Joel Cohen's Restaurant Marketing Blog

Increase Restaurant Sales With Top Ten List

Restaurant Sales & Marketing. This time of the year you get inundated with top ten lists.  There's a reason that people are fascinated with these lists. They're easy to read, easy to remember and easy to talk about.  Some lists are ridiculous, some are humorous and some are factual.

Lists can play an important role in your restaurants sales and marketing efforts by educating your customers in an easy format, about the value of your products.

Does your restaurant have a list of the top ten reasons that make you different or better than your competitor?

Having a top ten list gives you and your staff the ability to easily verbalize how your restaurant stands out from the others, especially if you're building name awareness within a highly competitive business sector.

Restaurant Marketing: When I Retire, I Want To Be A Server

Restaurant Marketing: I Want To Be A Server --

That’s what I’m going to do when I retire. I’m going to serve guests in a restaurant. Why? It’s like being in my own business, except I don’t have to buy inventory, pay any rent, be responsible for employees, no overhead - nothing at all. Imagine having your own business without overhead and inventory.

As a server, it would cost me absolutely nothing to be in business for myself. And amazingly, (this is the best ever) I can make up to 20% on everything I sell. And sometimes even more than that. Wow ... and everyone coming into the restaurant is going to buy something already! That's one heck of a deal and an easy way to make money.

I just need to treat the customers like royalty, give them a great dining experience to remember ... and I've got it made! 

I'd even have my own title, and business cards. They’d say "Director of Hospitality." Or, "Director of Fun." I’d give them out to my guests and thank them for allowing me the opportunity to serve them.

I’d develop my own guest mailing list and send them thank you notes. I could make as much money as I want. Is there any better "business" to be in than the "server business?"

Restaurant Marketing Newsletter Says, "No More Couponing"

About a year ago, I wrote in the WOW restaurant marketing newsletter that I’m "anti-couponing."

I believe that if you have a vision and a plan and give your customers a great value and a terrific dining experience, then no matter what kind of concept you have, customers will remember you and return with greater frequency.

Once a restaurant jumps onto the coupon treadmill, it’s difficult to stop. And it only gets worse. Couponing is an addiction. I asked my subscribers, "When will you say stop I’m not going to take it any more; I've got a business to run and I want to be profitable!"

The WOW newsletter takes a big stand against couponing and leans heavily towards a more intelligent approach that will increase your profits.

Here's what's been recently featured in WOW - Intelligent Marketing For Intelligent Restaurant Owners & Executives-

1. What you should be marketing over the weekend that will accelerate your profits.

2. What most restaurants don't know about emailing their newsletters that will increase their response rates immediately.

3. Best time to post relevant information on Facebook so your customers share it.

4. How to make January the best "start-over" month ever.

5. "Half-Way" marketing programs and why they're so effective in increasing your sales.

6. The most incredible dessert program from Jack Astor's that creates on-going customer buzz.

WOW is subscription-based - 4 issues each month - and is the best value if you're a restaurant owner or executive, looking to get away from promotional gimmicks and discounting and wanting to take a more intelligent approach to your marketing. More info at: WOW: The Restaurant Marketing Newsletter.

Restaurant Marketing: True Loyalty Doesn't Come From Loyalty Programs

Restaurant Marketing: Think that having your guests sign up for a restaurant loyalty program is “true loyalty?”

Think that’s going to make them really true-blue loyal to your restaurant? Although there is a place for such programs, and a great one is Loyal Rewards - loyalty shouldn’t be construed as solely a sign-up tactic to join the latest greatest club.

Loyalty is something deeper than that. True loyalty is something that you as a restaurateur have to earn. How do you earn that true loyalty?

Start by listening to your guests and what they have to say. It’s the best, most immediate (and inexpensive) business advice you’ll ever get.

Provide a great product and dining experience that WOW’s your guests, so they want to visit you again – rather than visit the competition.

Develop a connection with your guest. Surprise them with an action or a comment – an act of random kindness—things that other restaurants don’t do.

Olive Garden earns the loyalty of their guests by providing them with a “family experience.”

Now, I know this “sounds” great and tends to be trite and over-used by many other restaurants, but Olive Garden President David Pickens, in Fast Company magazine says, “treating guests like family isn’t likely to happen unless employees feel like family too.”

The company’s COO, Drew Madsen says, “people come to a restaurant for both physical and emotional nourishment. The physical is the food; the emotional is how they feel when they leave.”

Loyalty is truly difficult to earn, but the first step to take is to tear down the old rules and throw away the old tapes. Mold your staff into a championship team. Don’t hire second stringers. Exert your passion for hospitality. Decide what you want to be and what it’s going to take to be what you want to be. Take some bold risks. Have some fun. Be known for something.

Once you’ve established true-blue loyalty, people will continue to dine with you because you’ve shown them the love ... and that’s not in those plastic cards.

18 Restaurant Marketing Ins & Outs For 2012

Restaurant Marketing: Here are 18 restaurant marketing  Ins And Outs For The New Year, 2012. You're welcome to add more to the comment area.

OUT: Advertising
IN: Connecting

OUT: Web sites that look like billboards
IN: Web sites that include video

OUT: Focusing on your restaurant
IN: Focusing on your guest

OUT: Training
IN: Educating

OUT: Working the kitchen
IN: Working the dining room

OUT: You're the owner/manager of the restaurant
IN: You’re the mayor of your community

OUT: Hi, my name is .... and I'll be your server
IN: Good evening and thanks for joining us tonight

OUT: You're in the restaurant business
IN: You're in the marketing of your restaurant business

OUT: Anything that's boring
IN: Anything that's WOW, of course

OUT: Listening to yourself
IN: Listening to your guests

OUT: Hunting for guests
IN: Nurturing and networking for guests

OUT: It's right just because everyone's doing it
IN: It's wrong because everyone's doing it

OUT: Twitter followers who follow you just for the coupons
IN: Followers who follow you just because they're passionate about your restaurant

OUT: Facebook fans followers who follow you just for the coupons
IN: Fans who follow you just because they're passionate about your restaurant

OUT: Torn, dilapidated, micro sized take-out lunch & delivery menus
IN: Bright looking oversized take-out lunch & delivery menus customized with a company's name

OUT: The story of your price
IN: The story of your product and your restaurant

OUT: Growing your business with Groupon
IN: Growing your business "the old fashioned way"

OUT: Web sites where you have to hunt for the phone number of the restaurant
IN: Web sites with the phone number in the upper right corner of each page

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