The Battle Against Pizza.
Now, to clarify, I don’t hate pizza. Not even a little. In fact, I love a good Supreme pizza. Thin crust or stuffed… if I’m feeling saucy.
Now that we’ve got that out of the way… what exactly is the battle against pizza?
This is how you should view your online ordering menu. YOU are battling against every person on your site saying “Eff this. I’m just getting pizza.”
Assume that every person who is feeling a little adventurous and perusing the menu on your website has pizza in the back of their mind. Why pizza?
Well, short answer is that it’s what I’ve got in the back of mind every time I’m looking for something to order for dinner. I’m just going to assume that everyone else has the same impulse, just waiting for you to say “nah, forget it” and pull up their pizza app.
The longer answer is that ordering pizza has been around for so long that it’s almost hard-coded in our DNA. You know what pizza you like. You could order it in your sleep. You know it’ll be warm, you know it’ll be good, you know they’ll almost always have exactly what you want.
You order pizza when you are too hungry to make a decision.
As someone who builds an online menu, it’s your goal to beat the internal voice that repeats over and over that “It would be so much easier if I just ordered pizza.”
How do you do that?
Make a “Grab n’ Go” Section of your online menu. Your first 3ish categories for online ordering menu are the categories that you want people to find. If you know people will search out a section, you can push that category down your menu (salads, sides, drinks). Consider allocating one of your first three categories as a place where people can order some of your most popular meals without much decision making. Either have included sides or short lists of sides to choose from. Make it easy to order and check out.
Limit options on menu items. Analysis paralysis is a huge pizza pivot moment. Imagine someone is looking at your menu. They’re exhausted. They’ve just had 8-10 hours of back to back meetings where all they did was solve problems and make decisions.
They pull up your menu to order a sandwich. They need to choose one meat option from a list of about 8 options, one side from a list of 15, and a beverage from ten, and would you like to add another side? A dessert? Upgrade to a large drink? Silverware? Ketchup?
Limit the options on your menu items. I’d curb each item to 2-3 decisions with less than 12 options.
Make categories clear. Don’t combine too many categories or use kitschy names for your online ordering menu. No one knows who Chris is or what his favorites are. Assume 80% of people that use your online ordering have never been in your restaurant before. Use easily identifiable category names (Appetizers, Desserts, Sides, Entrees (Beef Entrees, Vegetarian Entrees, Pasta Entrees…etc) rather than inside jokes or vague names (From the Farm, Jim’s Picks, Lil’ Buddies Meals, Munchies).
Consider using your creative marketing for your in-restaurant guests. They have a server to explain inside jokes and clever names. Your online ordering customer doesn’t.
You don’t have to match your in-store menu. You have my permission to limit your online offerings. I’ve been in more than one heated argument where someone’s feelings got hurt because the online menu didn’t match the in-store menu.
I’m sorry for any feelings that get hurt, but that souffle is not going to travel well, bud.
This may be an easy way for you to cull your online menu. What doesn’t travel well? What takes too long to cook?
I can tell you it might be a hard fight to fight (I’ve been there), but if this increases your order completion rate, the benefits far outweigh the drawbacks.
To win the war on pizza, use the tools above. Use abandonment rate and completion rates to inform how well you’re doing. You may need to tweak your menu along the way, but it’ll be worth it to win the fight against the pizza pie!