The Advizia Blog
Practical, data-backed guides for bar, restaurant and venue owners on bringing guests back. Every number is sourced.
In this blog
How to Turn First-Time Guests Into Regulars: A Restaurant and Bar Retention Playbook (3 min read)
SMS Marketing for Restaurants and Bars: What the Numbers Say (3 min read)
Is Text Marketing Legal for Bars and Restaurants? TCPA, Opt-In and 10DLC Basics (3 min read)
Bar and Restaurant Loyalty Programs That Actually Work (3 min read)
How to Fill a Bar on Slow Weeknights (3 min read)
Birthday Marketing for Restaurants and Bars: How to Turn Birthdays Into Bookings (3 min read)
Sports Bar Marketing Ideas for Game Day (3 min read)
Why Every Restaurant Needs Guest Profiles (Restaurant CRM Explained) (3 min read)
Email vs SMS for Restaurants: Which Brings Guests Back? (3 min read)
How to Measure Marketing ROI for a Bar or Restaurant (3 min read)
How to Turn First-Time Guests Into Regulars: A Restaurant and Bar Retention Playbook
3 min read
Every owner knows the feeling. A new table has a great night, tips well, says they will be back, and you never see them again. That is not bad luck. It is the default.
Across more than 1,000 restaurant locations, 78% of guests visited only once in a year (Bloom Intelligence, 2026). The same data shows guests with four or more visits made up about 8% of the guest base but drove roughly 53% of all visits. Your regulars are a small group doing most of the work.
So the real question is not how to get more first-timers. It is how to move more of them into that small, loyal group.
Why the second visit matters most
The gap between visit one and visit two is where most guests are lost. Once someone comes back, the odds that they keep coming back go up fast. Among one-time guests who did return, 42% came back within 30 days and 69% within 90 days (Bloom Intelligence, 2026). That tells you the window is short. If you want a second visit, you need to ask for it within weeks, not months.
The money case is old but still holds. Bain & Company research found that raising retention by as little as 5% can lift profits by as much as 95% (Bain & Company). Results vary by business, but the direction is clear: keeping guests is cheaper than replacing them.
Step 1: Know who walked in
You cannot invite someone back if you do not know who they are. Most venues already collect pieces of this data without connecting them:
POS records tied to a card or phone number
Reservation details from your booking tool
Wi-Fi sign-ins
Text or email opt-ins from a QR code or table tent
The goal is one profile per guest that pulls these together, so you know a person came in on a Tuesday, ordered the short rib, and sat at the bar.
Step 2: Follow up fast and personally
A generic "Thanks for visiting!" blast does little. A short note that sounds like the venue, sent a few days after the first visit, does much more. Mention something real: the game they watched, the dish they ordered, a night that suits them.
Guests notice. In a 2026 Toast survey, 48% said being remembered by staff matters most to feeling valued, while only 30% said they always feel recognized at the places they visit most (Toast, 2026). That gap is your opportunity.
Step 3: Give a reason to return, not just a discount
Discounts work, but a reason to come back works better. Good second-visit hooks include:
An invite to a specific event or game night
A punch card that already has one stamp on it
A birthday invite if their birthday is coming up
A dish or drink that is new since their visit
Structure matters too. Toast found that loyalty enrollment moved return rates from a 7% baseline to nearly 30% (Toast, 2026). Being enrolled in something gives the guest a thread back to you.
Step 4: Watch for guests who drift
Regulars do not usually quit loudly. They just come in less. Set a rule: if a regular has not visited in twice their normal gap, send a friendly check-in. Welcome and win-back messages brought back 6.5% to 7.2% of recipients, measured by verified return visits (Bloom Intelligence, 2026). That is a small percent of a list, but a real number of covers you would otherwise lose for good.
Step 5: Measure what actually brought them back
Track whether each message led to a visit, not just an open. Over time you will see which hooks work for which guests, and you can stop paying for what does not.
The short version
Most first-timers never return, so the second visit is the battleground.
Reach out within the first few weeks.
Make it personal and give a concrete reason to come in.
Catch drifting regulars early.
