You may be wondering – just how powerful can Upside be? The answer is: very. But don’t take it from us. In this article, we’re sharing perspectives from current restaurant merchants on Upside and the performance results for their businesses.

Read on to learn what Greta Dvorak, owner of Dunn Brothers Coffee and Luke Pascale, manager of Aurelio’s Pizza have to say about success with Upside. 

Upside attracts more customers by helping you do less

Business success starts with filling tables and keeping them filled.

“Any business owner knows that the most expensive customer is the first-time customer. The one that you're marketing for, the one that you're trying to aim at, that's the most expensive customer,” says Greta of Dunn Brothers Coffee. 

Upside is a digital marketplace that empowers restaurant owners to cut down on the time, money, and energy spent on new customer acquisition. 

Instead of relying on customer loyalty to a single business like a proprietary app does, Upside is a product people use for ALL their everyday needs. 

We partner with all kinds of brick and mortar businesses – restaurants, grocery stores, fuel stations, and c-stores – to offer locals everywhere the opportunity to get more value from their everyday purchases. When they open the app to earn back on gas, we bring participating restaurants top-of-mind for millions of people.

And the best part is, participation is free. Consumers download the free Upside app to earn cash back, and operators like you simply list your restaurant with Upside and share in the profit earned. 

By listing your restaurant (for free!) on a marketplace like Upside, you increase your exposure to more prospective loyal customers. Millions of people open our app everyday to earn cash back while they shop. How many customers are opening your loyalty app everyday?

Had to see it to believe it - Greta’s story

Feeling skeptical? So was Greta from Dunn Brothers Coffee. Greta felt unsure about Upside from the start. 

“I had no idea what Upside was,” she says. “As a merchant, I initially was hesitant 'cause I didn't know what it was as a customer.”

Before partnering with Upside, Greta decided to try it out from a user’s perspective. 

 “It’s really fun to be a customer of Upside,” she explains. 

Greta was astonished how Upside encouraged her to go out and shop more with local vendors. “Once I started using the app, I actually started driving to places where those deals were.”

Feeling the excitement of cash back dining, Greta had a revelation. 

“There are more people like me who are searching for that. They will drive out of their way to use that 40% cash back promotion and become a customer if they have a winsome experience.” 

As for winsome experiences, Upside has got your restaurant covered. 

To ensure each and every one of your diners has a great experience, Upside generates personalized promotions. Using machine learning algorithms, we create individualized promotions for every potential diner.

And we do it for free using a resource you already have – anonymized credit card transaction data.

And the more they shop with you, the more fine-tuned our personalized promotions become. Your customers will want to order more items more frequently to make more cashback.

In 5 months of using Upside, Greta gained 63 new customers. 

“I've won them over because of a promotion on Upside and they're coming back!” she exclaims. 

We’re not done talking about Greta – because she has a lot more to say – but first, we’ll go over why Upside seems too good to be true while revealing what makes it accessible to anyone.  

‍

Upside is profitable and easy to use

The title says it all. Upside guarantees win-wins for everyone. Every time your customer dines with you, they earn cash back. And every time they dine with you, you earn a profit. 

Unlike other products that give away the field to bring in customers, Upside delivers proven measurable profit. With Upside, you don’t have to lose profit to win customers – we incentivize customers to visit your restaurant with margin-bound promotions.

And, with our easy-to-use dashboard, merchants can review business performance, so you can see how much profit and customers Upside actually brings to your business. 

Set up is easy because restaurant owners don’t have to set anything up at all! 

Here’s what Luke, owner of Aurelio’s Pizza, has to say about how easy it is to partner with Upside:
‍
“Upside has been an integral part of helping me revamp my advertising. At this time, we're faced with a lot of financial questions. Upside helps me track and know what new customers have come in, what new money is coming into the restaurant. It helps me maximize my advertising dollars.

Upside works with restaurants without adding any integrations, updates, hardware, user manuals, staff training, in-store signage, or fees. We do all the work in the background without impacting your business at all.” 
‍

Lifting the operational burden - How Upside helped Greta and Luke

Oftentimes, business owners and employees have to wear many hats and do a lot on their own. That makes time and resources even more precious.

Upside is a simple product that delivers big impact – we’re truly “set it and forget it.” 

Once you provide us with access to your anonymized credit card transactions, we get to work – generating personalized promotions that combine max cash back value for your diners and max profits for you. 

Even though Greta tried Upside as a diner, she was still wary of how much effort it would take to maintain Upside in her coffee shop. 

“I did have concerns when we first joined,” she remembers, “How much work is it gonna be for my employees?”

It was then Greta discovered how seamlessly Upside fit into her business model. 

 “I learned that there's not gonna be any work for my employees, they're not even gonna know that this app exists unless I tell them, and that the cost would all be maintained in the back of house, and so it would be automatic and simple.”

Here’s what Greta has to say about her experience with Upside: 

“I don't think about Upside. I don't think about what's going on, who is using it or how much money they're spending or how much it's costing me, because it's not costing me energy and it's not costing me time.”

And no offense taken. At Upside, this is what we want from a business partnership! We aim to operate in the background so you don’t have to think twice about us. 

Upside is a truly hands-off service with tangible results. We drive traffic, drive transactions, and drive profits, all while costing you zero time and energy. 

Luke, owner of Aurelio’s Pizza, had similar things to say about maintaining Upside in his restaurant.

“It takes zero effort to maintain the Upside program, it's basically opening an email and looking at what Upside has done for me on a weekly basis.”

Like Greta, Luke was both surprised – and relieved – at Upside’s effectiveness in increasing profits without increasing task load. 

“It has integrated into my business cohesively – that's so important to business owners because we have a lot of responsibilities, we have a lot of things to think about. And if you can take something, insert it into your business, and improve it without impacting the operation at all, it's worth every penny.” 

‍

Upside is transparent and supportive – we’re humans serving other humans

At Upside, transparency is integral. Our goal is to drive more quality customers your way while driving proven profit to your bottom line. 

Everything we do is mutually beneficial– we don’t earn until restaurant owners and diners do first. We maintain our customer-first mindset by offering crystal clear transparency throughout our service and our top-rated customer support. 

What this means is:

• Information is accessible. In addition to receiving weekly emailed updates, all of your customer and profit information is available in real-time on your merchant dashboard. 

• We are constantly improving our product. We combine your feedback with our automatic, machine learning algorithms to continuously create better service with even better promotions. 

• Our customer support is made of real humans. We’re a team of real people with names – not some chat bot or automated phone service. We care about your business just as much as you do. 

• You can count on us. At Upside, we utilize personalization in every way, which is why every business works with a dedicated, reliable account manager that walks you through regular reviews of your business performance.

‍

But don’t just take us for our word. Read what Luke of Aurelio’s Pizza has to say about Upside.

“There's some very dedicated individuals, and it's not just somebody on a website that I'm dealing with – it's faces, names – real people that actually become part of the Aurelio's team, because as we work together. Upside doesn't make money unless I make money, so they have a vested interest in improving the restaurant and the sales that we have.” 

Conclusion

If you’re curious about joining Upside, we just have one more thing to say:

Getting started with Upside is low-cost, low-risk. Growing with Upside is guaranteed. 

“To anyone who's on the fence,” says Greta of Dunn Brothers Coffee, “I would say 50 bucks and one month of commitment or 50 bucks until it runs out is, honestly, it's worth watching. And then if you don't like it, you don't like it, you walk away. I would just encourage you to try.”

‍