Sonic: Analyzing Customer Behavior Change During Covid

The Client

Sonic, the American drive-in fast-food chain, is one of the few businesses that have thrived during the restrictions of the pandemic. The restaurant’s unique format lends itself to success when dine-in is less popular, jumping from the 22nd most popular chain to the 5th in a matter of weeks.

The Challenge

How can Sonic understand who their new customers are and retain that audience as the economy moves back to a new normal?

The Results

Spatial.ai's PersonaLive™ segmentation system successfully identified the who behind the large spike in visitation. The new emerging audience consisted of higher income, family-oriented segments (#Kids&Country, #Family&Faith) and revealed that more rural consumers drove further (#JohnDeereCountry, #CrackerBarrelBarons).

Equipped with these insights, Sonic can target emerging areas with advertising, personalize messaging and menu design based on visitor type, and deploy ads to key segments directly across Facebook, Google, Twitter, etc.