6 ms·

Unfortunately, this sort of thing is a big turn-off for me. The thing that keeps me coming back to a restaurant is the quality of the food, not their marketing.

Unfortunately, this sort of thing is a big turn-off for me. The thing that keeps me coming back to a restaurant is the quality of the food, not their marketing. What I've experienced is that as the quality of the food goes down, the number of marketing notifications goes up. I've gotten an email from chipotle every 2-3 days for the last month, but the last time I went there the food was terrible. Also, your privacy policy isn't very confidence-inspiring. Sharing name, phone, and physical location with third parties shouldn't happen. I'd never use your services for that reason alone. I wish you the best of luck, but I can't say your services are for me.

pluc 4y ago
You could say the same about virtually all marketing. A product should let its product speak. Marketing is the art of shoving a sub-par product down users throats despite better alternatives existing.
- shaneliammurphy 4y ago
  Totally - a product has to be great. With that said, getting feedback from your customers is also vital to making real improvements in the product and many restaurants are blind to what their customers think. Not everyone is comfortable telling someone that their food isn't great, or that there was a service issue, and we've been able to provide a more comfortable way to give that feedback, which leads to real improvements. I also believe that there is a difference between marketing something to new customers that they might not want and what we do here. The only people who will raise their hand to join a text club are the actual fans who like the place and the product. Then this serves as a rewards mechanism to provide additional deals and incentives to continue to purchase more. This is retention marketing--not new customer acquisition.
- missedthecue 4y ago
  I don't know... Sometimes I like a restaurant, but it's not always at the top of my mind to go eat there. In this sense, the marketing is a reminder of how much I like the food.
shaneliammurphy 4y ago
I hear you on the importance of food quality. If you don't have good food or service, no amount of marketing is going to save you. I also think that there is a fine line that you don't want to cross when it comes to the number of marketing messages that you send to customers. Every 2-3 days would annoy me personally as a consumer too. Anything more than once per week is way too much for such a direct channel Since this is an opt-in program, only the people who really want to receive texts from a particular restaurant will participate. If that's not you, that's totally fine. Either way, we appreciate you sharing your thoughts!
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
stevekemp 4y ago
I went to visit a doctor recently, and booked the appointment online. As a result of that I received: - An SMS confirming my appointment. - An SMS the day before reminding me of the appointment. - An SMS the morning of the appointment inviting me to checkin. - An SMS after I left asking me about my experience on a scale of 1-5. That's four SMSs relating to one appointment/visit. The moment I read this post I could just imagine a similar situation - I make a reservation online for a table, and I'll get spammed indefinitely about offers, and invitations to leave a review.
- codegeek 4y ago
  Except possibly the rating SMS, why is this a bad thing ? Doctors have the problem of no shows and it is good to send reminders. I personally don't mind receiving reminders for something I have agreed to. I wouldn't call a Doctor reminder SMS spam.
- zbjornson 4y ago
  Medical appointment reminders and other medical communications have a special cutout in the TCPA, including reduced consent requirements. They annoy me too though; they're redundant with my calendar reminders. The feedback SMS might not be included in the exception either. https://blog.curogram.com/what-are-tcpa-and-traced-act-and-how-to-apply-their-rules-to-healthcare https://blog.curogram.com/what-are-tcpa-and-traced-act-and-h...
  - shaneliammurphy 4y ago
    You're correct. The TCPA's opt-in requirements are specific to ongoing marketing related texts and treat "transactional" texts differently.
- fasteo 4y ago
  For a reason. Patient no-show is a huge cost for doctors; it can get as high as 50% in some cases. They will do anything to fight this. And I am mostly at their side in this particular issue.
- TylerE 4y ago
mikeylikey 4y ago
A hacker after my own heart (Mikey here, Technical founder ). Thanks for you diplomatic critiques. This was/is the sentiment of myself and a majority of our developers from a consumer standpoint. It's a curious experience being your product's chief skeptic. It's also been interesting to observe the number of consumers eager to participate, along with the degree to which it works on behalf of our restaurant customers. A few months ago my skepticism decreased when one of my favorite local pizza joints became a customer and I found myself ordering a lot more with them despite my aversion to being "marketed to". Fortunately, food quality appears steady so far . One of the things I look forward to with more bandwidth and runway is to craft the product in a way that may even appeal to the segment of the market that shares our preferences. In the meantime, thanks for taking time to share your perspective.
- criddell 4y ago
  It sounds very strange to start a company to do something you don't initially believe in (although it sounds like you are a believer now). If it wasn't about creating something you wanted to exist, what was it that drove you to create Boostly? My guess: some combination of believing it could be a good business while helping restaurants. Now that you know it works, do you plan on expanding beyond restaurants? Wouldn't you like to send text messages from car dealers, record stores, dry cleaners, grocery stores, clothing stores, taxi and ride share companies, landscapers, HVAC service companies, dog walkers, barbers, book stores, home improvement stores, electronics retailers, and so on? You could have phones buzzing with commercial messages a dozen times a day!
  - mikeylikey 4y ago
    Aye. Yeah I was not "scratching my own itch" as we say. Shane has a background in restaurant sales and we started in the industry with an assumption that SMB restaurants were underutilizing their customer data. Your guess is accurate. The game as YC likes to say is "building stuff people want" and that's we attempted and eventually meandered into. Brick and Mortar retail is a big market with similar dynamics to restaurants. We do have non-restaurant customers already but believe there are advantages to carving out this niche. Some of the best customers who like us best are those that were texting with more generic companies prior.

