Restaurant Marketing Blog

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Restaurant Marketing: 10 Things I Want To See In Your Restaurant

Restaurant Marketing must take place and be successful inside your restaurant, before you can move outside into your trading area. Here’s my Restaurant Marketing 10 things I would like to see in your restaurant—

1. Give a great greeting and not call guests by a number.

2. Have clean washrooms, not decorated as an after-thought. Flowers in ladies’room.

3. Sincerely thank guests for their business. They have a choice of restaurants and have chosen your restaurant amongst all the others.

4. Make sure your menus are clean; no tattered corners; easy to read.

5. Give easy and accurate telephone directions to those calling for driving directions.

6. Make sure your servers hold drink glasses around the middle, not on the lips of the glass.

7. Make sure your servers have a strong product knowledge; how entrees are cooked.

8. Make sure servers have a their own favorite entree or dessert that they can truly recommend.

9. Allow your servers go out of the way to do something special or above and beyond the norm.

10. Never say the phrase, “Is everything okay?”

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Saturday, June 27, 2009

Restaurant Marketing: The great thing about Fuddruckers is the number of stories they tell to their guests, giving them the opportunity to share those stories with the “outside world.”  So here are the top 5 “stories” that one gets from Fuddruckers.

1. They are famous for having the “world’s greatest milkshakes.”
2. They display their meats in their “butcher room” to convey freshness.
3. They’ve got themed seating booths—Elvis and the Beatles.
4. They display their condiments, again conveying freshness
5. They display their fresh baked cookies.

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Wednesday, June 24, 2009

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 you? Think again.
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 the July/August issue of 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 the cards.

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Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Restaurant Marketing: Sometimes restaurant marketing utilizes amazing technology. The restaurant marketing folks at Dunkin Donuts now have an iPhone app that lets you find the nearest Dunkin and place your order right off of your iPhone. Check out Dunkin Run.

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Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Restaurant Marketing: How do you market your restaurant when everyone sells Chicken Wings? Aren’t all chicken wings (except in Buffalo) basically the same? Restaurant Marketing is also about differentiation and having a story to tell your guests. Jake Melnicks in Chicago sells chicken wings that are so hot you have to sign a waiver to eat them.

So, what’s your WOW story? What’s your claim to fame? What’s your “only”? Are you giving people something to talk about? See restaurant marketing videos for more.

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