According to our 2025 DoorDash Delivery Trends Report, more than a third of consumers have ordered food delivery twice in a day in 2025. We've asked seasoned restaurateurs how they successfully used DoorDash Marketing to increase their sales. Explore valuable insights, tips, and practical recommendations for a better understanding of how to attract potential customers using tools such as Sponsored Listings, Promotions, and Online Ordering.
Use Sponsored Listings to reach new customers
DoorDash marketing strategies, like Sponsored Listings (ads), can help you:
Attract new customers at a lower cost
Boost order frequency
Maximize your revenue potential
The Melt was able to increase their revenue through using this form of advertising. Delivery sales, once a small part of their business at 5%, soon grew to up to a substantial 50% – a transformation Sean Reiter serves, the Director of Brand Revenue for The Melt, fondly refers to as “the big change.”
After only two months using DoorDash ads, The Melt’s Gaslamp location brought in over 500 new customers, over $13,000 in sales, and over 50,000 impressions in just under two months. “I think of Sponsored Listings as getting the word out and having a competitive advantage,” Sean said.
Paying only when customers placed orders, they achieved a substantial increase in sales and visibility, demonstrating the value of in-app advertising tools for restaurants seeking to expand their customer base. If you want to learn more about what ads you can use to grow your delivery sales, check out Marketing 101: How to Use Ads & Promotions. For restaurants on the Premier Pricing Plan, DoorDash will automatically run ads on your behalf at no additional cost.*
Attract new customers with Promotions
Promotions on DoorDash help you:
Increase visibility on the DoorDash app
Incentivize new customers to try your restaurant
Provide discounts and free items
This was especially true for multiple-restaurant owner Derek Chang Both at The Boil Daddy and Amandine.
That’s where DoorDash comes in again: without the app, a lot of people wouldn’t discover us. Instead, I have people who order the same thing from Amandine, seven days a week! I could never get those same customers to actually come into the restaurant that often. And we make sure we send them a little treat now and then, to thank them for that loyalty.
On the other side of the globe, Sydney-based Manoosh Pizzeria found Promotions to be among the most lucrative resources offered by DoorDash. As put by Charlie Hoyek, the owner of Manoosh Pizzeria: “We promoted our Pepperoni Burst Pizzeria a few months ago, and we saw a 200% increase in sales through DoorDash. When we run big promotions, it definitely attracts more customers.” Erinn McCully, Director of Off-Premise Sales, Modern Market had a similar experience. Using promotions, Modern Market grew sales by 300%.
We weren’t on any other third-party platforms up until 2019. If you wanted delivery from Modern Market you had to go to DoorDash. That was such a great partnership for us because it grew that sales channel [on the DoorDash platform] 3X that amount for Modern Market compared to other partners.
She saw firsthand the substantial impact DoorDash promotions can have on a restaurant’s financial performance, which is why she wholeheartedly recommends it to anyone considering it to give it a shot. If you want to improve your campaign performance, check out How to Get the Most Out of DoorDash Ads & Promotions.
Online Ordering can help grow direct orders
With commission-free** Online Ordering, your owned channels can be easily turned into direct ordering channels.
In fact, running Online Ordering promotions is how family-owned Señor G’s Fresh & Healthy Mexican Food grew their online sales. The family-run restaurant started with a small menu of 20 items, but now offers over 100 items like juices, agua frescas, breakfast, and other Mexican dishes. They wouldn’t have been able to offer so many options without an easy, fast way to input these orders into their system.
Ben Arreola, the owner, wanted to tap into a larger online market but wasn’t sure how to find new customers. He integrated Online Ordering, an independent online ordering platform that leverages DoorDash's software to facilitate seamless online ordering directly through the restaurants' websites. Ben quickly noticed how Online Ordering was making a positive impact, especially when pairing it with promotions, which brought in more than 500 customers and $29,000 in sales from October 2021 to February 2022, and Ben looks forward to the continued relationship between Señor G’s and DoorDash.
I did 2,000 orders with you guys last month. Imagine if we had to input all of that by hand.
In Toronto, Fahim Ahmadi launched DoorDash Online Ordering for his Afghan cuisine restaurant Naan & Kabob. By leveraging DoorDash marketing, 32% of their DoorDash orders come from new customers, helping to grow their customer base. By adding Online Ordering Promotions, they were able to increase their average weekly sales by 214%, achieving a 3.9X return on investment.
"[Online Ordering] is an amazing idea. Having a professional, white-label ordering system adds value to our brand, especially compared to if we tried to build it ourselves."
Commission-free** Online Ordering product is part of the DoorDash Commerce Platform, a collection of tools and products designed to help merchants grow their businesses and brands. The Commerce Platform Starter Package is included with your DoorDash Marketplace account, while the Boost and Pro packages provide even more advanced features to grow direct orders and build your loyal customer base strategically.
And if you’re on Marketplace’s Premier pricing plan, you can save 35% on our DoorDash Commerce Platform Pro package.***
In today's restaurant scene, learning how to get new customers is a must. DoorDash marketing tools like Sponsored Listings and Promotions can help you reach untapped markets and help you find new customers who could decide you’re their new go-to place.
Log in to the PortalNow that you’ve learned how to attract new customers, here are some tips on how to entice them to increase their order size.
