1. Owner.com – best for increasing sales
Owner.com combines an online ordering system with automatic marketing features.
It’s designed for restaurants that want to increase their direct online orders. If you’re already doing thousands of dollars a month with the delivery apps, we’ll help you save on fees while getting your customers to order direct.
Our direct online ordering system does that by turning your website into your #1 direct order channel.
Owner.com drives more visitors to your website, converts those visitors into customers, then turns those customers into loyal regulars.
Here’s how it works:
We drive more visitors to your website
Owner.com is the only online ordering system designed to get you more traffic from Google.
When someone types in your cuisine in Google, we use SEO (search engine optimization) to put you at the top of the page. Here’s an example from a customer. Try the search yourself:
Owner.com gets your website to the top of Google because we’ve built our online ordering platform around best practices for restaurant SEO.
We convert visitors into customers
Today, everyone is used to ordering from third-party delivery apps. That’s because the apps have spent billions of dollars testing the best ways to get people to buy.
So why reinvent the wheel? Owner.com designs your online ordering system to feel like the third-party delivery apps. We use all their best practices to give you a website that converts three to five times more than the online ordering systems on this list.
Here’s how we do it:
Conversion best practice: We get your customers to build their cart ASAP
All the other online ordering systems want to give you a pretty website.
Owner.com gives you a website that makes money first, and looks good second. One of the best practices we use is getting visitors start building their cart immediately.
We put your popular items and favorites, which gets customers excited to add items to their cart. It’s also simple to choose pickup or delivery.
When people start building their cart ASAP, they’re more likely to complete their order, increasing your sales.
Conversion best practice: Increase average ticket size
Not only do we get more people to order, we also get visitors to order more.
As customers are building their cart on your website, we’ll suggest “Commonly Paired” items to bump up your ticket size.
Also, when customers click “Checkout” to complete their order, they get a popup like this:
Features like these are why our online ordering system consistently increases your average ticket size and profit margins.
Conversion best practice: Zero-commission delivery
With the Owner.com online ordering system, you get commission-free delivery.
Customers love this: it’s cheaper for them instead of ordering from the apps. Some restaurants also mark up their prices on the delivery apps. Since Owner.com is commission free, you don’t have to do that.
Fair for you, and fair for your guests – which gets them to want to order from you directly, increasing your online orders. Learn more about how Owner.com handles delivery here.
Turn customers into regulars
A branded mobile app & customer loyalty program
With Owner.com, you also get a branded app at no extra cost. With your app on their home screen, they’ll think of you more often, getting them to browse your menu when they’re hungry.
Your app comes with a built-in customer loyalty program, so customers get rewards for coming back.
Driving repeat orders is what turns customers into regulars, increasing your sales.
Automatic email & SMS marketing
Another way our online ordering system keeps your customers coming back:
Automatic marketing.
For example, Owner.com has built-in email campaigns to help you revive your regulars. It also comes with built-in SMS reminder campaigns for those customers who tend to order on the same night every week.
We’ve built in these automations into Owner.com, helping you increase your restaurant direct online orders without having to manually set up campaigns.
“We’ve more than doubled our direct online sales since starting. I didn’t think having our own app would work, but our regulars love it and use it constantly.” - Timirie Shibley, owner of Doo-Dah Diner. Watch her story here.
2. Toast – best for Toast POS users
Toast POS is a restaurant management platform that extends its capabilities to a powerful online ordering system.
If increasing sales isn’t your main goal, and you just want to deal with one vendor, Toast can be a great choice for your online ordering system.
t offers an all-in-one solution that combines point of sale, online ordering, and delivery management into a seamless experience for both restaurant operators and customers.
Key features include:
- Tableside Ordering and Checkout: Toast POS offers mobile ordering and payment processing at the table. However, payment processing is unavailable offline, which could be limiting in case of unreliable internet connections.
- Online Ordering and Delivery: The system enables online order placement and real-time delivery tracking for restaurants without their own delivery drivers. Access to online ordering requires a subscription to one of the bigger paid plans.
- Analytics: From sales to labor and inventory, Toast offers restaurant owners real-time reporting to keep your operations tightly managed.
- Menu Management: Quick and easy menu updates are a breeze with Toast. However, it lacks built-in nutritional information unless you opt for a more complex solution.
Toast has an average rating of 4.2 out of 5 on Capterra across more than 450 reviews. Here’s what one of the reviewers had to say about Toast’s online ordering system:
Pros: “The whole package is easy to use and provides a huge amount of valuable information. It also helps build sales with ordering and marketing options (some of which are at additional cost).”
Cons: “The initial installation required us to do a great deal of the set-up work, which required outside technical help. It also would have been nice to have someone present for an extra day or two to help with errors and changes. I am interested in rolling out Toast Order and Pay, but Toast can't locate a similar restaurant for me to model, which is causing delays in using this feature.”
