Digital signage is leading a revolution in the world of quick service restaurants or QSRs. The right digital signage solution can help to improve service and elevate sales, whether it's through promoting popular meals effectively or improving overall customer experience and loyalty. 

While this usually means digital menu boards, the truth is, there is more to QSR signage than just menus.

Why use digital signage for fast food or cafes?

More than ever, customers expect an efficient service and less friction in finding what they want. In simple terms, this means being able to choose the preferred items and checkout using self service or quick service elements.

The customer journey also needs to be smooth, with as few opportunities for delays. And, in addition, the business owner is often looking to increase sales or raise awareness of other products.

Digital signage offers a number of simple benefits including being able to display a clear menu board, displaying images, promotional messages or other relevant content.

What type of digital signage is used in quick service restaurants?

Restaurants, coffee shops and fast food businesses are increasingly relying on digital content to improve the dining experience. This means installing displays —screens, tablets, and kiosks—to communicate dynamic and eye catching content to customers or improve the in-restaurant customer experience.

Typically, quick service restaurants and coffee shops will display their menu board above the bar or order station. But they are also seeing the value in menu screens for restaurants streaming eye-catching food images or highlighting specific menu items or special offers.

In a fast food or quick service environment, efficiency and ease of customer engagement are both important, and that’s why digital signage is key. Screens can serve as a crucial driver of sales and efficiency through:

Dynamic menu boards: Showing the menu, prices and additional info such as special offers or QR codes to order at table

Digital posters: Playing promotions and special offers either in the store itself or in the window

Self checkout kiosks: Quickly and easily order without queueing at the cash desk

Point-of-sale (POS) displays: Strategically placed screens highlighting special offers designed to upsell at the checkout

Video walls: Eye-catching visual displays showing everything from the brand story to lifestyle content

Table screens: Tablet sized screens which can show the menu and include ordering functionality

Read More: How to Do Point of Sale Marketing Right 

Benefits of digital signage in fast food or cafe settings

1. Dynamic content with minimal design knowledge

Using digital signage software such as ScreenCloud, even teams without design expertise can easily create compelling, professional-grade content. We built our intuitive platform to simplify content management while maintaining the visual quality you expect for your brand.

You can create slides using dozens of templates, or use our Quick Post app to create screen-ready content in a few clicks. And with a suite of apps tailored for quick service restaurants, you can publish beautiful sales-driving content to all of your screens.

At the point of purchase, smaller digital screens such as tablets can be used to upsell based on products or customer behavior. Messages urging customers to upgrade their meal for just $2, or to take advantage of a great deal for just a little extra can have a huge impact on these kinds of sales opportunities.

Digital signage lets QSRs quickly update menus to reflect current availability. Easily transition from breakfast to lunch service with pre-scheduled menus. Stay agile during high-traffic hours and ensure your customers always see up-to-date, accurate information.

On busy days, digital menu boards can be adapted to show expected wait times, or remind patrons of additional seating areas.

Our Digital Menu Board app comes with ready to use templates, or easily create your own.

Read more: How to Make a Digital Menu Board

Digital signage can address one of the biggest customer pain points in quick service restaurants: waiting for their order. Screens can streamline the ordering process by displaying clear digital menus as soon as customers enter, positioned in key areas to improve visibility.

Restaurants can also display their order queue to customers so they can see how long orders are taking - and where their order is in the queue. Using ScreenCloud digital signage means you can easily integrate your order management software and display it on your screens.

Another way screens improve the customer experience is by displaying a variety of engaging content, from social media feeds and weather updates to live news and sports scores.

We’ve also seen that strategically placed screens can reduce perceived wait times by up to 35%.

Digital signage screens make it easy to maintain consistent brand messaging across multiple restaurants and locations because you can manage all of your content from a central control panel. 

For example, if you manage a chain, you can quickly and easily share company wide promotions. But you can also share location specific special offers, or schedule content for local events or occasions.

And because your restaurant content is managed using cloud based software, you don't need to upload files from USB sticks or do fiddly manual updates. One less thing to do in your day!

There are many ways to use digital signage to improve customer engagement with your brand. A simple and easy method is to add your social media feed to your digital posters, or add a call to action to follow your company on socials on your menu boards.

You can also display your Google or Yelp feedback on window display screens, or share your loyalty program on your point of sale displays.

Some more ideas can include a call to action to sign up for your newsletter, or asking people to share their pictures or feedback on social media in return for a discount or freebie.

Instead of tired piece of paper on the wall displaying the calories and allergy information of a dish, digital signage allows you to easily add these features in a clear and engaging way. With customer access to touchscreen devices, the customer can click and view additional nutritional information so they can make more informed decisions about their choices.

This can also be displayed on a digital menu, or accessed via QR codes.

All of this information makes the ordering experience less stressful for those who might have special dietary requirements or who want peace of mind.

Launch ScreenCloud’s digital signage for your quick service restaurant

Whether it's showcasing your menu options on your digital menu boards, sharing images of your new mouth watering dishes, or sharing details of your monthly promotional offers, digital signage is becoming a must have for food-based businesses.

While many solutions offer basic functionality, ScreenCloud's digital signage software stands out for its premium features. You get seamless integration with your current software solutions, meaning you can easily integrate dashboards to display pending orders or display promotions.

And with a centralized and cloud based control panel, it's easy to manage content across different branches of your QSR chain. This enables brand consistency, easy content scheduling and an easy-to-use content creation suite perfectly suited for QSRs' needs. 

Sign up for a free 14-day trial today. No credit card required.

Digital signage in quick serve restaurants and fast food is changing how customers interact. Find out how businesses are using signage to boost sales.

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