3 Action Ideas To Make Your Restaurant Staff Happy To Work For You

These are hard times. Tough economic times for businesses, hard times for restaurants. But even so, this is no excuse not to invest some time and money on your restaurant staff. Take it from me. When a person loves his work, he works harder and provides better service to customers. The customers will love and remember the experience and keep coming back. It’s a snowball that began all the way back with a single, happy server.

Here are three ways to invest in your restaurant staff.

1. Recognize their efforts
Are you familiar with The One Minute Manager? It’s a popular book on business management, and one of its teachings is One Minute Praisings. In other words, praise your restaurant staff as soon as you catch him or her doing something right. Recognize his or her efforts. Salary isn’t everything. There is a special feeling of contentment when your boss at work commends you for a job well done.

2. Stir friendly competition by rewarding your staff
Nothing motivates a bored staff better than a little friendly competition. Most people are willing to work when they’re gunning for something in the long run.

The trick is to stay away from clichés like “Employee of the Month”. Who cares if you’re employee of the month? Instead you should stick to basic and concrete facts, such as the employee who made the most sales, the employee with the least absences, etc.

3. Get together once in a while
Call it a team building event, [insert restaurant name here] Employee’s Day, etc. Do this at least once a year with your restaurant staff to help further strengthen the bond with employees and yourself, the restaurant owner. Working every single day can be very stressful. You should know that. So planning this kind of event once in a while is a great way to say “Thank You” to your hardworking staff.

Sometimes we have too many problems coming in the front door all at once that we forget the most important thing that holds a successful company together – satisfied employees. So invest in your restaurant staff. Make them happy. You won’t be disappointed.

Share your tips on how to make your restaurant staff happy by leaving a comment below.

3 Sure-Fire Tips To Promote Your Restaurant Brand Without Spending A Fortune

Tough competition has forced restaurants to advertise. There are more restaurants than most customers could afford dine in, especially in major cities. So what’s a restaurant owner to do? Advertise, of course, to get the lion’s share of the market. But when restaurant owners think of advertising they think about getting an effective message out and mass appeal. Then they think about expenses, expenses, expenses.

There are simpler, cost-effective ways to market your restaurant. You don’t always have to spend millions to advertise on Super Bowl. Sometimes all you need is a little creativity and a techie friend working at your side.

Here are some tips.

1.    Distribute business cards and leaflets
The restaurant owner must work “on” the restaurant, not “in” it. While your waiters are busy serving tables, you should be monitoring your restaurant and figuring out who your target customers are. In time you’ll form a better picture of your regular clients. These are who should focus on. Reach out to them by distributing menu fliers, leaflets and sample cards.

2.    Stay in the public eye for all the right reasons
It’s important to have locals talking about you, but make sure it’s for all the right reasons. Do this by promoting your restaurant locally. Offer discounts, coupons, and even sponsor charity events. Make sure your restaurant’s presence is heard during festive seasons.

3.    Get into social networking
This is where your techie friend comes in. Social networking is advertising on the 21st century. And the best thing about it is, it’s FREE – or mostly free. Get your restaurant’s name out through Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, or by blogging, what KogiBBQ did for its franchise. Social networking is the best way to get your name out without spending a fortune.

Tell me what you think about these cost-effective means of marketing your restaurant by leaving a comment below.

What Every Restaurant Operator Ought To Know About Restaurant Week

In the US, January 25 holds a special place in the hearts of restaurant owners. It is winter, and it is the season when most people like to go out and enjoy a steak or lobster at their favorite restaurant. Still doesn’t ring a bell? January 25 is the start of Restaurant Week in many key cities in the US, including New York City. Yes, you got that right, restaurant week.

Restaurant week in the US began in 1992. It formed from an idea by Tim Zagat, founder of Zagat Survey, and Joe Baum, a restaurant owner. The duo aims to promote both local and national restaurants on a worldwide scale, and so restaurant week was born.

During restaurant week, participating restaurants offer special discounts, coupons and other events you don’t normally see at any other time of the year. Zagat and Baum thought, what they’ll lose in check averages, they’ll get back through sheer sales volume. It was a risk that paid off well – restaurant week is still going strong every year and shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

You can organize and start your own restaurant week, even if you don’t live in the US. Here are some tips how.

• Get in touch with your local restaurant operators organization and ask them about starting a restaurant week.

• Get as many local restaurants as possible to participate.