3. BentoBox – for upscale restaurants
BentoBox is a restaurant marketing platform that helps restaurants design websites with an online ordering portal. They have a focus on designing attractive websites, which make them a particularly great fit for upscale restaurants. They don’t provide a branded mobile app, which is fine since most upscale restaurants focus on the dine-in experience.
Key features include:
- Simple Integration: The online ordering experience is an extension of the restaurant's brand, offering a consistent look and feel that matches the in-person dining experience. It's designed to be mobile-friendly, allowing customers to order conveniently from any device, and for multi-location restaurants, it centralizes orders through one unified URL.
- Sales and Inventory Management: The platform allows for real-time inventory updates, lets guests know about item availability on your online menu, and streamlines the checkout process with various payment options, including Apple Pay and Google Pay. Restaurants can also drive sales by creating promo codes and loyalty programs.
- Marketing Automation: Comes with built in marketing tools, including direct integrations with social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook, email marketing campaigns, and feedback collection through SMS and email, all manageable through free social media templates.
- Centralized Operations: Restaurants can control their operations from a single dashboard, which includes managing orders, viewing revenue reports, and configuring printers and payment processes. It offers flexibility in menu and promotion updates and provides insights into diner behavior and ordering patterns.
- Group Ordering Capabilities: Supports group ordering, allowing customers to place collective orders with a single payment and share the order via a link or QR code, all without incurring third-party fees.
BentoBox has an average rating of 4.4 out of 5 across 24 reviews on Capterra at the time of writing.
Here’s what one of the reviewers had to say about the Bentobox:
Pros: The websites look great, the content is easy to update, and when we have something to say, we're able to say it directly to our audience.
Cons: I don't think the navigation tools behind the scenes are particularly intuitive. I often feel like I'm digging around for the right box.
4. Popmenu – for dine-in restaurants
Popmenu is designed to give restaurants control over their online ordering process, from customer interaction to final sale, but it does not have a mobile app, which is a key driver for sales and customer convenience today.
Popmenu websites also prioritize design over conversion. Therefore, it’s a great solution for restaurants focused on dine-in, where direct online ordering is not the priority.
Key features include:
- Direct Engagement: Customers can keep the online ordering experience in-house, and build their website for customers to place orders.
- Data Insights: You can collect valuable customer data with each order, that you can use for more targeted and effective marketing strategies.
- Efficiency and Integration: Popmenu integrates with existing POS systems and simplifies marketing with tools that work in sync with your online ordering page. It also offers analytics for smarter decision-making and a mobile app for managing customer orders.
- Simplified Operations: You can easily create special menus for events and promotions, encouraging larger orders and repeat business.
At the time of writing, Popmenu has a rating of 2.3 out of 5 on Trustpilot.
Here’s what one of the reviewers had to say about the Popmenu on Reddit:
“I expect technology to work, especially for what they charge. They kept pushing the no-fee online ordering, but clearly, the monthly charge is a fee for online ordering. I didn't see anything they offered as worthwhile in the slightest.”
5. Menufy – for new restaurants
Menufy offers a free online ordering solution for restaurants looking for entry-level software for their business. It allows your customers to place orders for pickup or delivery directly from your website, Menufy.com, and their mobile app.
Key features include:
- Easy Integration: Menufy is designed to work with your existing site, which reduces setup time.
- Custom Restaurant Website: Menufy comes with marketing assistance to help you build a custom restaurant website. However, the website design is simple, with a single ‘order now’ button leading to a different platform. They don’t offer a branded mobile ordering app for your restaurant.
- Order Management: You can manage your orders in the Menufy Manager system on any connected device or directly on your POS system.
- Repeat Business: Menufy offers a loyal program called Tasty Rewards and also has a platform for text and email marketing.
Menufy is a suitable choice for restaurants looking for an entry-level online ordering system. However, we’ve found that Menufy customers sometimes “graduate” to Owner.com once they cross a certain size. You can see how the online ordering features of Menufy compares to Owner.com here.
Learn More about Owner.com
Choosing online ordering software is a big decision. I recommend that you get demos with several platforms so you can figure out the best fit.
If increasing direct online ordering is your top priority:
Get a demo of Owner.com to see how we work with restaurant owners to increase their direct online orders.
It’ll take about 20 minutes, and we’ll cover:
- How to increase your direct order sales. You’ll get a quick audit of your website and see opportunities for driving more traffic.
- How to convert more visitors. Restaurants that use Owner.com get all the best practices from the third party delivery apps, but for their own own online ordering website. You’ll see examples from our customers.
- How to turn customers into regulars. There’s a number of things we do to help you build customer relationships and drive more online orders.
Our all-in-one-platform helps you take back control of your online presence, drive direct sales, save money on fees, and manage everything in one place. Schedule a demo to see the platform in action and discover why our new restaurant partners increase online sales by an average of 270% in their first three months using Owner.com.
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Adam Guild
Adam Guild is the CEO of Owner, a restaurant marketing platform that gives restaurant owners online superpowers. See Adam’s best restaurant marketing tips here.