pluc 4y ago

You could say the same about virtually all marketing. A product should let its product speak. Marketing is the art of shoving a sub-par product down users throats despite better alternatives existing.

shaneliammurphy 4y ago
Totally - a product has to be great. With that said, getting feedback from your customers is also vital to making real improvements in the product and many restaurants are blind to what their customers think. Not everyone is comfortable telling someone that their food isn't great, or that there was a service issue, and we've been able to provide a more comfortable way to give that feedback, which leads to real improvements. I also believe that there is a difference between marketing something to new customers that they might not want and what we do here. The only people who will raise their hand to join a text club are the actual fans who like the place and the product. Then this serves as a rewards mechanism to provide additional deals and incentives to continue to purchase more. This is retention marketing--not new customer acquisition.
missedthecue 4y ago
I don't know... Sometimes I like a restaurant, but it's not always at the top of my mind to go eat there. In this sense, the marketing is a reminder of how much I like the food.

shaneliammurphy 4y ago

I hear you on the importance of food quality. If you don't have good food or service, no amount of marketing is going to save you. I also think that there is a fine line that you don't want to cross when it comes to the number of marketing messages that you send to customers. Every 2-3 days would annoy me personally as a consumer too. Anything more than once per week is way too much for such a direct channel Since this is an opt-in program, only the people who really want to receive texts from a particular restaurant will participate. If that's not you, that's totally fine. Either way, we appreciate you sharing your thoughts!

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

stevekemp 4y ago

I went to visit a doctor recently, and booked the appointment online. As a result of that I received: - An SMS confirming my appointment. - An SMS the day before reminding me of the appointment. - An SMS the morning of the appointment inviting me to checkin. - An SMS after I left asking me about my experience on a scale of 1-5. That's four SMSs relating to one appointment/visit. The moment I read this post I could just imagine a similar situation - I make a reservation online for a table, and I'll get spammed indefinitely about offers, and invitations to leave a review.

codegeek 4y ago
Except possibly the rating SMS, why is this a bad thing ? Doctors have the problem of no shows and it is good to send reminders. I personally don't mind receiving reminders for something I have agreed to. I wouldn't call a Doctor reminder SMS spam.
zbjornson 4y ago
Medical appointment reminders and other medical communications have a special cutout in the TCPA, including reduced consent requirements. They annoy me too though; they're redundant with my calendar reminders. The feedback SMS might not be included in the exception either. https://blog.curogram.com/what-are-tcpa-and-traced-act-and-how-to-apply-their-rules-to-healthcare https://blog.curogram.com/what-are-tcpa-and-traced-act-and-h...
- shaneliammurphy 4y ago
  You're correct. The TCPA's opt-in requirements are specific to ongoing marketing related texts and treat "transactional" texts differently.
fasteo 4y ago
For a reason. Patient no-show is a huge cost for doctors; it can get as high as 50% in some cases. They will do anything to fight this. And I am mostly at their side in this particular issue.
TylerE 4y ago

mikeylikey 4y ago

A hacker after my own heart (Mikey here, Technical founder ). Thanks for you diplomatic critiques. This was/is the sentiment of myself and a majority of our developers from a consumer standpoint. It's a curious experience being your product's chief skeptic. It's also been interesting to observe the number of consumers eager to participate, along with the degree to which it works on behalf of our restaurant customers. A few months ago my skepticism decreased when one of my favorite local pizza joints became a customer and I found myself ordering a lot more with them despite my aversion to being "marketed to". Fortunately, food quality appears steady so far . One of the things I look forward to with more bandwidth and runway is to craft the product in a way that may even appeal to the segment of the market that shares our preferences. In the meantime, thanks for taking time to share your perspective.

criddell 4y ago
It sounds very strange to start a company to do something you don't initially believe in (although it sounds like you are a believer now). If it wasn't about creating something you wanted to exist, what was it that drove you to create Boostly? My guess: some combination of believing it could be a good business while helping restaurants. Now that you know it works, do you plan on expanding beyond restaurants? Wouldn't you like to send text messages from car dealers, record stores, dry cleaners, grocery stores, clothing stores, taxi and ride share companies, landscapers, HVAC service companies, dog walkers, barbers, book stores, home improvement stores, electronics retailers, and so on? You could have phones buzzing with commercial messages a dozen times a day!
- mikeylikey 4y ago
  Aye. Yeah I was not "scratching my own itch" as we say. Shane has a background in restaurant sales and we started in the industry with an assumption that SMB restaurants were underutilizing their customer data. Your guess is accurate. The game as YC likes to say is "building stuff people want" and that's we attempted and eventually meandered into. Brick and Mortar retail is a big market with similar dynamics to restaurants. We do have non-restaurant customers already but believe there are advantages to carving out this niche. Some of the best customers who like us best are those that were texting with more generic companies prior.