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
SMS Marketing for Restaurants and Bars: What the Numbers Say
3 min read
Text messages feel personal, which is exactly why they work and exactly why they can backfire. Before you start texting guests, it helps to know what the data actually supports.
Almost everyone can get your text
Reach is not the problem. According to Pew Research Center, 98% of U.S. adults own a cellphone of some kind and 91% own a smartphone (Pew Research Center, 2025). Unlike an app or a social feed, a text does not depend on an algorithm deciding who sees it.
Many guests prefer it
Guests are open to hearing from restaurants by text. In SevenRooms' 2025 U.S. report, 48% of consumers said they prefer text communication with restaurants, and 83% said they are willing to sign up for restaurant marketing programs (SevenRooms, 2025). That same report put the average return on text campaigns at 24x (SevenRooms, 2025).
This is not a new trend. A 2016 Twilio study of 6,000 consumers found 90% wanted to use messaging to communicate with businesses, and native text messaging was the top choice at 47% (Twilio via TechCrunch, 2016).
Texts mostly bring back people who already know you
Here is the number owners should pay most attention to. In Toast data from Q1 2026, 83% of SMS-driven orders came from returning guests (Toast, 2026). Text is a retention tool. It is great for filling seats with people who already like you, and weak for reaching strangers.
That shapes how you should use it:
Text people who opted in after a real visit
Send fewer, better messages rather than daily blasts
Tie each text to something specific: a game, an event, a birthday, a punch card reward
What makes a restaurant text work
It sounds like you. A message that reads like the bartender wrote it beats one that reads like a coupon book. Use the venue's name and voice.
It is relevant to the person. A Cubs fan should hear about Cubs games. A brunch regular should hear about brunch. Guests want this: in a 2025 Toast survey, 48% of diners wanted discounts based on their ordering history (Toast, 2026).
It is timed well. Send close enough to the moment that it can change plans, like the afternoon before a big game, not a week ahead.
It is easy to stop. Every marketing text should make opting out simple. People who feel trapped report spam, and that hurts your delivery for everyone else.
Common mistakes
Texting a number that was given for a reservation, not for marketing
Sending the same blast to every guest on the list
Texting too often and training people to ignore you
Not tracking which texts actually led to a visit
How to tell if it is working
Opens and clicks are not the goal. Visits are. Match each text to whether that guest came in during the following days. If a message drove return visits, do more of it. If it drove opt-outs, rethink it.
Bottom line
The numbers support SMS for restaurants and bars, mostly as a way to bring back guests who already know you. Keep it opted-in, personal, and measured by visits rather than clicks.
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
Is Text Marketing Legal for Bars and Restaurants? TCPA, Opt-In and 10DLC Basics
3 min read
Quick note: this article is general information, not legal advice. Talk to a lawyer about your specific situation.
Yes, text marketing is legal for bars and restaurants. But there are rules, and the penalties for ignoring them can be large. Here is the plain-English version.
Texts count as calls under the TCPA
The main federal law is the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). The FCC has made clear that a text message is a "call" subject to the TCPA (FCC, 2023). That means the consent rules for marketing calls apply to marketing texts too.
For automated marketing texts, the FCC requires the "prior express written consent" of the person you are texting (FCC, 2023). In practice, that means the guest actively agreed, in writing (a web form, a checkbox, or a text keyword counts), to receive marketing texts from you.
Why it matters
The TCPA allows statutory damages of $500 per violation, with up to triple damages for knowing or willful violations (WilmerHale, 2024). Each text can count as its own violation, so a single bad blast to a large list can become very expensive.
What good consent looks like
The guest takes a clear action to opt in, like texting a keyword or checking a box
The sign-up says what they will get and roughly how often
It says message and data rates may apply and how to opt out
Consent is not a condition of buying anything
You keep a record of when and how they opted in
What does not count: a phone number given for a reservation, a waitlist, or a to-go order. That number was given for a different purpose. Do not move it onto your marketing list without separate consent.
Opt-outs must be honored fast
Guests must be able to stop texts easily, usually by replying STOP. Under FCC rules adopted in 2024, businesses must honor a revocation within 10 business days, and may send one confirmation message that contains no marketing (WilmerHale, 2024). Best practice is to stop immediately.
