Sonic Sees Success With Mobile Marketing Test

Sonic, a nationwide chain of drive-in restaurants, may be doing more mobile text messaging thanks to a successful pilot test last fall.

The trial drew a 3% response from about 1,000 customers in southern Louisiana who were offered incentives like food discounts and a chance to win free meals for a year. The chain also solicited feedback on its food and service, says Bernard Stolberg, vice president of Sonic's mobile marketing agency GradeUs LLC.

Stolberg says the mobile campaign's response was as much as 20 times higher than a typical e-mail or direct mail effort.

The test ran last October through December at 10 individual restaurants. It consisted of two elements: a customer satisfaction survey asking patrons to grade their dining experience via text message, and a marketing campaign.

As Stolberg explains, “We were brainstorming to come up with a project that could easily intertwine both a customer satisfaction survey and create an additional customer service touch point that would build the relationship for a future marketing effort.”

Here's how the test worked: In each of the 10 participating restaurants, Sonic promoted the campaign through such devices as printouts at the bottom of purchase receipts that encouraged diners to participate in the poll. Also, individual carhops (waiters and waitresses) told customers about the program. This setup enabled customer response to be tracked at the individual restaurant level.

Customers were asked to rate the restaurants' food and service on a scale of A to F via text message. “We asked questions like ‘What was the most important aspect of your experience?’ Stolberg says. “Customers could give specific feedback and also grade Sonic on the overall experience. That way we would have constructive criticism.”

Before trying text messaging Sonic used interactive voice recognition (IVR) for customer satisfaction efforts, which didn't yield much response.

According to Stolberg, “Sonic had some units where the IVR survey would only get seven responses a month and we were getting seven responses a day with text messaging. So it was very significant.”

Sonic is considering more mobile marketing.

Stolberg says, “We are talking with Sonic right now about expanding the campaign and integrating it throughout its systems and other key areas.

“Ultimately we want to have a touch point with a customer once a month,” he continues. “The first month may not necessarily be a mobile coupon offer — it may be a promotion for a brand-new menu item or a message saying that snack bags are back or happy hour is back.” Incentives likely would be offered during the second month of a Sonic mobile campaign.

Stolberg says mobile marketing is much less costly than direct mail but may not be quite as inexpensive as e-mail.

“But the response rate and the reaction you get is worth it,” he adds.