One Million Reasons to Join Online Reservations
- Friday, 12 August 2011 09:42
Australians are fast joining the online restaurants reservations race.
Booking online has become second nature to people around the globe, how has that affected the way Australians book and dine?
Since its launch in September 2009 Dimmi, Australia's first online reservations system for restaurants, has helped one million Australians to enjoy their easy dining experience in restaurants throughout the country. With so many people now taking to booking online rather than phoning for a booking Dimmi has been able to secure some early statistics that indicate Australians dining preferences.
"The Australian online reservations market is still incredibly young and it is growing rapidly. In the US, 10 years in online restaurant reservations account for about 9% of all reservations and in the UK the figure sits at 7%. In just under two years, Australians are now making over 1% of all reservations via Dimmi," said founder Stevan Premutico.
"Being an integral part of the restaurant industry and having so many members is providing us with the basis of some great dining statistics. This insight allows us at Dimmi to continue expanding our offering and allows us to continue to invest in areas that will help our restaurant partners," added Stevan. "With 75 000 members of our Dimmi Rewards Program and feedback from 50,000 diners, telling us about their individual dining experience, we have a great base to help work with our partners to make important industry developments."
Year 2011 has seen a significant increase in bookings through Dimmi and has seen a change in booking patterns as Aussies become more accustomed to booking reservations online. In 2009/10 the average booking lead time was 8 days, in 2011 that is down to just 5.5 days. Men are still leaving it to the last minute with 58% of bookings within less than 6 hours are men! Dimmi diners are 43% more likely to use their mobile to make a booking within 24hours.
People are booking evenly across days of the week with Wednesday being the most popular booking day, with people making plans for Friday and Saturday nights.
