How do I Create a Great Website for my Takeaway Food Business?
Takeaways are becoming an increasingly popular dining option in the UK. Due to the increase in popularity of takeaways following the pandemic, demand is also rising. This increase in demand means taking orders over the phone is probably not the easiest way to keep up with the building volume of orders.
As a restaurant owner you are responsible for creating a positive experience and providing overall satisfaction to your customers so that they will want to keep coming back for more. At first, a customer’s view and opinion of your business may be based solely on your website, so it is important that you provide a site that is fast, convenient, and easy to navigate to ensure satisfaction for every customer.
What does a good takeaway site contain?
The essential information
To make your site easy to navigate, all the essential information should be easy to find from the home page. Hungry customers don’t want to waste time browsing confusing websites before choosing where to eat, so you risk losing customers if your website is not streamlined.
The most important things diners want to know are:
What’s on the menu
Takeaway, delivery and collection options
The restaurant’s address (with a link to Google maps)
Contact details (i.e. the phone number and email) and social media links
Opening times
Transport and parking information
Cancellation policy
Providing a responsive website design is one thing, but making sure all these key pieces of information are located where they can be easily found so that your website is user friendly is also crucial. Your contact information should be easy to find to show you are ready to assist with any type of enquiry or concern your customers may have. Being difficult to contact would be like taking too long to seat and serve dine-in customers, so it is important to be able to acknowledge their queries immediately.
By making your site easy to navigate, you ensure that hungry and impatient visitors don’t go elsewhere as essential information is front and centre.
The Stoke Inn, Chew Valley
The Menu
The most obvious highlight of your homepage should be your menu as this is the main thing you’re advertising so should be easy to find. Your menu should be up to date, clearly indicate vegetarian and vegan options and highlight other allergy or nutrition information available.
Don’t upload your menu as an image (i.e. a photo of the menu), provide a searchable menu. An easily avoidable but very common mistake for takeaway and restaurant websites is providing a copy of the menu as an image. This causes your menu to be unreadable by search engines and difficult for customers to access and navigate.
Providing your menu as a searchable section of your website also makes it possible to make adjustments to it with an online editing system so making amends is quick and easy if prices or dishes change. Keeping your menu updated prevents conflicts or disappointment for your customers when taking orders and reservations.
Make sure the menu provided is interactive, easily searchable and has adequate details to keep your customers informed about the contents of the dishes you serve.
Indian Rassasy, Hotwells
A Gallery of High Quality Images
High quality is the key focus here. Delicious food does not always look so delicious on camera, as it’s surprisingly difficult to make food look palatable in photographs – poor attempts will make your food look worse and likely not do it justice. Hiring a professional photographer is the smartest route here. Professional images are also great to use for social media promotion.
The Stoke Inn, Chew Valley
Make it easier to order from you with an order/delivery function
Now more than ever, customers want the ability to easily order and pay online without needing to call and place an order over the phone. This makes the process of ordering hassle-free for your customers.
There are a variety of options for how to do this; you could register with a third-party delivery service such as Deliveroo, Just Eat, Uber Eats or a number of others. However, if you don’t want to give a portion of your revenue in fees to one of their services, you could integrate a third-party order and pay app into your website and hire drivers independently. This could include an intuitive basket and ordering function where customers can select the dishes they want directly from your menu when browsing.
Indian Rassasy, Hotwells
Make it mobile-friendly
With over half of internet traffic coming from mobile devices, it is more important than ever for your website to be optimised for easy navigation on smartphones. Making your website mobile-friendly is one of the most effective ways you can avoid losing customers. If your website is difficult to navigate, people won’t bother trying to use your website and will take their business elsewhere.
46% of food delivery is currently processed through smartphones, this evident dependency of modern diners on mobile technology means that percentage will only grow with time. Making your website suitable for mobile devices will reduce the likelihood of customers going elsewhere for their takeaway food. Making your website design mobile-friendly can also boost engagement as customers won’t have to leave your site to use another app when completing their transaction with your business.
Reviews/link to TripAdvisor
Advertising reviews from previous customers that visitors can see without having to leave your website shows transparency and builds customers trust for your business. It shows visitors to your website you have nothing to hide and you’re doing your best to give all your customers a great experience.
Indian Rassasy, Hotwells
Communicate why they should use you
Many restaurants and takeaways make great use of social media to market their business in areas that are important to customers. For example, takeaways may show the process they go through to disinfect their delivery bags, clean their kitchens, and the personal protection equipment that is used to show how they are protecting customers during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Next steps
Once you have ensured all the above information is readily available on your website, give it an additional push on social media or in your café/restaurant/takeaway. If you are struggling to edit your website then do give us a call at it’seeze Web Design Bristol on 07837 003937 or contact us via our contact page – we would love to find out more about your business and show you how we can help you increase your customer base online.
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