• Plan it so your restaurant week coincides with the slowest time of the year. Restaurant week in New York runs for two weeks in January and then another two weeks in July.

• Show consistency. Participating restaurants should follow the same regulations and guidelines. Agree on a specific price range.

• Last but not the least, offer your best food.

A restaurant week in your local area is good for your business. Don’t miss out on the fun.

Share your insights on restaurant week by leaving a message after this post.

The Untold Secrets To Running A Restaurant Business Like A Real Pro

Managing a restaurant is no walk in the park. Even before you declare your restaurant “open for business”, there are a lot of things that needs to be done and needs to be taken care of. There’s no denying that restaurant owners are hardworking and very knowledgeable individuals.

But any successful restaurant owner will tell you that knowing how to manage a restaurant isn’t enough. Thing is, most restaurant owners have no idea what their role is in running a restaurant business.

Here are some tips from a master restaurant entrepreneur, Ray Kroc, creator of the McDonald’s empire.

1. Work “on” the business and not “in” it
The problem with most restaurant owners is they work “in” the business and not “on” it. They confuse participation with good management. Just because you’re willing to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty doesn’t mean you’re doing a good job managing the business.

Fact is you’re doing the opposite.

The primary role of a restaurant owner is to take a step back and analyze. Think. Figure out what needs to be done to improve operations, to hasten speed of service, to improve the menu, etc. If you’re working “in” the restaurant, there’s no way you’ll accomplish any of these.

2. Success is in the system
Anyone who’s ever lived in the 20th century will tell you that McDonald’s is the biggest fast food chain in the world. How did Ray Kroc manage to build thousands of restaurants around the world exactly the same way?

It’s in the system, Ray believes. Ray believes, restaurants can’t afford extraordinary people, but they can make ordinary people produce extraordinary results with the help of an excellent system. He also believes consistent quality is only possible with a good system.

You may or may not be thinking about starting a franchise restaurant business. But you definitely need a good system to run your restaurant. Take my word for it. Take Ray’s word for it.

The full article can be found here.

Check back on Online Marketing for Restaurants next week for more restaurant marketing tips.

Why Isn’t Your Restaurant Catering To Local Businesses In Your Area?

Marketing your restaurant on the Internet is important, but sometimes you need to take a step back and look at the things happening around you. What do you see? If your restaurant is standing in the middle of a business district, you’re in good luck – you might just make some extra money on the side if you’re thinking what I’m thinking.

Pray other restaurants in your area aren’t doing this already. Why not contact your neighbor local businesses and see if you could offer to serve them breakfast or lunch? This way they could get more work done by not having to worry about where to go for breakfast or lunch every day of the week.

You get the picture. It’s like catering, yes, but on a regular basis.

Here’s what you can do.

You could approach local businesses by sending out restaurant marketing letters to pitch your catering offers. Take note it doesn’t have to be every day. Maybe you could arrange it so you could fix breakfast for one company on Mondays, a lunch catering service for another on Tuesdays, brunch for another company on Wednesdays, etc.

But the best approach is still on a personal level. Prepare brochures with everything the company needs to know about your catering services. Then arrange to meet the office supervisor to discuss things in person. Sometimes you need to get in touch with the receptionist first, and sometimes the receptionist is all you need to get your foot in their doorstep. Get every interested employee’s name and contact information and store it in your database for future reference.

Once a deal is made, your food will do the talking from here on out.

Who knows? They might like your recipes and become regulars at your restaurant. In any case, this is a win-win situation for you, the restaurant owner. This is good business.

What can you say about catering for local companies? Leave a comment below.

9 Reasons Why Women Make Better Restaurant Marketers Than Men

There’s the saying,

“The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.“

That should tell you women know a thing or two about food and how to satisfy men with their cooking. It should also explain how more women restaurant managers and owners are driving more customers into their restaurants over the past couple months. And they’re doing this on a shoe string budget.

Looking at current statistics, it seems men are more likely to rely on conventional restaurant marketing techniques than women. Thing is conventional methods are becoming less and less cost-efficient and effective. I thought men took risks more than women, too. But I guess when it comes to restaurant management that simply isn’t the case. When it comes to managing their restaurant business, women have become far more aggressive.

Their secrets…

1. They stay away from print, TV and radio advertising.

2. Instead women seem to have found a niche doing direct mail promotions. Email promotions are also proving effective.

3. Remember the term “USP” or “Unique Selling Proposition” in your management classes back in college? Women restaurant owners know their USP, and they make it a point to convey it to the customer using as few words as possible.

