The accelerated technological advancement in recent years, combined with the ever-changing customer trends, has altered how we live, work, and consume. As a result, almost every industry has changed how they interact and do business with their customers.

Over the years, the hotel restaurant industry has relied on various technologies to run its operations and to tackle a multitude of challenges it faces. These cover everything from recruiting and retaining skilled staff to optimizing pricing strategies and adapting to new consumer dining habits and diner expectations while also managing multi-properties across different geographies. By adopting tech in their operations, hotel restaurants had been able to navigate these challenges and stay competitive in their industry.

With that in mind, below are seven ways F&B hotel restaurant operators can leverage technology to run their restaurant businesses more efficiently:

1. Manage your online reputation

In this digital age, everyone has easy access to information. Determining a restaurant brand's online perception is crucial, and it demands a proactive approach to managing the information people find on the internet. Most consumer decisions are now often reliant on online reviews from other guests, as much as they would regard personal recommendations coming from friends and family.

To manage the brand's online reputation, hotel restaurants can use digital surveys to gain insights into customer satisfaction and areas for improvement. Leveraging guests' feedback combined with creating highly personalized dining experiences will help enhance the restaurant's standing in the eyes of its guests.

By using its Guest Feedback Survey feature, restaurants can gather first-hand guest information to improve guest satisfaction and personalization.

RELATED: Create and customize guest surveys using TableCheck | Top 10 restaurant survey questions to improve guest satisfaction

2. Personalize the dining experience using data

F&B has a very competitive landscape and being distinctive often poses the greatest challenge. It is essential for every operator to have access to customer data to provide unique personalized dining experiences to new customers and retain loyal ones. 

A sophisticated restaurant booking platform like TableCheck can help improve Guest Profiles in a seamless way and can aid the staff to understand their guests' preferences, likes, and dislikes. It can secure guest information from different aspects of their dining journey, to help them deliver memorable dining experiences to guests.

And here's another benefit: By leveraging their own guest data, hotel restaurants can convert guests into direct booking patrons, increasing their profits while reducing dependence on costly third-party or online travel agency (OTA) booking platforms.

RELATED: Fuel your success with your own restaurant guest data

3. Combine eco-conscious thinking with tech

Across every industry, sustainable business practices are becoming non-negotiable, and hospitality and F&B are no exception. The demand for more initiatives and accountability from brands in various industries are becoming more adamant as the world is fast-tracking its Net Zero efforts.

Enhancing the dining experience in a more environmentally and socially responsible way can sound a like a tedious task, but restaurants can leverage technology to fast-track their eco-initiatives. Using automated inventory systems to track supplies or monitor their consumption of energy and water is a good start. Even using cloud-based apps like TableCheck for Table Management and Table Reservations can help restaurants lessen their consumption of paper and reduce errors in booking and orders. It reduces carbon footprint and helps improve restaurant operations.

With the rise of eco-conscious travelers, many hotels have drastically upgraded and lined up more technological upgrades to provide their guests with bespoke experiences and options that are healthy for them and the planet.

RELATED: Going eco-friendly: The future of restaurants

4. Integrate new digital solutions to optimize operations

Investing in new technologies in daily operations contributes to the enterprise's efficiency and gives them a significant competitive advantage in the market. By staying updated with trends and gaining insights into changing consumer habits, businesses can unlock a full circle of benefits. This includes enhancing business operations, improving customer service, increasing profits, and elevating employee satisfaction. Embracing new technologies brings about many advantages that positively impact various aspects of the enterprise.

TableCheck Insight feature equips operators with essential information to help them make better-informed decisions to accelerate revenue and profit not just for one but for all their multi properties. Hotel and restaurant operators can discover trends and patterns within the industry, and rank different booking channels to analyze different segments of their business. This feature also provides them the advantage of understanding spending habits and visit history to increase guest retention and evaluate data across multiple venues without manual input.

5. Incorporate menu engineering and innovation

Customers’ needs and wants are constantly evolving. Trends come and go and the next big thing is just hours apart. When it comes to food, consumers are persistently demanding options, which continuously expand along with higher expectations of quality and taste.

This is where the need for constant review of the menu is a prerequisite when it comes to operating a restaurant. With a lot of dietary restrictions that spurred out in recent years, coupled with the rise of eco-conscious consumers, the consequences will affect both the front and back end of the restaurant. As inflation directly affects food and operational costs, there are a lot of instances where creativity and innovation need to be involved in delivering a top-notch dining experience

RELATED: How technology can help restaurants beat inflation

6. Automate marketing campaigns

In today's competitive market, hotel restaurants must stand out and engage better with guests. Aside from having a social media presence, hotel restaurants can also directly manage their relationship with guests by using automated marketing tools to create promotional materials that appeal to their market segments. Tools like TableCheck EDM can help hotel restaurants automate their marketing campaigns with a click of a finger while differentiating themselves from their competitors and enticing guests to choose their establishment over others.

TableCheck EDM feature makes it convenient for operators to send automated email marketing to targeted customers while building long-term loyalty among guests.

RELATED: How to run successful EDM marketing campaigns

7. Level up your staff with digital transformation training: Get them tech-savvy

Delivering a consistent dining experience requires a lot of learning.  More than finding skilled individuals, educating staff about the enterprise's goals and vision will enable them to deliver a much better dining experience to guests.

For hotels and restaurants that are on the path of digital transformation, it's key to empower their employees with essential digital skills. Equipping them will enable them to use various digital tools to run restaurant operations more effectively. This includes managing their TMS (Table Management System) or crafting EDM newsletters for marketing campaigns.

Training the team also creates connectedness to the brand. Effective teamwork makes day-to-day operations run more smoothly and increase employee morale. This, in turn, boosts so much more efficiency and reduces turnover costs, while the staff stays motivated while they progress in their roles.

RELATED: How to train staff to deliver an exceptional guest experience