What is 10DLC?
If you text from a regular 10-digit local phone number through software, U.S. carriers require you to register under a system called A2P 10DLC. Registration identifies your business and what kind of messages you send. Twilio notes that anyone sending application-to-person texts over a 10DLC number to U.S. recipients must register, and unregistered traffic faces more carrier filtering and added carrier fees (Twilio, A2P 10DLC docs).
Registration also sets daily limits. For example, Twilio lists sole proprietor brands at about 3,000 texts per day across U.S. carriers (Twilio, A2P 10DLC docs). Most venues using a marketing platform will register as a standard brand with a defined campaign.
Carrier rules sit on top of the law
Wireless carriers and their industry group, CTIA, publish messaging best practices covering consent, opt-out keywords like STOP and HELP, and content rules. Carriers can filter or block messages that break them even when no law is broken. Common red flags include misleading links, missing opt-out language, and content tied to restricted categories.
Alcohol promotions deserve extra care. Many platforms require age gating for alcohol-related campaigns, and state liquor rules on promotions vary. Check yours.
A simple compliance checklist
Get clear, written opt-in for marketing texts
Keep records of every opt-in
Register your number for 10DLC
Include opt-out instructions and honor STOP right away
Text at reasonable hours
Do not reuse reservation or order numbers for marketing
Reach is not the issue: 98% of U.S. adults own a cellphone (Pew Research Center, 2025). The issue is doing it the right way so your messages arrive and your guests stay happy.
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
Bar and Restaurant Loyalty Programs That Actually Work
3 min read
Most owners have tried a loyalty program at some point. Paper punch cards that end up in the trash. An app nobody downloads. Points that take a year to redeem. The idea is right, but the execution often is not.
Loyalty programs do move the needle
When they work, the impact is big. Toast found that loyalty enrollment shifted return rates from a 7% baseline to nearly 30% (Toast, 2026). Loyalty members were retained at roughly twice the rate of new customers (Toast, 2026).
But many guests quit them
The same Toast research found that more than half of diners surveyed had left a loyalty program, usually because it took too much to earn or the rewards were not worth it (Toast, 2026). A program that asks too much just becomes another thing guests ignore.
Recognition beats points
Here is what surprises many owners. When Toast asked guests what makes them feel valued, 48% said being remembered by staff, while only 22% prioritized points-based rewards (Toast, 2026). Yet only 30% said they always feel recognized at the places they visit most (Toast, 2026).
Guests want to be known. Points are just one way to show it.
Match the reward to the venue
The type of reward matters. Toast data from early 2026 showed:
Cashback rewards at casual spots like pizzerias and cafes drove 24% to 26% 90-day retention (Toast, 2026)
At fine dining, item-based rewards like a free appetizer or dessert drove 20% retention, versus 13% for cashback (Toast, 2026)
A neighborhood bar might do best with simple, fast rewards. A higher-end room might do better with something that feels like hospitality, not a coupon.
What a working program looks like
No app required. Every download is a hurdle. Tie the program to a phone number or card the guest already uses at your POS.
Automatic tracking. Guests should not have to remember a card or ask staff to scan something. Visits should count on their own.
A fast first reward. If the first reward is ten visits away, most guests will never see it. Make the first win reachable in two or three visits.
Progress reminders. A text that says "one more visit and your next round is on us" brings people in. A silent balance in an app does not.
Personal touches. Birthday invites, a favorite drink remembered, a heads-up when their team plays. These cost little and match what guests say they want. In a 2025 Toast survey, 49% of diners wanted loyalty rewards customized to their preferences (Toast, 2026).
Mistakes to avoid
Rewards so small they feel insulting
Rules nobody on staff can explain
Paper cards that guests lose
Never telling guests where they stand
Treating your best regulars the same as a first-timer
Measure visits, not sign-ups
A big member count means little if those members do not come back more. Compare visit frequency for members versus non-members over a few months. If the gap is small, change the rewards or the reminders.
Done well, a loyalty program is less about points and more about making each guest feel like a regular, starting with their second visit.
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
How to Fill a Bar on Slow Weeknights
3 min read
Friday and Saturday mostly take care of themselves. Monday through Thursday are where margins are won or lost. Staff is on the clock, the lights are on, and the room is half empty.
