From the 360-degree Al Dawaar Revolving Restaurant to the tantalizing delicacies of Japanese cuisine, Hyatt Regency Dubai boasts a myriad of fine dining restaurants, each with its own delectable menu.
Both Al Dawaar Revolving Restaurant and Miyako receive thousands of guests each month. Each looking for a memorable dining experience, along with a fantastic view.
So, how does the front-of-house team manage the influx of guests efficiently? How do they ensure each guest dining experience is unique? Moreover, how does the Hyatt Regency Dubai restaurant reservations team maintain a consistent flow of new and repeat guests?
To answer these questions, we sat down with the Hyatt Regency Dubai reservations and marketing team to learn more about how they are using Servme to increase guest retention, deliver memorable dining experiences, and promote their restaurant concepts.
For the past three years, the reservation and marketing team at Hyatt Regency Dubai has been using Servme to
Streamline their operations
Deliver exquisite dining experiences
Get commission-free bookings through restaurant integrations
Create, manage, and own their guest data
Promote and cross-sell upcoming events
Increase bookings through email marketing
Segment guests using tags for marketing and retention
Improve internal communications between teams across venues
Smooth sailing during peak seasons
For Al Dawaar Revolving Restaurant and Miyako, among other restaurants at the Hyatt Regency Dubai, the peak season begins in September throughout March, while peak days are Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
A hotspot for guests looking for a memorable experience, Al Dawaar Revolving Restaurant, gets anywhere between 1,500 and 2,000 reservations per month.
Preparing a restaurant to welcome guests can be challenging. Yet with Servme, the Hyatt Regency Dubai team is hitting a home run in efficiency and delighting guests.
Getting more reservations during the off-season
While the team experiences significant revenue during peak season, the slower months and weekdays can be demanding. After all, empty tables are bad for business.
They use Servme’s email marketing module to share special offers with their loyal guests, corporate clients, and groups, which can reach up to 10 people.
“During the off-season, we offer competitive rates for our guests,” comments Kristina Ivanova, F&B Marketing Coordinator at Hyatt Regency Dubai. She adds, “during slower months, the team runs promotions and tries to get more group bookings. The low season is a great time to test marketing strategies and see if they are working or not.”
To streamline bookings, Servme offers a direct integration with Hyattrestaurants.com, an online platform by the Hyatt Hotels Corporation, featuring the various dining options available at Hyatt Hotels worldwide.
Guests can explore restaurant locations, browse through dining experiences, and make reservations directly through the platform. When guests make a booking for the first time, Servme seamlessly collects their information and logs it as a guest profile in the table management system. Moreover, Servme integrates directly with other platforms, such as Zomato, that are key channels for Hyatt Regency Dubai.
To stay top-of-mind for guests and continuously drive bookings during weekdays and the off-season, Restaurant Reservations Team Leader, Rejina Dangol sends out email campaigns to local guests.
Making internal communications a breeze for all
Using Servme’s reservation and CRM platform, the team at Hyatt Regency Dubai has found it much easier to manage their internal communications, along with guest expectations and needs.
“Prior to using Servme, everyone had to communicate by email or verbally and make a note of an upcoming special event or celebration. Using Servme has allowed everyone to know what’s happening or about to happen early on. So, we can easily plan for any changes,” explains Shruti Khare, Marketing Coordinator at Hyatt Regency Dubai.
In addition, Servme’s manager’s notes feature allows the Hyatt Regency Dubai restaurant reservations team to stay on top of their operations and guest needs.
The restaurant reservation team leader can save time by seamlessly adding a note which automatically alerts their staff about any important changes related to the tables, events, and guest requests.
Likewise, Hyatt Regency Dubai’s restaurant reservation team leader comments that a game-changer for her team has been the rich guest note feature in Servme.
“The guest note feature is really helpful because we know what needs to be taken care of during the guest’s next visit. It also helps us prepare if the guest has allergies or if they prefer a certain table. We can easily add all this information in the guest notes in the CRM,” explains Rejina.
Each restaurant can also add notes for guests. Al Dawaar Revolving Restaurant, for example, has a specific dress code that guests can easily see and adhere to. These notes appear directly into the point-of-sale upon checking a guest, which prove valuable for upselling by the servers and personalizing the overall guest dining experience.
Favorite Servme features
Servme’s restaurant reservation and CRM platform goes beyond managing reservations and walk-ins for the Hyatt Regency Dubai team. The marketing and reservations teams have favorite features that pertain to each role.
As an F&B Marketing Coordinator, Ivanova’s role involves supporting the marketing and operations sides of the F&B concepts at Hyatt Regency Dubai. This involves using Servme’s email automation module to send email campaigns with special offers, announcements, and seasonal tailored menus.
Having switched from a different email marketing platform, the Hyatt Regency Dubai team has found that using Servme’s email marketing features to be a breeze.
“To send out promotional email campaigns, we rely on Servme’s marketing module to communicate with our guests about upcoming promotions and events. We also tap into Servme’s guest lists, which are readily available. We can easily use the tags and filter across metrics . It’s made life much easier,” Kristina says.
Meanwhile, restaurant reservations team leader Rejina finds the tags feature to be the highlight of using Servme. The tag feature helps with marketing, guest segmentation, and personalizing the guest experience.
One way Rejina and her team use the tags feature is to identify guests by nationality.
“For example, during Ramadan, we usually focus on Arab and Muslim guests who will have their iftar at Al Dawaar Revolving Restaurant. We use the tags feature to email those guests specifically during that month. The tags also help us identify our top spenders and allow us to generate guest spending reports based on those tags, which is very helpful,” clarifies Rejina.
The auto-tagging feature has “really reduced communication challenges for us,” says Rejiina. The ability to link the reservation to the table check via the point-of-sale integration with Simphony, has allowed them to capture lots of data about their guest spend and behaviors.
Servme’s automated tags simplify the need for the reservation teams to continuously update the guest profiles. Users can create rules with AND/OR/IF conditions which will tag the guest profile based on these conditions.
For instance, a ‘Returning Guest tag’ can be classified as a guest who has visited the restaurant three times within 1 month and has spent over AED 500 for their meal.
About Hyatt Hotels and Servme: A Seamless Hospitality Solution
Approved as the technology provider for F&B concepts across Europe, Middle East, Africa, and India, Hyatt Hotels’ long-time partnership with Servme serves more than just a reservation management system but a CRM platform integrated within a key system and marketing platform to drive the guest experience.
Want to see how Servme can increase your restaurant bookings, boost retention, and help you manage daily operations? Schedule a quick personalized demo!
Nada Sobhi
Customer Spotlight
