In a time of self-isolation and social distancing, what’s one of the best things to keep people sane? Your delicious food and beverages! And that’s where Abacus’ Online Ordering for restaurants and cafés helps your business provide services that satisfy your customers’ needs.
If you’ve already activated your Abacus Online Ordering system, this is a quick guide to help you maximise your ability to take online takeaway and delivery orders. If you’re someone new who is interested in implementing this system in your own store, you can learn more about it here. If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to open up the chat bubble in the bottom right corner to chat with our product specialists.
Without further ado, let’s get into it.
1. Refresh your menu
With your new online web ordering system in place, you are essentially opening up a new storefront for your business. So make sure your menu reflects that. Customise your menu to your liking with the products you want customers to be able to purchase through your online store.
Through the Abacus backend, you can then upload mouth-watering images and descriptions to those products to help customers know exactly what they’re ordering. You’ll also have the ability to flag new and popular products that reflect immediately to your online store, so customers can be enticed by the new products you’ve added or gravitate toward the products you’re best at!
2. Efficiency in the kitchen
It takes time for you to create your dishes, so it would be unreasonable for customers to expect their orders to come prepared immediately. This is where you are able to set an “Order Preparation Time” in the Abacus backend so that you don’t get orders any sooner than you can complete them.
For example, if you set a 30 minute order preparation time, customers won’t be able to place an order and pick it up within 20 minutes. This gives your team the flexibility to take the time required to make sure every dish is perfect.
This also ensures that the order dockets don’t print out any sooner than it is required. For example, keeping with the 30 minute preparation time, when a customer places an order ahead of time for 6pm, you will be able to approve the order but the docket won’t print out until 5:30pm. This in essence keeps your kitchen ticking along without any confusion and unnecessary dockets clogging up your backhouse.
3. Preparing your store for delivery
With many stores having to make the tough decision of letting go employees, this is a reality that you can potentially avoid with your now implemented online ordering system.
A great way to keep your beloved employees on your books is to potentially shift them to delivery for a temporary amount of time. This therefore allows your team to still support themselves and their families while also helping your business generate online delivery revenue without the added cost of hiring new delivery drivers or services.
In times like this, it is always best to look at how we can make the best of what we’ve got 👍
4. Share it with the world
With your online ordering store set up, the most important thing to do is shout it out to the world! Upon completing your setup, you would have been met with a variety of different options that allow you to notify your customers that you’re open for (online) business.
Utilise your social media channels by sharing the direct URL to your customers or implement a button on your webpage that links directly to your online store. We’ve given you a QR code – you can even use this on digital posts or physical posters at your shop front to allow customers to quickly navigate to the online store with a quick scan on their smartphones.
We hope this helps you get fully up and running with your Abacus Online Ordering platform for takeaway and delivery.
If you’re interested in opening up your business to online sales, and takeaway and delivery functionality, we are currently providing our Online Ordering platform with NO upfront cost and $0 ongoing monthly fees on top of your regular Abacus POS subscription. The only additional cost to you is a small 5% transaction fee.
Submit your interest here or email us at sales@abacus.co and our product specialists will reach out to you to discuss how we can help your business in these tough times. Alternatively, give us a call on (03) 9017 2792.