Why siloed data is likely stalling your hospitality brand’s growth

Data silos are rife in a lot of businesses. And hospitality is no exception. With a proliferation of digital technologies has come access to an abundance of data, but a lot of it is sitting isolated from other data sources, meaning its full potential is likely not being realised. Many are unable to interpret it properly and take any real action from it. What’s more most businesses aren’t even aware of just how siloed their data is and what effect that’s having on their business’ ability to grow.

With many in hospitality looking to double-down on their digital future, and with data a huge competitive differentiator, it’s imperative restaurants understand how data silos may be hindering their performance in order to rectify it. So here’s 4 key ways these silos are likely affecting your brand.

1. A lack of oversight and inability to see the full picture

Knowing what’s happening across the whole business at any given time is paramount to being able to see what is working and of course what needs to change. With data operating in silos, it’s likely your business is only able to see certain things in isolation, meaning your ability to make really informed decisions is severely hindered.

With large-scale hospitality brands especially having a myriad of data points and interactions to track, it can make it easy to fall into the trap of just tracking isolated metrics, without looking at the bigger picture. Finance teams may just be looking at revenue, marketing at campaign views, and store managers average order values. But all of these business, product and guest metrics tell a much wider story, and you don’t want to turn the dial on one, influence certain elements of the guest experience or online storefront for example, without knowing the direct effect that may have on other areas of the business.

2. Data silos are time consuming and costly

With data located in a range of different places and platforms, inherently your teams are going to have to spend a lot more time and money trying to pull together the data they need. As well, a lot of duplication of efforts will be seen, contributing to inefficiencies within the business.

What will be costly to your business especially is being able to accurately interpret all the data and take action accordingly. You may need to employ analysts or data scientists to bring it all together and make sense of it, which can be expensive. Or, you may have other teams doing what they can, spending a lot of time trying to see how they can derive information from it all.

Marketing teams for one need to be able to make both strategic and reactionary, on the ground decisions to ensure campaigns and promotions are tracking well. They need to be able to see how many discount codes for example have been used, across time, across locations and channels to see whether the desired outcomes of the campaign are being realised, and of course whether the code is experiencing any fraudulent use. They need to be able to see whether the new product or combination in the latest campaign is actually driving sales and if not, pivot accordingly. And to do all this, they need a centralised, single source of truth that is easily interpretable, and not have to pull data from multiple sources, be it Google Analytics, individual channel platforms, even anecdotes etc, and then manipulate spreadsheets to see how everything is stacking up.

Operationally, it’s the same. Those looking after stores need to be able to see what products and combinations not only drive the most orders but are the most profitable, when they sell the most, and of course how this changes over time. This lets them react accordingly, optimising their menu to maximise their revenue potential and also accurately manage their stock too.

3. An inability to truly tracking guest behaviour and loyalty

Repeat customers spend more - in fact 300% percent more - so are paramount to revenue generation, business growth and sustainability. At the very least, investing in this means not having to drastically increase marketing budgets, let alone the value that comes from the brand advocacy and influence these customers can have.

However, data silos are proving a big blocker to understanding loyal guests and tracking guest behaviour overall. Simplistic measures mean you may know their source once they’ve arrived at your online ordering channel for example, or if they log in that they have ordered from you multiple times before. But what happens if they don’t login? What happens when that online guest joins you in-store? Are you still able to know who that guest is, and track any and every interaction across every channel? It all adds up to form an incomplete picture of guests, and through the lack of a single customer view restaurants are unable to truly understand their guests, forge meaningful relationships with them, and capitalise on their efforts in order to foster long-term loyalty.

4. Information sharing is low and data integrity compromised

Data silos are quite often two fold in the sense that they occur as a result of fragmented technology and platforms but also through siloed teams within a business. Sometimes it’s both, with different teams working on different platforms, together forming these larger silos. Irrespective, quite often the result is a prolific effect on collaboration and problem solving, whereby teams are analysing and tackling problems in isolation.

On the back of data being accessed from different places, what some encounter also is a problem with data integrity. What some teams might be reporting on or analysing might not match data in other areas of the business, be it it has become outdated or it’s simply inaccurate. And without the collaboration and centralised source, no one is able to uncover this. It could be as simple as franchisee owners analysing sales and orders from somewhere different to head office, with any discrepancies that crop up unable to be seen and rectified quickly.

Bringing your data silos together

It is imperative now, in a digital-first age where hospitality businesses are continuing to evolve their omnichannel experiences and lay the foundations towards what their digital future looks like, that data silos are reduced. Brands must look to take ownership of their data, and processes, to create a single view of the business and their guests, one that is easily interpretable. Because the winners of today and tomorrow will not be who has the most data but those that can properly use what they do have.

If you would like to discuss how MOBI can help you centralise all your hospitality data to gain the insight you need to grow your revenue and your brand, then get in touch with one of our experts.