Weeknights are slow, but they are moving
The gap between weekends and weeknights is real. In a 2026 DIRECTV for Business survey of 2,000 sports bar visitors, 67% said they go on Saturdays and 55% on Fridays, but only 23% on Thursdays (DIRECTV for Business, 2026).
The good news is that habits are shifting. Toast's Q3 2025 data showed Tuesday had the largest jump in reservation bookings of any day, up 15% year over year, and called it "the new hot night for a dinner reservation" (Toast Q3 Restaurant Trends, 2025). Guests are open to weeknights. They need a reason.
Give people a reason, not just a discount
A half-off sign says "we are empty." An event says "something is happening." Ideas that work well on slow nights:
Trivia or in-venue games on the screens
A weekly watch party for a show or league
Industry night for local service workers
A themed menu or a limited special that only runs that night
Live music, a DJ, or a local guest bartender
Pick one and run it every week. Consistency builds a habit, and habits build regulars.
Invite the right people, personally
The biggest mistake is promoting a slow night to everyone the same way. Your best weeknight guests are people who already came in on a weeknight. Look at your guest data for who visited Monday through Thursday in the last few months, and invite them first.
Then widen it. A guest who came for a game might like trivia. A happy hour regular might like an early dinner special. Personal invitations outperform generic posts because they feel like an invite, not an ad.
Make it easy to plan
Guests often stay home because going out takes planning. In a 2026 Kantar study, 78% of sports fans said they would go out more often if it were easier to plan ahead for major events (Kantar, 2026). Send the invite early enough to plan around, then a short reminder the afternoon of.
Bring back lapsed guests on the slow nights
Slow nights are the perfect time to welcome back guests who drifted. You have room, staff has time to make it special, and a return offer costs you less when the seat would otherwise be empty. Among one-time guests who did return, 42% came back within 30 days (Bloom Intelligence, 2026), so reach recent first-timers quickly.
Reward the weeknight habit
A punch card that counts weeknight visits double, or a reward unlocked after three Tuesdays, nudges people to make your bar their weeknight spot. Toast found loyalty enrollment moved return rates from 7% to nearly 30% (Toast, 2026).
Track what actually worked
For each slow-night push, look at who was invited and who showed up. Over a few weeks you will know which events, offers and guest groups fill the room, and which ones just cost you money.
Quick checklist
Pick one recurring weeknight event and stick with it
Invite past weeknight guests first
Send early, then remind the day of
Use slow nights for win-back offers
Measure visits, not likes
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
Birthday Marketing for Restaurants and Bars: How to Turn Birthdays Into Bookings
3 min read
A birthday is the easiest reason a guest will ever have to go out. They are going to celebrate somewhere. Birthday marketing simply makes sure your venue is the first place they think of.
Guests actually want birthday offers
This is not marketing guests tolerate. It is marketing they ask for. In SevenRooms' 2025 U.S. report, 47% of consumers said they want birthday and anniversary promotions from restaurants (SevenRooms, 2025). In a 2025 Toast survey, 49% of diners wanted loyalty rewards customized to their preferences (Toast, 2026).
Birthday messages outperform regular promotions
The classic data here comes from Experian's study of 7,000 birthday email campaigns. Birthday emails had a 56.2% open rate versus 16.8% for mass promotions, and a transaction rate of 0.49% versus 0.10% for standard bulk emails (Experian via MarketingProfs, 2010). That is close to five times the transactions. The study is older, but the pattern makes sense: a personal, timely message beats a generic one.
Birthdays bring groups
One birthday guest rarely comes alone. They bring friends, family or coworkers, which turns one invite into a full table. That makes birthday outreach one of the best uses of a single message.
How to collect birthdays
You cannot send a birthday invite without the date. Easy ways to get it:
Ask for birth month and day (no year) at text or email sign-up
Add an optional field to your reservation form
Ask on Wi-Fi sign-in
Note it when a guest mentions it at the table
Skipping the year makes people more willing to share.
Timing matters
Send the invite two to three weeks ahead, when people are still making plans. A message on the day itself is nice, but by then the plans are usually set. Send a short reminder about a week out.
