Restaurant websites are a category I spend a lot of time on. They’re deceptively tricky. On the surface it seems simple — put up some photos, post the menu, add the address. Done. But the restaurants that actually drive reservations and foot traffic from their website are doing a few key things differently.
Let me break down what actually matters.
The Menu Has to Be Readable — Not a PDF
This one drives me crazy. I see it constantly. A restaurant spends real money on a nice-looking site, and then uploads a scanned PDF as their menu. Here’s what happens: on mobile (which is where most people are), it’s nearly unreadable. You’re pinching and zooming. It doesn’t render properly half the time. And Google can’t index it, so all those dishes you make that people search for? Invisible.
Your menu should be real text on the page. Formatted cleanly, easy to skim, mobile-friendly. That alone puts you ahead of most of the competition.
Photos Are Everything
People eat with their eyes. A well-lit photo of your signature dish will do more for your reservations than any amount of clever copy. If you don’t have good food photography, that’s the first investment to make before anything else. You don’t need a professional shoot necessarily — modern smartphones can produce good results with decent lighting.
The photos on your site should make someone hungry. If they don’t, they’re not doing their job.
Contact Info on Every Page
I can’t count how many times I’ve landed on a restaurant site looking for the phone number and had to dig through three pages to find it. Phone number, address, and hours should be visible and easy to tap from anywhere on the site — especially on mobile.
Think about the use case: someone is in their car deciding where to eat. They pull up your site. If they can’t get the info they need in five seconds, they’re going to the next place.
Hours That Are Actually Up to Date
This one hurts restaurants more than they realize. Nothing kills trust faster than showing up to a restaurant because the website said they’re open, and finding them closed. Keep your hours current, and make it obvious what to do on holidays.
A Reservation or Ordering Link That Works
If you take reservations, the booking button needs to be front and center. Not buried in a contact page. If you offer online ordering, same thing. These are money links. Treat them that way.
Where Most Restaurant Sites Go Wrong
The biggest mistake I see is prioritizing aesthetics over usability. Flash intros, autoplay music, full-page animations — these things might look impressive in a demo, but they slow down your site and annoy real users. Speed and simplicity win.
The second mistake is building something and never touching it again. A restaurant website needs to stay current. Seasonal menus, changed hours, new specials. A stale site is almost worse than no site, because it misleads people.
If you run a restaurant and your current site isn’t pulling its weight, it might be time for a rebuild. At RaizHost, restaurant sites start at $500 with $50/month for hosting and maintenance — including help keeping your menu and hours updated. Get in touch for a free quote.