10 May 2010

Overview of Popular Online Restaurant Reservation Systems

Posted by Crystal under: Recession Tips & Tricks; Restaurant Business .

Online restaurant reservation systems allow diners to make reservations for free in real time. Such systems automate the restaurant reservation process and simplify table management for restaurant hosts. There are several major online reservation platforms that are widely used today. Here is an overview of the 3 most widely-used reservation systems:

OpenTable.com is the most popular and prolific restaurant reservation system due to its reach, speed, and super-friendly user interface. This website is connected real-time with thousands of online reservations systems at OpenTable participating restaurants. Because this online reservation system is real time, using it can be a great advantage to an average consumer, as there will always be last-minute cancellations and diners can often snag such last-minute table reservations at great, hard-to-reserve, restaurants. OpenTable.com provides reservation services not only in the US, but in many foreign countries, as well. OpenTable also provides table management and guest management software for restaurants. This allows restaurants to build customer databases, increase guest recognition and create targeted e-mail marketing campaigns. OpenTable.com is a great tool not only for diners and restaurants – it is also very popular among professional concierges who use OpenTable.com to find available tables for their demanding clients, based on many criteria, including cuisine, location, price, specials, etc. Another advantage of OpenTable.com is that it is interconnected with many other online partners, including citysearch.com, AOL CityGuide, sfgate.com, and yahoo.com.

SavvyDiner.com. This company has started out in 1987 by originally providing concierge and guest services exclusively to the finest hotels in the US cities, and referring guests to the finest restaurants in any given city. Today, SavvyDiner.com provides the same service to a much broader audience, including individual diners. SavvyDiner.com aims to provide diners with accurate and up-to-date information about the high quality dining establishments. Consumer can place reservations online, and the concierge service of SavvyDiner.com then manually places reservations by calling the upscale restaurants. Therefore, SavvyDiner.com is not a real-time system, like OpenTable.com, as it may take days to get some reservations. However, by adding this personal touch and involving a person in the reservation process is something many diners enjoy and prefer.

DinnerBroker.com connects diners to some of the best restaurants and allows diners to use a number of online resources, including reservations, information, and discounts. Dinnerbroker.com offers 10% to 30% discounts of the meal price to diners who make reservations during off-peak hours. You can also book regular reservations instantly online, and dinnerbroker.com takes care of all the arrangements with the restaurant. All you have to do is give your name to the host once you arrive at the restaurant. When reserving a table through dinnerbroker.com, guests can also enjoy special offers, such as prix-fixe menus or free valet parking. Participating restaurants also provide discounted gift certificates to consumers using dinnerbroker.com system. Each time a consumer uses dinnerbroker.com, he can earn points for making reservations or referring friends. These points can later be used to buy gift certificates at the participating restaurants.

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