Still using a paper waitlist or reservation book? Clinging to outdated paper-based solutions can be a drag on a restaurant. Here are six reasons to switch to a digital waitlist and reservation app like Waitlist Me. Read more at Restaurant & Cafe
The restaurant world is getting a tech upgrade, and it’s powered by AI. OpenTable’s new AI Concierge feature is a big step forward in exposure of the new type of capabilities that are now possible with vertically integrated AI, and it follows the type of features we proved were possible when we launched Perklist’s AI Assistant earlier this year in March.
OpenTable’s Concierge: Summarizing User Reviews
OpenTable, the go-to for reservations, has introduced its AI-powered Concierge. This assistant is integrated directly into the OpenTable app and website and is designed to answer a diner’s questions about a restaurant, like “What are popular dishes?” or “Can I get a vegetarian meal here?” It’s a handy tool that saves diners from having to call the restaurant or dig through different websites.
However, a key point here is where the Concierge currently gets much if not all of its information from customer reviews. The big advantage of this approach is it works with data that OpenTable already has for the restaurants using its platform, but it can be a bit of a double-edged sword for a restaurant. The AI might provide details based on a past review that may not be entirely accurate or up-to-date. A restaurant has less direct control over how this information is presented, and the AI’s response might not always perfectly align with what the business wants to communicate. Still the simplicity of just turning on this feature for existing customers with many reviews is key, and OpenTable can allow restaurants to refine or better control the feature over time.
Perklist’s AI Assistant: Utilizing Restaurant Menus and Other Information
On the other side, Perklist offers an AI Assistant that’s all about empowering the restaurant. This tool is a chatbot that a business can add to its own website and gives more control to the restaurant in the menu and other information it uses for its interactions with customers.
To set it up, you simply upload your own official menu, product list, or other business information. The AI assistant then uses this exact information—and only this information—to answer customer questions. A restaurant can also add custom details about their policies, FAQs, and hours. This means that a customer’s question about a specific menu item will be answered with the restaurant’s own description, not with an interpretation from an online review. Perklist puts the business directly in the driver’s seat, ensuring the message is always accurate and on-brand, and makes it easy to update and keep the information accurate and aligned with the business goals.
Whether you’re using the Waitlist Me web widget to let customers self-schedule or your team is entering reservations or appointments for customers, there are some optimizations you can make in your settings to get the most out of the scheduling features.
If you plan to use the widget, on the Waitlist Me website go to Account > Settings > Add Yourself. The Main View section has a feature called Time Increments, which will control how frequently the time selection option shows reservation slots to customers. You can choose every 5, 10, 15, 30 or 60 minutes. (If you haven’t started using your widget yet, also see this page for the basic setup information.)
Click Waitlist at the top to go to the main waitlist page, then click on the settings gear icon and choose Reservations. You can customize the time increments you want displayed on your calendar view and the average time a table or resource is occupied. Based on these settings you can block out your reservation availability visually in your calendar view.
Choose to show tables as occupied either by how many parties will be arriving in a time block or by how many parties are expected to be currently seated in the time block. The Arrivals option shows the total number of people arriving, with the number of groups in smaller font below if more than one group is arriving in that time block:
The Scheduled option shows the total number of people and groups being served, regardless of when they arrived:
Some settings (including many view settings) are device-specific. These settings for how you prefer to view reservations would also need to be set on tablets you plan to use. In the tablet you can navigate to the calendar and press in any time block to see an additional option on the upper right for changing views.
A Waitlist Me Pro or Platinum subscription offers more controls for scheduling. You can set up party size limits by going to Account > Settings > Add Yourself > Input Fields. Under Size Limits, select reservations, waitlist, or both. Then you’ll see the option for minimums and maximums. There are also more scheduling features available with Business Hours, Display Hours, Scheduling Rules, and Blackout Dates. Please see this page to walk through these features.
With the biggest eating-out day of the year upon us, the big question is this: How are you going to make Mother’s Day a big success for your restaurant?
