9. Playbooks — ten campaigns worth running

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Each playbook gives you the exact list settings, the subject line, what to say, and when to send. All of them assume you're working with your Enterprise selected, since that's where guest data lives.

Contents

The four that pay for themselves

1. Win-back — guests who've drifted
2. The second visit
3. VIP first-look
4. Slow-night filler

The regular rotation 5. New menu launch 6. Event or holiday booking 7. Gift cards in December

The specialists 8. Catering and private events 9. Birthday month 10. The re-permission email

Plus: A twelve-month calendar · Writing that works · Measuring

1. Win-back — guests who've drifted

The highest-return campaign in restaurant email, every time. These people already liked you enough to come in; something just got in the way.

List: Customer Query, name it Lapsed — 60+ days

Subject: We miss you, {{firstName}} 
Preview: Here's 15% off to bring you back — good through Sunday.

Say:

• One sentence acknowledging it's been a while. Warm, not guilt-inducing.
• One reason to come back now — a new dish, a seasonal menu, a change they haven't seen.
• One offer with a real expiry, 7–10 days out.
• One button: Reserve, or Order.

Send: Tuesday or Wednesday, 10–11am. Monthly, moving the date forward each time.

Watch: click rate. Under 2% and your offer is too weak or your subject line too vague.

2. The second visit

Getting a first-timer to visit twice is the moment a guest becomes a regular. This is a small audience with an unusually high response.

List: Customer Query, First-timers

Subject: Thanks for trying us, {{firstName}} 
Preview: A little something for your second visit.

Say:

• Thank them specifically for coming in.
• Recommend two or three dishes — "if you had the carbonara, next time try…". Guests want to be told what to order.
• A modest offer: a free starter or dessert beats a percentage here.
• Mention one thing they might not know: the patio, the Sunday roast, the wine list.

Send: monthly. Because the filter is "exactly one visit", nobody receives it twice — the moment they come back they drop out of the list.

3. VIP first-look

Exclusivity, delivered honestly. Your best guests hear things first, and they respond to being told that's what's happening.

List: Customer Query, VIPs — VIP Status = VIP Only Or: Big spenders — Total Revenue min 250

Subject: Before we tell anyone else… 
Preview: Twenty seats, one night, our regulars only.

Say:

• Explicitly why they're getting it: "you're one of our regulars, so you're hearing first."
• The thing: a wine dinner, a tasting night, the new menu 48 hours early, a chef's table.
• Scarcity that's true — a real number of seats, a real deadline.
• Reply-to-book beats a form for this audience.

Send: whenever you have something worth it. Four to six times a year. Don't dilute it by making every campaign "exclusive".

Watch: replies. This campaign should generate conversations, not just clicks.

4. Slow-night filler

Tactical, same-week, unglamorous, and it fills tables.

List: Customer Query, Active — last 90 days — Last Visit After = 90 days ago

Subject: Tonight only: half-price bottles 
Preview: Walk in from 5pm — no reservation needed.

Say: as little as possible. One offer, tonight or this week, one line about how to take it up. This should read like a text message from a friend, not a marketing email. Skip the header image.

Send: morning of, or the day before. 10am–2pm.

Watch: covers on the night, not open rate. Compare against the same weeknight the week before.

Don't run this every week to the same audience — the offer stops feeling like an offer, and unsubscribes climb. Once or twice a month.

5. New menu launch

List: Active — last 90 days for the launch, then Lapsed — 60+ days a week later with a different angle ("a lot has changed since you were last in").

Subject: The spring menu is here 
Preview: Six new dishes. The lamb is the one.

Say:

• One good photo of the one dish you're proudest of. Not a collage.
• Three or four dishes named with a short, specific line each — "charred hispi cabbage, brown butter, hazelnuts". Menu language, not marketing language.
• What's staying, if guests have favourites.
• Link to the full menu, and a Reserve button.

Send: 2–3 days before it goes live to the active list, day-of to lapsed guests. Thursday morning.

6. Event or holiday booking

Mother's Day, Valentine's, Thanksgiving, New Year's Eve, big local match days.

List: All guests — Customer Query with no filters.

Subject: Valentine's tables are open 
Preview: Four courses, £65, two seatings — book before they go.

Say:

• The date, the format, the price, and how to book. All above the fold.
• Whether it's a set menu, and whether the normal menu is available.
• One line of scarcity if true.