Experian's data also found that birthday campaigns sent daily or weekly, close to each person's actual birthday, had higher transaction rates than monthly batches (Experian via MarketingProfs, 2010). Send each guest's invite based on their own date, not as a once-a-month blast.
Make the offer feel like a gift
The best birthday offers feel like hospitality, not a coupon:
A free dessert or celebratory drink
A reserved table or the best booth
A complimentary round for the group when they book for six or more
A redemption window covering the whole birthday week or month
Keep the window generous. Birthday celebrations often happen on the nearest weekend, not the day itself.
Write it in your own voice
"Happy birthday from the crew at the bar. Bring your people in this month and the first round is on us" lands better than a templated corporate message. If you know their usual order or favorite team, use it.
Track the results
Count how many birthday guests booked or came in, and how large their parties were. Party size is the hidden win here. Over time, compare the visits from birthday messages to your regular promotions.
Quick checklist
Collect birth month and day at every sign-up point
Send two to three weeks early, plus a reminder
Offer something that feels like a gift
Give a wide redemption window
Measure visits and party size
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
Sports Bar Marketing Ideas for Game Day
3 min read
Game day can be the best night of the week or a missed chance, depending on whether fans pick your bar or the one down the street. The good news is that fans are telling us what they want.
Fans want to watch at a bar
Going out for the game is still a big deal. In a 2026 DIRECTV for Business survey of 2,000 sports bar visitors, 29% named a sports bar as their preferred place to watch, tied with home (DIRECTV for Business, 2026). Globally, Kantar found nearly one-third of sports viewers watch at bars or restaurants, and three in four say it is worth the extra cost (Kantar, 2026).
Chicago knows this well. Ferg's, voted the #1 sports bar in America by USA Today readers, shows how much fans care about where they watch.
What fans choose a bar for
The DIRECTV survey asked why fans pick a bar (DIRECTV for Business, 2026):
51% said the vibe
50% said food and drink selection
40% said big-screen TVs
49% said food and drink specials add to the game-day atmosphere
Atmosphere and specials matter about as much as the screens.
Tell fans you have the game
This sounds obvious, but fans often do not know. In the same survey, 40% checked a bar's website or social channels to see if it was showing a game, and 39% called the bar (DIRECTV for Business, 2026). If your game schedule is hard to find, you are losing people.
Better yet, tell them directly. A text the afternoon before a big game, sent to fans of that team, beats a generic post.
Market to fans of each team
Not every guest cares about every game. Track which teams your guests come in for, and invite them to those games specifically. A Bears fan wants a Bears invite. A soccer crowd wants the match times. Personal invites feel like being saved a seat.
Help fans plan ahead
Kantar found 78% of sports fans would go out more often if it were easier to plan ahead for major events, and 71% actively look for deals tied to big games (Kantar, 2026). Post the schedule early, open table reservations for big games, and send reminders.
Make the game interactive
Fans stay longer when there is something to do. More than half of visitors in the DIRECTV survey stay two to four hours (DIRECTV for Business, 2026). Fill that time:
Halftime screen games where the whole room plays
Predict-the-score contests with a prize for the winner
Specials that trigger on touchdowns or goals
Team-specific drink or food deals
In-venue games also give guests a reason to share their phone number, which lets you invite them back.
Turn game-day crowds into regulars
A big game brings in plenty of first-timers. Most will never return unless you ask. Follow up after the game with an invite to the next one, and reward repeat game-day visits with an automatic punch card. Fans already have habits: 21% say they visit the same bar for important games as a superstition (DIRECTV for Business, 2026). Make yours the lucky bar.
Game-day checklist
Post the schedule where fans look
Invite fans by team, a day ahead
Run game-day specials
Add halftime or in-game contests
Follow up after every big game
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
Why Every Restaurant Needs Guest Profiles (Restaurant CRM Explained)
3 min read
Your best bartender remembers names, orders and birthdays. The problem is that one person cannot remember everyone, and when they leave, that knowledge walks out the door. Guest profiles fix that.