It’s not just about getting people in the door. It’s not even about serving the best food in town. It’s about giving your customers the best overall experience possible—one that will keep them returning long after Mother’s Day ends. And that experience starts the minute they walk through the door.
Here are 3 ways Waitlist Me wows customers while they wait for their table
Accurate wait time estimates make you look like a pro
Shuffling through loose papers doesn’t inspire confidence. Neither does the look on your host’s face when she’s guessing when that table in the corner will turn.
Waitlist Me takes the guesswork out of time estimates. The app shows estimated waits by table size, so you have your answer with a quick look, whether it’s a table for two or ten. Plus, it tracks how long customers have been waiting in real time, right next to the time they were quoted, so you can better adjust for surges and lulls in visitors to fine tune your quote accuracy.
Text alerts let customers relax while they wait
No one wants to be tethered to a restaurant lobby—and a cluster of hungry people waiting for a table can be a turn-off for walk-ins.
Waitlist Me lets you text guests when their table is ready, which means they can wander freely without worrying that they’ll miss their name being called. We’ve even made it easy for them to let you know they’re on their way, or that they need to cancel with a simple text response.
A public waitlist allows customers to see where they are in line (and plan accordingly)
An out-the-door line keeps you busy enough. Add the inevitable “how long will it be?” grumbles to the mix, and you’ve got mayhem on your Mother’s Day menu.
When you add a customer to your waitlist, Waitlist Me sends them a confirmation text automatically. That text includes a link to your public waitlist, empowering them to check on their place in line wherever they are, whenever they want. The less time your team has to spend providing updated estimates to the people waiting, the more time they can spend greeting and making guests feel welcome.
A 5-minute fix? You bet.
You can start using Waitlist Me now on any iOS, Android, or web-accessible device. Getting started is easy, and you can get it up and running in less time than it takes you to fire up your restaurant’s most popular dish. Now that’s a win!
Waitlist Me makes it simple to know the best place to seat your next customer. Our unique approach to section management blends psychology, data science, and cutting-edge design principles to create an intuitive tool that restaurant staff can pick up in a few minutes and enjoy using. See how it works in this video:
The old way of scribbling on a laminated floor plan with a grease pen is messy and inefficient. It’s hard to estimate wait times and optimize table assignments without seeing key information like how long tables have been occupied.
Most apps that try to use data to improve on the grease pen approach make the mistake of clinging to the old-fashioned floor map diagram, which is deceptively complex. Why? Searching the whole map for the information you need is slow. Comparing different clusters of shapes, colors, and symbols is complicated. And interpreting a bunch of unordered data, like little progress bars, spread across all the tables, is very difficult. To name a few reasons.
All this extra complexity is unnecessary. Wait staff shouldn’t need a map to find tables after a couple days on the job. What they need is a fair, easy, intuitive way to know where to seat the next customer.
Look how much simpler it is when you group tables into a framework where the data can work for you, and you can read key information naturally like a book, in ordered lines, from top to bottom and left to right.
Tables are grouped by sections, and sorted by availability to make comparisons and decisions simple. The open tables for each section stand out in green on the left. Tables that have been occupied the longest show first, with the time displayed in the lower left. So it is easy to do a quick scan within a section to see how busy it is, as well as compare across sections.
Tapping on a table will bring up an action bar for adding customers to tables, clearing tables when done, changing table statuses, and more. This page has a good overview and video of the other table management features.
If you organize your tables and sections differently by day or time, Waitlist Me also gives you the flexibility to switch between different layouts. For example, you might divide tables into 6 sections for a busy weekend night, but only need 3 for a regular weekday night. By tapping on the Layouts link in the top right, you can choose from among your saved layouts and regroup your tables and sections on the fly.
Creating and editing sections layouts can be done in the app settings under Manage Assignments. There you can also choose to have different colors represent different sections or special tables within a section or layout as well.
With Waitlist Me’s table management features, your customers will get better service, with less waiting. Your employees will get their fair share of the work, and the tips. And you’ll have a more efficient restaurant, and a more profitable business.
Stop struggling with floor maps. Take control of your tables, and your business, with Waitlist Me.