COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS
Restaurant Choice: Krua Thai Restaurant, North Hollywood
Target Audience:
Krua Thai had 4 things going for it: it is cheap, in a great location, it’s open late and the food is phenomenal. Whenever I visit Krua Thai, it is usually late and the place is packed to the gills with young people (this was before Covid-19, of course) because the food is so cheap and tasty.
So, I believe Krua Thai’s audience should be the young, hip, crowd looking for low-priced but very tasty late-night eats. Their biggest nights seem to be Friday and Saturday evenings when families ordering dinner morph into those look for some good eats after visiting a local bar. The current website has a very old-fashioned feel that is not matched by the rather modern layout and décor of the restaurant, nor the vibrancy of its predominantly young staff.
Goals: The goal for the website should be to increase both business and buzz of Krua Thai Café. The restaurant has a great location and a hip, young vibe inside and should be able to pull in a young, social media savvy clientele.
I believe the most important research aspects necessary would be images and descriptions of the various food items. This seems to be the most time-consuming part of the website build. We would need to see if there is any specific information that the website wants to include beyond what is standard (mottos, welcome message, reviews) or if there is a particular style or color scheme they would like adhered to with the building of the site. While color is a more personal choice, I would steer them to a cleaner, more modern look.
The website should both communicate necessary information (location, hours, directions, parking), but also include ideally an interactive menu, which contains photographs and short descriptions of all the dishes. I believe it would be ideal if the interactive portion could contain an online ordering system, as many users prefer internet/mobile interaction, as opposed to phoning in their orders.
COMPETITORS
1) Sanamluang Café
Sanamluang Café is a Thai food restaurant in North Hollywood, down the street from Krua Thai. They are a direct competitor. \n
Visual Design – The website for Sanamluang Café is a very low-key, clean design. It highlights the photographs of the location and the food
Content – The main content is: customer reviews, images (mostly of food), a Contact Us page and a Menu page
“Call to action” – The main call to action is a link to online coupons.
Navigation – The navigation is very straightforward. There are no pop-up windows, or links to external site
Functionality – The website functions primarily as an information vehicle. One can not interact with the company much through the website.
Communication – The website has a Contact Us page
2) Thai Thai Café
Thai Thai Café is another direct competitor to Krua Thai, as it is a North Hollywood Thai restaurant that stays open until 3am.
Visual Design – This is a very perfunctory design. While it does contain lots of useful information, the design feels a bit clunky and old-school.
Content – This site contains more overall content with the ability to order delivery or pickup directly from the menu
“Call to action” – The Thai Thai Café site allows user to order food and to download coupons
Navigation – The navigation is very straightforward but there are more navigable links than Samnamalung Café’s site and is more interactive overall.
Functionality – The website allows users to both get information about the restaurant, as well as contact and interact with them on Social Media and, perhaps more importantly, order pickup or delivery
Communication – The website has a Contact Us page and links to the Social Media accounts (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter), for Thai Thai Cafe
2) Kinnara Thai
Kinnara Thai is a Van Nuys Thai restaurant that definitely has more of a modern feel and appeals to a younger demographic
Visual Design – This design has quite a bit more visual flair than the other two. While it isn’t the most modern design, the greater use of images and boxes to segment out information is more pleasing to the eye and feels less clunky.
Content – This site is similar content-wise to Thai Thai Café. It is both informational (including the background story of the restaurant) and interactive. This is much more the type of interaction I would expect to have for the new Krua Thai website.
“Call to action” – Kinnara Thai site allows user to order food online and to contact the restaurant.
Navigation – The navigation is very straightforward but there are more navigable links than both Thai Thai Café ‘s Samnamalung Café’s site and is more interactive overall.
Functionality – The website allows users to both get information about the restaurant, as well as contact and interact with them on Social Media and, perhaps more importantly, order pickup or delivery
Communication – The website has a Contact Us page. There are, however, no social media links, which feels like a missed opportunity.