4. It seems women are better negotiators overall.

5. Women do a better job of overseeing their restaurant marketing campaigns than men. So they have a better knowledge of which ones work and which ones don’t.

6. Women tend to remember customer names, addresses and other personal information better than men.

7. They take advantage of press releases.

8. They write better headlines. I have no idea how, but apparently they do.

9. Women understand their customer’s demographic than men.

Maybe it’s about time you think about hiring a woman restaurant operator to manage your restaurant. Better yet, study their methods and tactics and apply it yourself.

This blog post is based from information by Jerry Minchey. He is the editor of Marketing Your Restaurant.

Feel free to leave a comment below.

You Don’t Have To Be An Award-Winning Novelist To Write An Effective Restaurant Newsletter

I once sat down with a relative of mine over coffee to talk about restaurant marketing. We talked about a lot of things, but mainly about her restaurant newsletters. She said she’s had great success as a restaurant owner thanks to her newsletters, which brought her more clients and patrons than she could ever imagine.

Here’s a brief excerpt of our conversation.

Q: Where did you get the idea to start a newsletter?
A: I’m a restaurant owner. I’m a business woman, you could say that, but I also love to write. I guess it’s this love of writing that urged me to sit down and write an “experimental” newsletter for my restaurant. Before I knew it, I was getting calls out of nowhere—take-outs, events, etc.—mostly from people who’ve read the newsletter and had become interested in my restaurant.

I said to myself, I might be on to something good here…

Q: I told you there was something special about newsletters. When done right, of course. How many years has it been?
A: Yeah. When I realized newsletters were actually effective in marketing my restaurant, I remembered your advice about them when I was first starting out. I’ve been writing newsletters for about three years now.

Q: I remember you sending me an email one time about how you were shocked when you stopped sending them for a month or two?
A: I did. I remember that. I think it was about a year ago, when something suddenly came up in my life that I needed to fix, and I couldn’t find the time to write newsletters. So I stopped sending them out for about two months. You wouldn’t believe how much business we lost during those two months. I didn’t expect my newsletters had this much impact on our sales until that time.

I guess you really need to try it out and see things for yourself before you jump to conclusions, especially when it comes to newsletters.

Q: What’s your style in getting more subscribers?
A: I’ve tried lots of approaches. But a really effective one is to tempt them with a promo—say, free wine for three. If they come in and make a reservation for three people, they get to sign up for our in-house wine event and receive the free wine. Right now I have 1,500 subscribers, give or take a few.

Q: Did you think about what I wrote you about putting ads in your newsletters to cut down on costs?
A: There was a time when I did consider the option. But I didn’t follow through. You see, I was too busy managing the restaurant and I simply didn’t have the time to shop around for advertisers trying to pick out the best deal. I could hire someone to do that job, but that would just defeat the purpose, don’t you think?

I guess it depends on how much attention you’re willing to put into your restaurant newsletter. Hiring that sales person could still offset the cost of having to shoulder the entire thing yourself. All you need is time to balance the figures out. Anyway, successful as I’ve been with my restaurant newsletters, I’m not spending too much on them, so in my case I didn’t think it was worth the hassle.

Check back on Restaurant Marketing Zone next week for more restaurant marketing tips.

Discover The Insider Strategies That Make Your Restaurant Menu An Important Part Of Your Marketing Scheme

A friend of mine once asked, “I recently hired a restaurant consultant. What else can I get him to teach me other than how to manage my business?” I raised the coffee to my lips and gave it some thought. Then I said, “The second most important thing you could get a consultant to teach you is how to design your restaurant menu.” I looked at my friend. “Yes, that’s about right,” I said.

Most people think the point of a menu is to show the customer what’s available in your restaurant. But here is the thing. The restaurant menu can also be designed in such a way as to steer the customer away from the unprofitable (but cheap) dishes and draw their attention towards the more profitable (but more expensive) offerings. This is where the restaurant consultant comes in.

But you don’t always need a restaurant consultant to tell you what to do. Here are a few basic tips on how to design an effective restaurant menu that works.

1. Look up, and then to the right
The upper right corner of the restaurant menu is crucial because the customer’s eyes instinctively float to this area upon sitting down at the table and opening the menu. Place a delicious, high-quality photograph of one of your most profitable dishes in this section.

2. No Man’s Land
This is where unprofitable menu items go. No Man’s Land is the most inconspicuous section of your restaurant menu.

