad photos are actually worse than no photos at all. That seems wrong. How can that be? It's about perception of quality. No photos is a mystery. A bad photo suggests a lack of care. And the numbers back it up. 36% of diners have decided against a restaurant, specifically because of bad food photography. So if your pictures are dark, blurry, or just unappetizing. You are actively driving customers away. A bad photo makes them think the food might be bad, or even that the kitchen isn't clean. It breaks trust. That's a powerful warning. Okay, let's talk about something really specific to us here on the central coast, where, you know, cell service can be spotty once you get out in the vineyards. Let's talk about mobile. The mobile imperative. Yes. Guiners here are almost always on their phones. They're standing on the sidewalk, or they're trying to navigate off the 101. If your site doesn't work perfectly on their phone, you're out. Right. A mobile-friendly site isn't a bonus feature anymore. It's the absolute baseline expectation. And when we say mobile-friendly, we mean the site's design actually changes to fit the screen. It's not just a shrunken down version of your desktop site.
[6:04]
So for a restaurant owner, what does that actually look like? What should they check? First, your menu text has to be easy to read without any pinching or zooming. Second, your phone number has to be tapped to call. One touch. And third, your address has to open automatically in their maps app. Zero friction. Zero friction. And it have to be fast. You mentioned spotty cell service. If your site is bloated with huge images, it will take forever to load out and loss alamos. That delay feels like an eternity when you're hungry. And if you get it right, the payoff is huge. Eight out of 10 diners are more likely to come back to your website if they have a good first experience. You build trust just by being fast and easy to use. Which brings us to another part of that trust equation. Reviews. Right. Your website is only half the battle. Reviews are the gatekeepers. They decide if someone even bothers to click your link. And in that world, Google is king. 46% of diners check Google reviews before deciding. That's more than Yelp, TripAdvisor, and OpenTable combined. So if a restaurant owner in SLO is trying to improve their online presence, what's the magic number for their star rating? The stakes are incredibly high. A full third of your market, 33% of diners will not eat at a restaurant with less than four stars. Wait, a third. So if you're at a 3.8 or a 3.9, you're just invisible to one out of every three people looking. You are. They use it as a filter. They're hungry. They're in a hurry. They see a 3.8 and they just scroll right past to the 4.1 next door. They don't have time to read the nuance in the reviews. So how much does improving that rating actually matter to the bottom line? It's phenomenal. The data shows that every one star increase can boost your annual revenue by 5 to 9%. Wow. Let's make that real. For a restaurant doing, say, 600,000 a year, that's... That's $30,000 to $54,000 an extra revenue. That could be months of rent. It could be a key staff member salary for the year. The ROI on managing your reviews is undeniable. That really puts it in perspective. Okay, and what about planning habits?
[8:05]
People aren't booking a week in advance anymore. Are they? No. It's all about right now. 66% of diners make same-day reservations. That couple in Paso? They're deciding where to eat tonight right now. So if your website lets them grab a table in 30 seconds, you win. You solve their immediate problem. I win. And that speed ties right into takeout delivery. A lot of places rely on apps like DoorDash, but the data tells a much more profitable story. A key opportunity for sure. We found that 84% of customers would rather order delivery or takeout directly from the restaurant's website. That is almost nine out of 10 people. And they do it for a reason. They know those apps take a huge cut and they want their money to go to you, the local business. So if you're only on DoorDash, you're losing margin and you're missing the chance to build a direct relationship with your own customer. You're giving away your customer data. They're email, they're order history. It's a huge loss. Okay, this is the perfect time for a quick self-check. Everyone listening, pull up your site on your phone right now, set a 30-second timer. Let's call these the website SINs that kill revenue. Start the clock. First question. Did you struggle to find the menu or the hours? If you did, that's SIN number one. Confusing navigation. A third of your visitors are discouraged by that alone. They are gone. SIN number two. How did the photos look? Were they appetizing? Or did they look like they were taken in a dark basement? Remember, bad photos can cost you 36% of your customers. And finally, SIN number three. The one that guarantees they never come back is the information 100% current. If your site says you're open but you changed to your winter hours last week, you just created an enemy. You've lost their trust. That digital front door to your business here in Essela County, it has to be flawless. It's either earning you thousands of dollars a month or it's costing you thousands. There is no middle ground. That's the quick tip for today. If you want a professional website without the agency price tag or the DIY headache, here's the better way.
[10:06]
At Ugrow.pro, we build it, we manage it, and we handle every update forever all for just $79 a month. There is zero setup fee, no contract, and it is strictly month to month, so there is zero risk. We're local here in AG and we can have you live in days not months. Want to see what your site could look like? Go to Ugrow.pro right now and we'll design three custom mock-ups for your business completely free no strings attached. Thanks for listening and keep growing. The question you should be asking yourself tonight is, is my website an asset that's paying me or is it just digital debt?