Takeaway Sales Strategy: What It Is & How To Do It

Selling is all about timing and targeting the right person. The takeaway sales strategy helps create a sense of urgency and scarcity, prompting prospects to act quickly.
By implementing this selling strategy, your business can close deals faster and boost overall sales, ensuring you engage customers at the right point and time.
In this article, you will learn:
- What is the takeaway sales strategy
- What are the benefits of the takeaway sales strategy
- How to create and implement the takeaway sales strategy in your restaurant
What is the takeaway strategy?
The takeaway strategy is a sales technique designed to create urgency and scarcity, compelling customers to make quick decisions. This involves emphasizing limited-time offers or exclusive deals, highlighting the product’s or service’s unique value, and offering risk reversals like money-back guarantees.
It also includes specific closing techniques and building emotional connections with customers. This strategy is most effective when prospects are undecided, encouraging them to act quickly to avoid missing out on a valuable opportunity.
How to create a takeaway sales strategy?
The sales process can be complicated. Choosing the right sales tactic leading to closing deals with potential clients requires a deep understanding of your audience, effective communication, and the strategic use of sales techniques.
Below is a guide to help you bring more value to your restaurant customers. This will ultimately increase your sales from takeaway.
Step 1. Choose an online ordering system
One essential aspect of creating a restaurant marketing plan and developing an effective takeaway sales strategy is choosing an online ordering system that meets your business requirements.
Systems like UpMenu provide a wide range of features that facilitate the restaurant’s everyday functioning and increase the restaurant’s profit.
- How to Set Up Online Ordering System For Your Restaurant (10 Steps)
- 10 Best Restaurant Online Ordering Systems
Step 2. Build a restaurant website
Your restaurant website is like your business card. It allows you to showcase the products and services you offer to your customers and should also enable potential customers to purchase.
To create a website, use an intuitive restaurant builder. Choose one of the available restaurant website templates, add a logo, adjust colors to reflect your brand, add your menu, and enable online ordering.
- How to Create a Restaurant Website For Free (9 Steps)
- 9 Best Restaurant Website Builders
- 51 Best Restaurant Websites
Step 3. Create an attractive restaurant menu
The next step is to prepare a takeaway menu. Remember that not every dish travels well, so include items that can easily withstand the journey from the restaurant to the customer’s home.
Group the menu into menu categories to make it readable and transparent. Add menu descriptions and include attractive photos to encourage purchases.
Take advantage of the option to add modifiers. For example, if you sell pizza, allow customers to choose their preferred pizza sauce.
You can also add menu item labels such as gluten-free, vegan, spicy, etc.
- How To Make a Restaurant Menu (11 Steps)
- 25 Types of Menu in Restaurant (With Examples)
- Menu Engineering: How To Build Profitable Restaurant Menu
- Menu Descriptions: How To Write a Menu (With Examples)
- Menu Categories: How To Optimize & Personalize Them
Step 4. Create special deals and promotions
The next step is to plan the promotion of your takeaway menu.
Use restaurant marketing tools to send email and SMS campaigns to your customers, informing them about special deals and promotions.
If you offer customers a restaurant mobile app for ordering, you can schedule push notifications to keep them updated about changes in your offerings and current promotions.
Learn more about restaurant promotion ideas here.
Step 5. Create a loyalty program
Creating a restaurant loyalty program can significantly boost sales with a takeaway sales strategy.
By offering rewards such as discounts, free items, or exclusive deals to repeat customers, you encourage them to order more frequently and increase their overall spend. Learn how to increase customer loyalty in a restaurant.
Step 6. Use upselling and recommendations
Sell more with upselling and recommendations. Suggest complementary items or upgrades when customers place their orders, such as
- adding a side dish,
- adding a dessert,
- adding a premium ingredient to their meal,
- creating a combo meal.
Step 7. Analyze your data
Lastly, track and analyze your sales data as a part of your takeaway strategy.
Use restaurant analytics to monitor the number of new and returning customers, the number of orders, and their average value.
This data will help you understand customer preferences, optimize your menu, and identify successful restaurant marketing strategies.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
The takeaway method in sales uses urgency and scarcity to prompt quick customer decisions by offering limited-time promotions and exclusive deals. This strategy increases conversion rates by leveraging the fear of missing out (FOMO) to overcome objections. By highlighting the limited availability of an offer, customers are motivated to act swiftly to avoid missing out.
Imagine you’re a manager at a popular restaurant. You could send an email campaign to your customers with a message like, “We have a special promotion this week: our signature three-course meal is available at a 20% discount, but only until Sunday. This offer is limited to the first 50 customers each day. After that, the price goes back to normal. If you want to enjoy this exclusive deal, I recommend making a reservation today. You won’t want to miss out on this delicious opportunity!”
This creates urgency and emphasizes the exclusivity of the offer, encouraging customers to act quickly.
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About the author

Content Writer
6+ years Partnerships Manager passionate about helping restaurants thrive in online space.