3. Menu price anchor
Below the photograph is the restaurant’s menu price anchor. Here you can strategically list expensive dishes alongside menu items with high profit. The aim is to create the illusion of your high-profit offerings being “cheap” compared to your most expensive—but low-profit—dishes, whose main purpose is to create that illusion.

4. Special boxes
Dishes, or beverages, in boxes draw the customer’s attention. What’s so special about that seafood dish that they put it in a box and not in a list alongside everything else? Your customers will find the answer when they order it.

5. No columns, please
Most restaurant owners do this. But top restaurant operators know better than to design their menu items in an ordered list and encourage customers to choose from the cheapest dishes available. If it can’t be helped, at least stay away from leader dots connecting the names of the dishes to their respective prizes.

The restaurant menu is an important part of your – or any other restaurant owner’s – marketing scheme. Design it carefully. If you have to, hire a restaurant consultant just for that purpose. You won’t be disappointed when customers are ordering your most profitable dish offerings.

Why Aren’t You Advertising Your Restaurant To Baby Boomers?

It’s the year 2010, a fresh start, a new beginning. It’s time to put your focus on how to reach out to one of the wealthiest generations in history – the baby boomers. Sit down and take time to realize how some of the most successful restaurant franchises nowadays appeal to baby boomers more than anything.

Experts say baby boomers seem to favor the unconventional. And it makes sense – baby boomers began their lives during the economic boom of the 40s and 50s and then flourished in the 60s during the cultural revolution. It’s no wonder baby boomers respond well to unconventional advertising methods.

Here are a few unconventional advertising techniques you can use to market your restaurant to baby boomers.

In-house advertising – Baby boomers like to eat out more than any other generation before them—or, at least not since Vlad the Impaler. You can place advertisements at strategic locations, such as on the door of the cubicle in the bathroom. Hook them in at their most vulnerable moment!

Advertising in airports – There’s no question that baby boomers love to travel. As a restaurant owner, you should take this opportunity to invite foreigners to dine at your restaurant, and remind out-of-towners to visit your restaurant again when they return to the country.

Advertising in movie theaters – Hollywood made and continues to make a lot of money from baby boomers. Why can’t you, restaurant owner? Advertising in movie theater lobbies and restrooms are unconventional, yet effective, ways to market your restaurant.

Mobile advertising – Everyone owns a mobile phone these days. Even baby boomers. Mobile advertising is a great way to market your restaurant to people on the move.

Advertising in golf courses – If there’s anyone who loves to play golf more than anybody, it’s the baby boomer generation. Look around your local golf club courses and check for advertising opportunities. Baby boomers love to socialize. When they’re looking for a place to talk with friends after a relaxing game of golf, they’ll see your restaurant.

Browse our pages for more information and restaurant advertising tips.

8 Sure-Fire Tips To Improve Your Pizza Menu Design For Your Restaurant

I have a friend who is a marketing major. He drives a car to work every day. But every so often his car breaks down—the engine won’t start or else one of the tires gave out overnight—and he has to commute on his way to work. I have never seen my friend try and fix the car himself. And I bet neither would you. My friend knows something most restaurant owners don’t – just because you own a car doesn’t make you an auto specialist.

The same is true for pizza restaurant owners. Owning a restaurant doesn’t make you a business advertising specialist.

Thing is pizza menus are critical to the success of a pizza restaurant business. Pizza menus help find new customers. They advertise your menu items, the quality of your ingredients, the history of your establishment, and help keep loyal patrons in place.

Here are 10 tips for creating and designing an effective pizza menu for your restaurant:

1. Don’t force yourself to design a pizza menu. Hire a graphic designer to do that job.

2. Put some other purpose on your pizza menu, such as making it a monthly calendar.

3. Remember to include your brand name and contact information (contact nos., address, etc.).

4. Make sure to highlight the company or restaurant logo.

5. Choose your distribution method carefully. Keep in mind your budget for this one. Are you going to distribute it as handouts in high traffic areas? Or are you going to put it in a popular local magazine?

6. Slip in a coupon or two to come along with the pizza menu.

7. Keep the design clean and easy to read. Cluttered and messy designs aren’t very attractive.

8. Use high-quality pictures of your pizzas and menu items. Also use high-quality, glossy paper.

Simply put, a pizza menu is a must for every pizza restaurant establishment. It’s guaranteed to bring a lot of good things on your table. That is, when done right.

Share your tips on pizza menus by leaving a comment below.

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