What a guest profile is
A guest profile is one record per person that brings together what you already know: visits, spend, favorite items, preferred night, birthday, and how they like to be contacted. A restaurant CRM (customer relationship management system) is just the tool that keeps those profiles and acts on them.
The data usually already exists. It is just scattered:
POS transactions
Reservations and waitlist entries
Text and email opt-ins
Wi-Fi sign-ins
A good CRM matches these into one view per guest.
Guests want to be known
Recognition is what guests say they value most. In a 2026 Toast survey, 48% said being remembered by staff matters most to feeling valued, but only 30% said they always feel recognized at their most-visited spots (Toast, 2026). In a 2025 survey, only 20% of guests said they consistently receive personalized experiences (Toast, 2026).
Guests are also willing to share. SevenRooms found 83% of diners are willing to sign up for restaurant marketing programs (SevenRooms, 2025).
Operators are stuck
The same SevenRooms report found 77% of operators face barriers to personalization, with 35% struggling to track performance and 28% unsure who to personalize for (SevenRooms, 2025). That is a data problem. Without profiles, you cannot tell who is who.
What profiles let you do
Send the right message to the right guest. Invite a wine lover to the wine dinner, not the whole list.
Catch regulars who drift. If someone who came every two weeks has not been in for six, you can notice and reach out.
Treat regulars like regulars. Flag your top guests so staff can greet them properly.
Know what works. Tie each message to whether that guest actually came back.
Why it matters for revenue
A small group of guests drives most of your business. Across more than 1,000 restaurant locations, guests with four or more visits were about 8% of guests but drove roughly 53% of visits (Bloom Intelligence, 2026). Meanwhile, 78% of guests visited only once (Bloom Intelligence, 2026). Profiles show you both groups, so you can protect the first and grow the second.
What to look for in a restaurant CRM
Connects to your POS and reservation system automatically
Builds one profile per guest without manual entry
Respects opt-in and privacy rules
Sends personal messages in your voice, not generic blasts
Reports visits driven, not just opens and clicks
A note on privacy
Guests share data when they trust you. Ask clearly, use it to make their visits better, and never sell it. SevenRooms found 20% of consumers cite data-sharing concerns (SevenRooms, 2025), so be transparent about what you collect and why. Some systems in this space use cameras. Advizia uses no cameras.
Start small
You do not need a perfect system on day one. Start by connecting your POS and your opt-in list, then add reservations and Wi-Fi. Even a basic profile with visit count, last visit date and contact preference is enough to send a smart win-back message or a birthday invite.
Bottom line
Guest profiles turn what your best staff already do by memory into something the whole venue can do every day, for every guest.
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
Email vs SMS for Restaurants: Which Brings Guests Back?
3 min read
Owners often ask which channel to pick: email or text. The honest answer is that they do different jobs. Here is what the data says about each.
What guests say they prefer
Guests are split. In SevenRooms' 2025 U.S. report, 62% of consumers said they prefer email for promotions and updates, while 48% said they prefer text communication with restaurants (SevenRooms, 2025). Many guests are fine with both, for different things.
Reach and attention
SMS: 98% of U.S. adults own a cellphone (Pew Research Center, 2025), and texts land on the lock screen. Text is the stronger channel when timing matters.
Email: Across industries, Mailchimp reports an average email open rate of 35.63% and a click rate of 2.62% (Mailchimp, 2023). Email has room for photos, menus and longer stories, and guests read it on their own schedule.
Both bring back people who already know you
Toast data from Q1 2026 found that 86% of email-driven orders and 83% of SMS-driven orders came from repeat guests (Toast, 2026). Neither channel is mainly for finding new customers. Both are retention tools, which means the quality of your guest list matters more than the channel.
When to use text
Same-day or next-day prompts: "Big game tomorrow, we saved you a spot"
Punch card progress: "One more visit for a free round"
Last-minute openings on a slow night
Birthday reminders close to the date
Keep texts short, personal and infrequent. Overuse leads to opt-outs fast.
When to use email
Monthly event calendars and new menus
Stories about the team, suppliers or the neighborhood
Win-back messages with more context
Birthday invites sent a few weeks ahead
Email can carry more without feeling intrusive.
