Restaurant sales are largely influenced by two factors: how many guests you reach and how often you reach them. Increase both, and orders follow.

We then calculated their average number of guest contacts and monthly email messages, including mass emails sent to all guests and automated emails that are triggered by individual guest actions. We also looked at their average number of texts to guests and social posts each month.

The chart below highlights data for restaurants in the top 25%, i.e., those who set the bar for strong, consistent marketing. You’ll notice that restaurants in higher revenue ranges typically have significantly higher guest touchpoints.

According to the chart, if you want your annual sales to fall within $1.0M to $1.5M, you should have 4,654+ guest contacts in your database, send 7,059 mass emails, automated emails or texts each month and post on social media at least 9 times each month. If you want to hit $7M to $10M in annual sales, you should have 20,256+ guest contacts, send 38,671+ emails or texts each month, and post at least 15 times each month.

While not textbook scientific, the data is statistically meaningful and can give you a blueprint for marketing activity needed to achieve business goals.

Ocean State is an example of a single-location restaurant that does a great job of automatically collecting guest contacts on their online menu: they provide two prompts asking guests to join their VIP list, the ability to “like” and review dishes, and direct online ordering. They also incentivize guests to leave reviews with the chance to win a $500 monthly raffle. Ocean State has more than 9,000 guest contacts and reaches out to them regularly to drive repeat business.