Incentivizing new and existing customers to order from your restaurant by sending them great deals remains one of the most popular ways to drive more sales and increase customer engagement. In this article, we discuss the benefits of Automatic URL Coupons and how they can guarantee significantly higher conversions and customer retention.

The Old Way - Coupon Codes

The most enduring question restaurant owners and managers ask themselves is, “How do I get more restaurant sales online? The most common answer to that question is to use coupon codes to entice people to place orders and get discounts.

Sure, coupon codes help motivate prospective customers to place orders. But have you ever wondered why some of your coupon campaigns don’t perform as expected even though you offered great deals? 

One common issue with coupon codes is that they are difficult to memorize and typos are a common occurrence. As such, recipients often fail to type in the correct codes. In 2021, the average attention span continues to reduce drastically. After a user has incorrectly entered a coupon code, they may get frustrated and give up.

Also, ideally, the best sales strategy is to make the user journey as short as possible. When you use coupon codes to try to win customers, you are requiring them to take an extra step – manually typing in (or copying and pasting) coupon codes.

Online coupon codes were once a gamechanger. But that era has passed. There is a much better way to make sure that people redeem your restaurant coupons.

What are Automatic URL Coupons?

An Automatic URL Coupons is a coupon that is embedded in a link to make the coupons automatically get applied when somebody clicks on that link. It’s that simple!

How do Automatic URL Coupons benefit your restaurant?

Automatic URL Coupons make it incredibly easy for your customers to redeem your offers with just a single click. No need to memoize coupon codes. No need to copy-paste the coupon code. The process of redeeming a coupon is automatic. Any discount associated with the automatic coupon link will be applied automatically. In doing so, you are effectively reducing the customer journey by taking out that extra step of manually entering coupons and dramatically increasing the likelihood that the customer will redeem the coupon.

And oh, the URLs can be dynamic. That is to say, you don’t have to create a new coupon link every time you want to run a different promo, as it is possible to simply reuse the same link for more than one campaign.

TLDR: Automatic URL coupons will help you: 

1. Simplify the process of customers adding coupons
2. Reduce support issues where customers have mistyped a coupon code
3. Shorten the customer journey  and increase conversion of a coupon deal by making sure no one has any issues in redeeming it
4. Save time and resources as links are reusable.

Some common use cases for Automatic Coupon URLs include:

1. Retargeting Campaigns: When retargeting new customers with great offers, instead of sending them coupon codes that they would have to manually copy and paste, just send them an Automatic Coupon URL. For example, if you own a macaroni and cheese speciality cafe called Mac n' Cheese Cafe, and you are offering 20% OFF promo, your link can look something like this: order.macncheesecafe.com/save20  

When a recipient clicks on the link, it'll take them to a page with a welcome message and they can start ordering right away. While adding items to the cart, they will see the coupon being automatically added. They don’t need to copy and paste any codes.

2. Influencer marketing: Let’s say you want to partner with an Instagram food influencer named Alice Walkman, to run a special 25%-off campaign. Instead of using Alice’s name to create a coupon code that their audience would have to manually enter, you would create a custom URL link that looks like this: order.macncheesecafe.com/alicewalkman25.  Alice will then include this link in their Instagram bio. Again, once users click on the link, the coupon will automatically be applied.
3. As a QR code on promo fliers: Sometimes you want to take your restaurant marketing campaigns offline. You could also generate QR codes with your automatic coupon URL and print them on a campaign poster like this (image below). The same rules apply: all your audience needs to do is scan the QR code and see the coupon automatically added.

Conclusion

The easier your customers are able to redeem your coupons, the better your sales will grow. Including Automatic URL Coupons in your restaurant marketing strategy will give customers an easier, faster-ordering experience, which in turn will increase your conversion and customer retention rate.