Use POS data to enhance holiday marketing promos

Using your POS data is a great way to identify best-selling items and peak periods at your restaurant, especially during the holidays. Doing this will provide accurate performance insights and help you plan campaigns that maximize returns.

When it comes to consumer spending during the winter holidays, Christmas typically leads, followed by Thanksgiving, and New Year’s. That’s why it’s particularly important that restaurants increase traffic, sales, and customer satisfaction on those special days of the year.

According to Global Payments Systems, a good restaurant POS system can help operators plan holiday marketing campaigns by providing data on personalized offers, tracking campaign performance for maximum effectiveness, managing inventory of seasonal items, and enabling targeted promotions, such as gift cards and loyalty rewards. For example, the information its Genius POS product line provides can help create successful campaigns that resonate with customers and ramp up sales.

4 areas where POS data will drive sales

Here are four areas where restaurant POS systems could increase sales during the holidays:

1. Data-driven marketing. Your POS system can analyze your guests’ purchase histories, including preferences and visit patterns, allowing restaurants to create personalized holiday offers, like vouchers for favorite meals or discounts on new menu items. It can also track which promotions perform best, giving you the opportunity to adjust strategies for success. In addition, they can identify peak hours and days to help staff accordingly and create targeted promotions for those dayparts. 
2. Inventory and menu management. Advanced POS systems can monitor stock levels of popular holiday dishes and automate your re-order processes to ensure that high-demand items don’t run out. They can also manage seasonal specials by tracking inventory of ingredients used to create special holiday menus and prevent the over-ordering of perishable stock items. 
3. Loyalty and promotions. Operators can integrate their POS systems with their loyalty programs to offer exclusive holiday treats, such as double points or special deals that encourage repeat visits. They can also track and manage gift card sales, a major revenue driver during the holidays. Last, but not least, operators can use POS data to create and manage holiday-themed coupon promotions, like "buy one, get one free," on seasonal drinks or discounted festive dishes. 
4. Operational efficiency. Using POS systems to accept various payment methods will result in smoother and faster guest checkout experiences, especially during the holiday crush. Not only that, if it’s integrated with your off-premises ordering component, you can manage holiday orders more efficiently, ensuring a better customer experience for in-person and off-premises guests.