Everything you need to rebound and reconnect with your guests
Guidance
Data & Insights
Industry Aid
Inspiration
Reopen, recover, rebound
No matter where you are in the process, get the tools, guidance, and insights to help you succeed.
Drive demand and fill seats
- Capture the attention of eager guests by offering your waitlist online.
- Take advantage of the universal love for al fresco dining by adding outdoor tables to your floor plan.
- Drive bookings with an OpenTable boost campaign or by offering extra loyalty points when you have seats to fill.
- Target travelers or last-minute bookers to capture pent-up dining demand.
- Engage hungry diners—reminding them of Taco Tuesday or your new bar—when you connect your email marketing tools with OpenTable.
- Track reservations and revenue from your digital and social channels—including Google Ads, Facebook and Instagram Ads, email, landing pages, and your website.
Spread the word you’re open for business
Effective, low-cost ways to get yourself on people’s radar again (or for the first time) …read more
Your 2021 digital marketing checklist
Easy tips to get your restaurant seen online, across your website, social media and more …read more
How to get more eyes on your OpenTable profile
What to consider when choosing a channel and how to measure a paid campaign’s success …read more
Operate more efficiently
- Maximize new and growing demand by adjusting your floor plans and shift settings.
- Seat every guest possible: review and fine-tune turn times.
- Get in more turns—and set guest expectations—with dining time limits.
- See how neighboring restaurants are doing with benchmark reporting.
What to do when your front of house is short-staffed
Strategies to help you offer great guest experiences even with a sub-optimal headcount…read more
Table management tips for a more efficient business
5 ways to operate your business better, from turn times to party sizes and more …read more
Industry trends and reporting to reopen with confidence
Data on market-level and neighborhood-level reservations, plus diner sentiments …read more
Maximize revenue
- Reduce no-shows and late cancellations with ticketed reservations, deposits, or credit card holds at booking.
- Get your POS talking to OpenTable so you can keep track of revenue—plus enabling auto-table statusing helps to speed up turn times and seat more guests.
- Earn more revenue when you offer your menu, meal kits, grocery items, or merch with takeout.
- Remind guests that they can support your restaurant by buying gift cards to use in the future.
What happens when diners don’t show up
The ripple effect diners set off when they bail on a dinner reservation …read more
Maximize your takeout orders—and revenue
4 ways to identify what’s working, what’s not, and make improvements …read more
Why more restaurants are setting time limits on reservations
How a different business model brings guaranteed revenue and a way to test ideas …read more
Set and meet diner expectations
- Go the extra mile on your OpenTable profile— update menus, takeout, and delivery availability, select applicable cuisine types, and upload photos that showcase all your restaurant has to offer. Don’t forget to highlight your safety precautions, too.
- Use QR codes for contact-free sharing of menus, safety precautions, contact tracing surveys, and more.
- Monitor guest feedback to celebrate successes and respond to concerns across all the channels that matter to your restaurant—such as Google, Facebook, etc.
- To understand what’s working and what’s not, get as specific as you want with custom post-dining surveys.
- Customize and resend booking confirmations to keep your guests in the know before every reservation (remember: OpenTable automatically confirms reservations through text and email)
9 ways your restaurant can use QR codes beyond menus
As contactless becomes the way of the future, find ways to make QR codes work for you …read more
Best practices for outdoor dining
How restaurateurs from coast to coast have adapted their operations to al fresco …read more
Drive more bookings with profile photos
How photos can lead to a higher conversion rate, and tips to improve your photos …read more
Keep guests delighted and coming back
- Stand out—offer special menus, live music and one-time events as Experiences.
- Turn guest preferences into personalized service with detailed pre-shift reports and robust guest profiles.
- Turn up the charm and recognize guest loyalty with unique moments to keep them coming back.
- Stay connected beyond the four walls of your restaurant with tailored guest emails.
- Offer a special takeout menu with fun options like DIY meal or cocktail kits.
Build relationships with guests before, during, and after their visit
13 ways to turn any guest into a lifelong regular …read more
Guide on how to meet diners’ needs and keep them coming back
Quick guide in collaboration with Toast to build relationships with guests …read more
How restaurants turn first-timers into VIPs
How to engage new diners to build a relationship for a lifetime …read more
Reliable, flexible tools to recover and rebound
Use our interactive guide to find the plan that best suits your restaurant.
Uncover trends and make the most of pent-up diner demand
Access the data about both the restaurant industry and diner habits only OpenTable can serve up.
What OpenTable data reveals about global dining trends
From reopening to full rebounds—it’s all visible and trackable in our State of the Industry dining hub.
Get insights to help your restaurant flourish
Webinar
Now Serving webinar: How diners are searching
Get the skinny on how to make it easier for more people to find your restaurant online …read more
Survey
Summer is here, dining is back
See what people want—and don’t want—as they return to restaurants …read more
Article
What a fully open dining market looks like
See what we can learn from the restaurants and diners in Australia …read more
Right by your side
Get tips and takeaways on how to apply for the Small Business Administration’s relief spending.
Restaurant stories that inspire us
Q&A
How Rayme Rossello learned to stop sweating Yelpers
Rethinking her identity as a businesswoman and the elusive work-life balance …read more
Article
3 restaurants dared to open their doors mid-pandemic
The unseen upsides to starting a restaurant amid a global pandemic, from coast to coast …read more
Article
A growing number of chefs are embracing a new role
That role is activist chef, as they pioneer work on solving hunger and improving the industry …read more