If you are a restaurateur, and you offer your diners free Internet access, by implementing a web content WiFi filter for restaurants you can attract more business, protect devices from malware, and even gather valuable information about your customers that can be used for future marketing efforts.
This article explains how providing free WiFi access in restaurants can attract new customers, why implementing an Internet content filter for restaurant WiFi can be beneficial to your business, and how you can take advantage of your website content filtering for restaurant WiFi to attract new customers.
How Important is Free Restaurant WiFi to Customers?
Attracting more customers to your restaurant is not only about providing great food and excellent customer service. If you want to increase lunchtime trade or the number of covers each day, providing free WiFi could be almost as important as your menu.
Being able to connect to the Internet is increasingly important for restaurant customers. For some people, WiFi access is a very important criterion when selecting a place to eat. Business customers need to stay connected, parents like to be able to keep their children entertained, and teens and twenty-somethings like to save their own bandwidth.
A number of surveys have been conducted by technology and market research firms to determine how important the provision of WiFi is for customers. Lunchtime haunts such as coffee shops can be chosen just as much for the free WiFi access they provide as they are for the quality of coffee according to a survey sponsored by Samsung. The survey revealed a third of workers choose their coffee shops on the basis of free WiFi availability.
In 2015, Technomic, a Chicago-based consulting firm that specializes in food industry research, conducted a survey to investigate the importance of free WiFi for restaurant diners. Four out of ten respondents said that the provision of free WiFi was a “very important” or “important” factor when deciding on a place to dine. It was the second most popular consideration behind adding a menu to a website. Interestingly, 65% of respondents also said that they “absolutely expect” quick service restaurants to offer free WiFi.
Not all diners want to access the Internet while they dine, but it is particularly important for the 18-34 age group to stay connected. These individuals are also some of the heaviest restaurant users, and are a demographic that many establishments struggle to attract.
An Internet Content Filter for Restaurant WiFi Should be a Requirement, Not an Optional Extra
While the provision of free WiFi can certainly bring customers into your establishment, an Internet content filter for restaurant WiFi will help ensure they return. If you do not provide safe WiFi access it can have the reverse effect and drive customers away. Worse still, if your WiFi is hijacked by hackers, they can use your free Internet service to spy on diners’ online activity and steal passwords and logins.
It is possible to attract business with free WiFi, but it is recommended that you protect yourself and your customers by installing a firewall and implementing a web filtering solution to limit what content can be accessed using your WiFi network.
An Internet content filter for restaurant WiFi will not only ensure diners do not accidentally catch a glimpse of hardcore pornography being viewed by a fellow diner, it will greatly reduce the risk of a malware infection on their mobile devices or nefarious activity taking place over your WiFi network.
Using Website Content Filtering for Restaurant WiFi to Your Advantage
The provision of a safe browsing environment may be the most important reason for using website content filtering for restaurant WiFi, but there is a marketing benefit to implementing a web content WiFi filter for restaurants as it can allow restaurateurs to gain valuable insights into customers’ online behaviors.
Website content filtering for restaurant WiFi can be used to restrict access to certain websites, or categories of websites, but can also be configured to report on the websites that diners are accessing. This can reveal a lot about the demographics of your customers, their jobs, interests, whether they are submitting Yelp reviews, or checking out prices offered by competitors.
The information gathered on customers via a web content WiFi filter for restaurants can be used for targeted advertising, marketing campaigns, and to direct future promotions. However, some restrictions do apply. You must inform WiFi users about any data you collect, why you are using it, and must obtain consent under laws such as the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)
An Ideal Web Content WiFi Filter for Restaurants
There are a number of options available for filtering the Internet but, for restaurateurs, an important consideration is that a web content WiFi filter for restaurants is practical, cost effective, and will not require hours of configuration and additional staff members to operate.
WebTitan Cloud for WiFi is the ideal solution. WebTitan Cloud for WiFi has been developed to be easy to set up and maintain. In fact, it can be configured in a matter of minutes and requires no technical expertise to implement.
Restaurateurs typically do not have much spare time to commit to IT, and the implementation of a web content WiFi filter for restaurants should not add to an already busy workload. With WebTitan Cloud for WiFi, setting up a flexible, practical, and powerful web filter could not be easier. Just point your DNS to WebTitan, use the auto configure option, and decide on what content to filter with a few clicks of a mouse.
Some of the benefits of the WebTitan web content WiFi filter for restaurants are detailed below:
- 100% cloud-based web filtering means no software installations are necessary
- There is no need to purchase any additional computer hardware
- An intuitive cloud-based administration control panel allows control of the web filter from any location
- Central control of multiple routers means WebTitan is ideal for chain restaurants
- You can filter the Internet no matter where your restaurants are located
- There are no bandwidth restrictions and Internet speed will be unaffected
- Highly granular controls mean content filtering can be finely controlled
- You can block websites or certain searches from being conducted
- You can prevent access to competitor websites and review sites
- The filter will help to minimize the risk of malware infections, hacking, and illegal activity
- Works with any device: smartphones, tablets, laptops, and even wearable devices
- Free access to world class customer support
WebTitan Cloud for WiFi – An Ideal Web Content WiFi Filter for Restaurants, Diners, and Coffee Shops
For further information on the benefits of a web content WiFi filter for restaurants, pricing, and advice on setting up a web filtering solution, contact WebTitan today:
US Sales +1 813 200 9460
UK/EU Sales +44 (0)247 699 3641
IRL +353 91 54 55 00
or email us at info@webtitan.com
