7 Restaurant email designs to boost your campaigns

The restaurant industry is notoriously competitive, with everyone from massive chains to local haunts vying for diners’ attention. In email inboxes, that contest is incredibly fierce. So, to stand out, what’s the secret ingredient? Amazing restaurant email designs. 

But what makes a restaurant’s email design amazing, and how do you decide what design to use for your particular message?

Choose your restaurant email designs based on your email message strategy

Just like a buffet or a menu with many choices, there are numerous options to choose from when you decide to send out a restaurant email message. But the best messages to send are the ones that are customized—allowing you to build engagement and begin a far more personal interaction with your customers. In fact, personalized emails deliver a 6x higher transaction rate.

These customized messages can be triggered by any number of customer actions—signing up for regular updates, or making an online purchase, for example. You can also send out personalized messages when you have a new menu item, or an upcoming event that, based on their previous participation or purchases, you know would be relevant to them—like Wasabi Wednesdays for your sushi aficionados, or The New Super Hero for your loyal sandwich eaters.

Determining your email strategy before you begin your restaurant email designs will help to ensure consistency for your messages and your restaurant brand. After all, while you’ll want each message to be interesting and personalized, you’ll also want to ensure that when a customer opens your message, they know right away it’s from you.

Like all great dishes, restaurant email designs need to have the right ingredients

Effective email design is a combination of both your message and the way it’s presented. Every email needs to accomplish four things in order to be considered truly successful. It must be:

1. Noticed amongst the other email clutter that arrives each day in every customer’s inbox

2. Opened, which requires a truly relevant subject line

3. Read, which will only happen if your message is presented in an engaging manner

4. Acted upon, because your message includes a customized, irresistible offer

Your restaurant email designs should keep your brand front and center and use a complementary color scheme. Included images should be aesthetically pleasing, and work to convey the intent of your message’s content.

Beyond color palettes and eye-catching photos, leveraging other email elements such as animation, special typography, videos, interactive surveys, and designs that keep you scrolling and engaged, will keep your customers coming back for more.

Here are 7 restaurant email designs that really keep the customer satisfied

It’s well known that a restaurant’s success is not only about incredible food. It’s also about the quality of their service. 

Every email you send is an extension of your restaurant’s customer service—and an opportunity to create another great customer experience. To keep you inspired, and to demonstrate restaurant email designs deserving of a Michelin Star, we’ve served up 7 restaurant email designs, and the smart strategies that help them win the inbox. Featuring:

1. Respond to your subscribers

Nothing says hello like a tasty burrito. The best way to introduce your brand to new subscribers? Set up an automated email to fire off immediately upon signup. This restaurant email welcome note design does it all: It makes a bold first impression, says “thanks” to new subscribers, tells them what to expect in future emails, and allows them to set their preferences for future personalized emails.

Welcome emails increase long-term engagement by 33%

Automated emails get 152% higher click rates

2. Ask your customers for more information

Speaking of preferences: Subscribers expect to receive emails tailored to their individual interests. So, if you don’t have the customer data you need to do just that, simply ask for it! Most people will happily take a moment to set their preferences, and you’ll see a huge boost in results because of it.

This restaurant email design makes the point boldly with a strong call to action that can’t be missed, and an easy to click button takes your customer right where they need to go. 

Relevant emails drive 18X more revenue than broadcast emails

3. Stay animated to keep your customers engaged

If you’re trying to drive attendance to a special event, you can’t do much better than this incredible invitation from Lincoln Ristorante. The GIF makes it easy to imagine yourself at the table receiving course after enticing course. Then, a streamlined design directs you to a single, focused call to action: Reserve your spot.

Emails with a single CTA can boost clicks sales by 1617%

GIFs increase conversion rates by 130% 

4. A video is worth a thousand words

The Batali brand uses email to keep fans connected to their main man in the orange Crocs, and their design looks as great as the tasty food coming out of the kitchen. This is an excellent restaurant email design example of giving your customers the content you know they want: delicious food and recipes for how to make it.

Adding video to your email can increase clicks by 300%

50%of marketers who use video in email see increased sharing and forwarding

5. An enticing email offer

 Let’s be real: It’s pretty hard to resist a fresh, steaming bowl of pasta. Olive Garden capitalizes on that with this gorgeous restaurant email design that keeps your eyes interested and fingers scrolling all the way to “Get Your Free Meatballs.” With an offer like that (plus multiple options to redeem it), how could anyone say no? 

Our brains process images 60,000x faster than text

80%of people are only scanning your email

6. Add a personal touch

The more personal your marketing, the better. Mimicking a handwritten letter by including a real signature (ideally from a person your audience will recognize, like a chef or company figurehead) at the end of your message is a nice touch that makes guests feel more connected to your restaurant.

If you can combine that with additional customization, such as an offer just for them, or a note thanking your customer for their recent visit or purchase, you’ll increase engagement with this winning restaurant email design even more.

Personalized emails deliver 6x higher transaction rates

7. Connect with your customers both inside and outside the inbox

 Email is a powerful tool on its own, but it works best when you combine it with your other marketing channels. Promoting your app to your customer base provides even more ways for you to communicate with them and boost conversions, even beyond the inbox.

This great restaurant email design not only maintains the Starbucks brand, but clearly communicates how to use their app—making this email both a welcome reference they may keep in their inbox for some time, and an easily actioned, instantly gratifying way to extend their brand experience. 

Over half of all email is opened on a mobile device

63%of guests say mobile apps help them decide where to eat