Send: three weeks out, then a "last few tables" follow-up ten days out to non-openers only — which the module can't segment automatically, so in practice: send the reminder to the same list with a different subject line, and keep it short.

7. Gift cards in December

The highest-margin thing most restaurants can email about.

List: All guests

Subject: The easy gift, sorted in two minutes 
Preview: Digital gift cards, delivered instantly.

Say:

• Lead with the problem you're solving: they have someone hard to buy for.
• Amounts, and that it arrives instantly by email.
• One button straight to your gift card page.
• A shipping/last-order deadline if there's a physical option.

Send: first week of December, and again around the 18th–20th for last-minute buyers. That second send is often the better one.

8. Catering and private events

A different audience with a different rhythm — these are hand-built and worth the effort, because one booking is worth hundreds of covers.

List: Dynamic, Catering leads — Tag catering-lead

Tag contacts as you add them (§2). Every enquiry that doesn't convert goes on this list.

Subject: Holiday party dates are filling up 
Preview: Private dining for 12–40, packages from £45pp.

Say:

• Capacity numbers and price per head. Corporate bookers need both immediately.
• Which dates are still open — specificity creates urgency.
• A link to a package PDF or page, and a direct person to reply to.

Send: early October for the holiday season, February for spring/summer events. Tuesday or Wednesday, 9–10am — these are read at a desk.

Also: every unconverted enquiry deserves a Quick Send follow-up 48 hours later. That one-to-one email converts better than any campaign.

9. Birthday month

NX doesn't store guest birthdays, but you can build this yourself with contacts, and it's worth doing because birthday email has the best response rate of any restaurant campaign.

Set-up:

1. Collect birth month wherever you already talk to guests — the loyalty sign-up, a card at the table, the host stand.
2. On each contact, add a merge field: birthMonth = 03 (two digits, always).
3. Create twelve Dynamic lists — Birthdays — March, and so on — each with the Custom Field rule birthMonth = 03.

Subject: Happy birthday month, {{firstName}} 
Preview: Dessert's on us — any time in March.

Say: short and generous. A free dessert or glass of something, valid the whole month so they can pick their night. Bring a table of friends — that's the actual return here.

Send: the 1st of each month. Twelve scheduled campaigns, one per list, set up once and duplicated each year.

Use two digits (03, not 3) consistently — the rule matches text exactly, so 3 and 03 are different values.

10. The re-permission email

Once a year, for the people who never open anything. It protects your delivery to everyone else.

List: you'll need to build this by hand today — the module can't segment on engagement. Work from a campaign's Recipient Activity list, or simply target contacts you know are old and cold.

Subject: Still want to hear from us? 
Preview: One click either way — no hard feelings.

Say:

• Honest and brief: "we've noticed you haven't opened our email in a while."
• One reason to stay, and one small incentive.
• Make both choices easy: a "yes, keep me on the list" link, and a plain pointer at Unsubscribe.

Send: once a year. Then stop emailing the ones who didn't respond. A smaller engaged list outperforms a big indifferent one — for revenue and for deliverability (§7).

A twelve-month calendar

Two to three campaigns a month is the sweet spot for most restaurants. Fill the rest of the year like this:

Run Win-back and Second visit on a monthly loop underneath all of it — they're the two that compound.

Writing that works for restaurants

• Be specific. "Charred hispi cabbage with hazelnuts" sells; "delicious seasonal fare" doesn't.
• One idea per email. Two offers means neither gets taken.
• Sixty to a hundred words. Guests skim in eight seconds.
• Always put a date on an offer. No deadline, no action.
• Sound like your restaurant. If your staff don't say "culinary journey", don't write it.
• Talk about food and people, not about your business. Nobody books a table because you're "excited to announce".
• Say what to do next, in a button, above the halfway point.
• Test the subject line on a colleague by showing them just the sender name and subject. Would they open it?

Measuring whether any of this worked

Email metrics tell you about the email. They don't tell you about the restaurant. Track both:

From NX (§5): delivered, opens as a trend, clicks as truth, bounces, unsubscribes.

From your own floor:

• Covers on the night of a slow-night campaign vs. the same night the week before.
• Redemptions of the offer — give each campaign a distinguishable code or ask staff to note it.
• Bookings mentioning the email.
• Gift card sales in the week after a gift card send.

A campaign with a modest open rate that filled twelve tables beat a campaign with a great open rate that filled none. Judge accordingly.

Next: §10 Troubleshooting & FAQ