Use both, per guest
The best approach is not choosing one channel for everyone. It is choosing the right channel for each guest. Some guests respond to texts and ignore email. Others never want a text. Track which channel each guest actually responds to, and lean on that one.
Personal beats generic on either channel. Experian found birthday emails had a 56.2% open rate versus 16.8% for mass promotions (Experian via MarketingProfs, 2010). Relevance matters more than the channel.
Measure visits, not opens
Open rates are a weak signal. Apple Mail Privacy Protection inflates email opens (Mailchimp, 2023), and texts are almost always seen. The number that matters is whether the guest came back. Welcome and win-back emails brought back 6.5% to 7.2% of recipients by verified return visits in one study of more than 1,000 locations (Bloom Intelligence, 2026).
Build the list the right way
Whichever channel you use, the list is the asset. Collect opt-ins at the moments guests are happiest: after a great meal, during a halftime game, or when they join Wi-Fi. Ask for both an email and a phone number, and let the guest choose what they want to receive. For texts, written opt-in is a legal requirement, not a nice-to-have. A smaller list of guests who chose to hear from you will beat a large list of people who did not.
Quick comparison
Text: fast, urgent, short, best for timely nudges
Email: richer, slower, less intrusive, best for stories and calendars
Both: work best on guests who have already visited
Use both, respect each guest's preference, and judge each message by the visits it drives.
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
Sources
How to Measure Marketing ROI for a Bar or Restaurant
3 min read
Most bar and restaurant owners spend on marketing without knowing what it returns. You are not alone. In a 2015 LivingSocial survey of restaurateurs, 49% said they struggled to track the ROI of their marketing (Hospitality Technology / LivingSocial, 2015). A decade later, SevenRooms still found 35% of operators struggle with tracking performance (SevenRooms, 2025).
Here is a practical way to measure it.
Start with the right question
The question is not "how many people saw it?" It is "how many guests came in because of it, and what did they spend?" Likes, opens and impressions are not revenue.
Step 1: Tie marketing to real guests
You can only measure what you can match. That means connecting each message to a specific guest profile, and each visit at the POS to the same guest. Card or phone number matching, reservations, and loyalty sign-ins all help.
Once a text, email or offer is linked to a person, you can check whether that person came in afterward.
Step 2: Pick a fair attribution window
Decide how long after a message a visit still counts. For a game-day invite, maybe 48 hours. For a birthday invite, the whole birthday month. Keep windows consistent so you can compare campaigns.
Step 3: Use a holdout group
Some guests would have come in anyway. To find the real lift, hold back a small random slice of guests from each campaign and compare.
Group A gets the message
Group B, chosen at random, does not
The difference in visits between the two is what the message actually caused
This is the single most useful habit for honest ROI.
Step 4: Know your benchmarks
Benchmarks help you tell if a result is good. A few useful ones:
Welcome and win-back emails brought back 6.5% to 7.2% of recipients by verified return visits (Bloom Intelligence, 2026)
Loyalty enrollment moved return rates from a 7% baseline to nearly 30% (Toast, 2026)
SevenRooms reports an average 24x return on text campaigns (SevenRooms, 2025)
Your numbers will differ, but if a campaign is far below these, look closer.
Step 5: Look at guest value over time
One visit is not the whole story. A guest you win back might visit ten more times. Track visits per guest and spend per guest over months, not just the next night. Bain & Company found that a 5% increase in retention can lift profits by as much as 95% (Bain & Company), which is why repeat visits deserve credit in your math.
Step 6: Compare channels and offers
Once each message is tied to visits, rank them. Which drove more return visits per message sent: the birthday invite, the game-day text, or the monthly email? Which offers brought guests in without giving away margin? Cut what does not work.
A simple ROI formula
ROI = (revenue from attributed visits, minus what the offer cost, minus what the marketing cost) divided by what the marketing cost. Use the holdout-adjusted visits, not the raw count, so you are not taking credit for guests who would have come anyway.
Quick checklist
Link every message to a guest profile
Match visits at the POS to the same guest
Set a fixed attribution window per campaign type
Always keep a holdout group
Judge by visits and spend, not opens
Advizia does this automatically for your venue, with no cameras involved. See a demo at advizia.ai/start.
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