Paper menus have been a staple of the restaurant industry for a long time, but now there is a new option – digital signage. This might be the first time you’re thinking about using digital signage in your restaurant. It’s expensive to invest in all those screens, but what are some of the reasons to do so? Here are five ways you might find that digital signage for your restaurant is the right solution to out of date and old-fashioned paper menus.

• Keep It Relevant

It seems like guidelines for the food service industry are always changing, like the recent legislation that made it a requirement for restaurant chains of more than 20 stores to include nutritional information. Digital menu signage is an easy solution to comply with signage, update nutritional information, or menu items with a few simple steps.

• Increase Agility

Businesses with small, constantly changing menus will find it easy to stay up to date with menu changes and price fluctuation by using digital signage to display menus. Because there are no paper menus to design, print, and ship, restaurants can turn on a dime in offering fresh and seasonal items without worrying about updating a paper menu.

Additionally, digital signage makes it a snap to update promotions during happy hour, run holiday specials, or to quickly run promotions at the spur of the moment to push undersold items. A 2013 study found that digital signs were 35% more effective in promoting specific items that static signs were.

• Save Face

Along the same lines, digital menus displayed digitally means you can keep your customers up to date by the minute with any menu changes. This can help your customers avoid disappointment if they were craving a popular item that just sold out. Now they’ll have the time to decide on something else without the pressure of standing right in front of a waiter. If you offer bright, enticing pictures of your menu items, it can even help your diners chose something new they might like even more than that tried and true favourite.

• Increase Diner Enjoyment

Digital signage in your restaurant gives you the chance to play videos or snappy animations with bright colors, which can decrease perceived wait times up to 35% during busy periods. This can help pass the time if there’s a long line and leave your diners feeler more satisfied while waiting in line. You can also display images from social media like photos from Instagram or Tweets that tag your restaurant. Ask your diners to get involved and snap a photo of their meal or share their dining experience.

• Make Your Personality Pop

Branding is the buzzword of the year with every business worrying about its image to its customers. Digital signage is a wonderful tool to use to make sure that your carefully crafted branding resonates with your diners. A study published last year found that 55% of customers that saw a digital billboard were highly engaged with it and could remember the message virtually every time they passed it, which means that digital signs could help increase your restaurant’s brand awareness with diners.

Digitally displaying your branding means that you will be displaying your restaurant’s truest branding colors with better clarity and you’ll stay in full control of the entire process. Better yet – with the ability to make changes with the touch of a button, it’s easy to show your personality with quick updates throughout the day or week.

If you’re excited about the possibilities with digital signage, you can read more about how OptiSigns can help you implement digital signage in your restaurant here.

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