What does a restaurant website need to bring in bookings?

What are people looking for when they open a restaurant's website?

They want four things: what food you serve, what it costs, when you're open and how to book. Most of them arrive on a phone, often from Google Maps or a search like “restaurant near me”, and decide within seconds whether to stay or go back to the list.

That's why the order of the content matters more than the design. The first phone screen should show the restaurant's name, one line about what kind of place it is, the booking button and a link to the menu. A big photo of the dining room looks nice, but if it pushes the booking button below the fold, it's costing you guests.

Events, a gallery, the story of the place and a blog all have their uses, especially for someone choosing between two restaurants. They come after the basics are one tap away.

How should the menu look on a restaurant website?

The menu should be text, grouped into categories, with a price and a short description for each dish. A PDF or a photo of the printed menu is hard to read on a phone: you have to pinch to zoom, it loads slowly on mobile data and Google can't read it.

Prices on the site are a trust signal. A guest who can see the prices knows what to expect and books with more confidence. If some dishes change often, it's better to mark them as “seasonal” than to leave an old price up.

People also look for allergen information and vegetarian or gluten-free options. Put them next to the dishes with a simple key, not hidden in a separate document.

• short categories, in the order people order: starters, mains, dessert, drinks
• a price on every dish, updated whenever the in-house menu changes
• a good photo for the key dishes, not necessarily for all of them
• allergens and special options marked next to each dish

Where should the booking button go, and what should the form ask for?

The booking button should be visible on every page, ideally fixed to the bottom or top of the screen on a phone. Guests decide to book at different moments: some after seeing the menu, some after the photos, some right away. The button has to be there every time.

The form should ask only for what you need to confirm a table: date, time, party size, a name and a phone number. An optional notes field covers birthdays, high chairs or a table on the terrace. Every extra field lowers the number of people who reach the end.

Next to the form, add a direct call link that rings with a single tap on a phone. Some guests would rather talk to a person, especially for large groups or events. At Graziano’s Pizza Ape, a mobile pizzeria in Kaiserslautern, the site was built precisely so the place gets found and takes bookings for events.

After they submit, guests should know exactly what happens next: is the booking confirmed straight away, or will you call them back? A vague “thank you” leaves people wondering whether they actually have a table.

Which practical details must not be missing?

Opening hours, address, phone number and a map. They seem obvious, yet they're the details most often wrong or out of date on restaurant websites. Opening hours that no longer apply send people to a closed door, and those people don't come back.

The same details should appear identically on the site, on your Google Business Profile and on your social media pages. When the hours differ from one place to the next, guests don't know which to believe, and Google trusts the information less too.

It's also worth adding the details that save a phone call: where to park, whether there's a terrace, whether pets are welcome, whether the place works for a pushchair or a wheelchair, and which special days have different hours. Every question the site answers on its own is a shorter path to a booking.

How do you keep a restaurant website up to date without a developer?

With an admin panel where your own team changes the menu, prices, hours, events and photos. A restaurant changes often, and a site that needs a developer for every edit will inevitably fall behind.

That's exactly what happened at Terasa Florilor in Bucharest: the menu and events changed every week, and the old website needed a developer for every edit. The new site has a menu, events and bookings, and the restaurant's team edits products, events, photos and coupons straight from the panel.

When you choose who builds your site, ask to see the admin panel before you sign and ask who on your team will use it. If the floor manager can change the daily specials from a phone in two minutes, the site will stay accurate.

What helps a restaurant website get found on Google?

A site that is fast on a phone, with the menu in text, clear titles on every page and the same contact details as your Google Business Profile. Google reads text, not images, so a text menu and a complete contact page help directly.

On the technical side, the site needs HTTPS, should load quickly on mobile data and should be submitted to Google Search Console at launch. Structured data for restaurants, an invisible block of code that describes the name, address, hours and menu, helps Google show the details correctly in search results.

The site doesn't replace your Google Business Profile or your reviews, but it complements them: the profile sends people to the site, and the site takes them to a booking.

Which mistakes keep guests from booking?

Most mistakes come from the same place: the site was designed for the big office screen, not for the phone of a guest standing on the street. These are the ones that show up most often.

• a menu only as a PDF or an image, with no readable prices
• a booking button hidden in the navigation or only on the contact page
• outdated opening hours that differ from Google
• a heavy video or gallery that keeps the first screen loading for seconds
• a long form with required fields you don't actually need
• no clear message after the booking is sent

Frequently asked questions