A Guide To Reducing Advertising Costs For Restaurant Owners

I have a friend who is a restaurant owner. He runs a fairly popular restaurant in his local area. But thing is, 2009 left him with a small hole in his pocket, and now he’s interested in hearing ways how he could cut down on his advertising costs without compromising his restaurant brand awareness.

He used to enjoy advertising in food magazines, etc. But when those publications demanded higher fees, my friend knew he needed to look someplace else if he wanted to keep advertising.

I was lucky enough to talk to him one afternoon over coffee, and he happened to share his dilemma. I asked, “Have you tried marketing online?” He said, “No,” and shook his head. “You’re missing out on a lot,” I said. Those were my exact words.

Seriously, what restaurant owner wouldn’t advertise online and not miss out on a lot of good things? So I told him, “You should think about advertising on social media like Facebook and Twitter. That way you’ll reach a broader set of audience without feeling the expensive costs of print media.”

My advice to restaurant owners, start with the most popular social media websites around – Facebook, MySpace, Multiply, etc. Of course, Twitter. Once you’ve gotten the hang of it, online restaurant marketing, then you can move on to deeper stuff like blogging. You could write for the blog yourself if you’ve got the time. Otherwise, you could hire a blogger or assign one of your chefs to blog on his or her spare time—of course, with proper compensation.

My friend was worried about the same thing. “I’m not a computer person,” he said. “I know my way around the kitchen, but I can’t tell one side of an iPod from the other. Isn’t hiring an online marketing company going to cost me more than what I used to spend on magazines?”

That’s a good question. But that’s also where online marketing shines. You don’t need to hire a company. You just need to hire someone—an internet-savvy person—to spend just a few minutes in front of a computer everyday to check your email, send newsletters, update your Twitter status. But here’s an even better solution: why not pay one of your servers to do just that for you? Unless you require your servers to be above the age of 60 and possess a senior citizen’s card, they should know how social media works and wouldn’t mind earning some extra income on the side.

More restaurant owners should recognize the power of online marketing on social media. It’s here, and it’s mostly free-of-charge. Why not use it to boost your restaurant business?

Tell me what you think by leaving a comment below.

4 Simple Tips To Catapult Your Restaurant Brand Name On Facebook

Who hasn’t tried Facebook? Who doesn’t even know Facebook? I’d be hard pressed to find someone without a Restaurant City or Farmville account. Simply put, Facebook has become one of the most visited—or overcrowded—websites over the last couple years. A study shows that 6 billion minutes are spent every day on Facebook all over the world. The question: what does this mean for your restaurant?

Get that worried look off your face. If anything, Facebook brings a lot of blessings to your restaurant—or any business, for that matter. Facebook is a household name. It’s a place where millions of people hang out. Facebook is one of the most popular websites on the internet. Therefore Facebook is a marketing machine.

But take note there more than 700,000 other businesses are competing for people’s attention on Facebook. Your restaurant is just one of them. But what am I here for, right? Here are 4 effective strategies to advertise on Facebook and gain a loyal following.

1. Add, add, add friends
Facebook is a gem for business owners because it connects friends with friends and friends of friends of friends. The same goes for maintaining an active business page for your restaurant. Keep adding people to your friend list. Add as many as 5,000 friends, or more. Don’t stop adding until you hit that magic number.

2. Create a fan page for your restaurant
A fan page is where your fan and followers can post their ideas and suggestions about your brand name in an open forum. It encourages discussion and brand awareness. So as soon as you’ve created an account on Facebook, proceed to creating a Facebook fan page for your restaurant. And remember – keep the fan page updated as often as you can.

3. Keep the fan page active by publishing interesting content
After a brief biographical background of your restaurant, you need to keep updating your fan page with fresh, interesting content to keep it going. There’s no concrete rule on how many times a fan page requires an update. But a good rule to remember is at least twice a day, usually before the major meals – lunch and dinner. Add mouth-watering pictures of your delicious recipes and offerings. Who knows? You might just attract the taste buds of a hungry friend or two.

4. Find a partner
Two heads is better than one, right? Right.

Go around your neighborhood and search for businesses with a fan page on Facebook. Ask them that if they’d be kind enough to promote your business on their fan page, you’d happily do the same on yours. The more partners you have, the better. This way you could still market your restaurant to people outside your market range without looking like an outsider.

Follow these tips when creating your Facebook fan page, and update me with your results.

Tell me what you think by leaving a message after this post.

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.

Proof That Social Media Works As An Effective Restaurant Marketing Platform

Always try to see things in a positive light, even when there’s tough competition. Fact is if there’s one thing you could take from having other restaurants in your business area, it’s the opportunity to learn from your competitors. As the saying goes, “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”

This is what came to mind when I heard Red Mango was pulling this stunt on the Internet.

Recently Red Mango opened its fan page on Facebook, the social media website that’s on everyone’s mind these days. To celebrate its garnering more than 100,000 fans, the yoghurt franchise is giving away coupons to its Facebook fans good for slashing $1 off any order.

Dan Kim says about this recent development,

“In a short time our Facebook fans have become dedicated lovers of our all natural frozen yogurt. Facebook is a fun, engaging and rewarding way for Red Mango to communicate directly and interactively with our customers. We are excited to thank the 100,000 fans that stand by our product and brand.”

Dan Kim is the CEO, president, and founder of Red Mango Inc.

Red Mango is planning to give fans additional rewards for every 100,000 new fans on Facebook.

Like I said, the moral of the story is to learn from the competition. See what works for them and what doesn’t. Then take the things that work and modify it a little so it goes well with your business workflow. In this case, Red Mango is harnessing the marketing potential of Facebook by giving away free coupons on its fan page and encouraging more people to sign up.

As a restaurant operator, I’m sure you could come up with other ways to take advantage of social media to boost sales. I wrote this article simply to prove a point: that advertising on social media works. But it’ll only work if you’re determined to make it work. Otherwise, sit back and watch your competition take in all the customers, even your loyal patrons.

Learn from Red Mango’s example.

Visit the Online Marketing section of this blog for more detailed tips on social media marketing for restaurants.

A Step-By-Step Guide To Creating Your Restaurant’s Fan Page On Facebook

Facebook is a social media website and it needs no introduction. A couple years from now, I won’t be surprised if Facebook is named the most visited and most popular website in the world. Look around you. The Facebook buzz is in the air.

Which is why I’m writing this article. restaurant owners can – and should – no longer ignore the advertising opportunities that Facebook offers. So in this article we’ll go through the process of creating a Facebook Fan Page for your restaurant, step-by-step.

Here goes.

Step #1. Sign in your Facebook account
First things first, you need to sign up for a Facebook account. Once you got that taken care of, you need to log in using that account to be able to create a Facebook Fan Page.

Type your username and password to log in.

Step #2. Navigate to Facebook Fan Page section
You’ve logged in your account and opened your Facebook homepage. Now scroll down and find the link “Advertising” at the bottom of the page. Click it.

On the next page you’ll see the link “Pages” with an orange flag icon beside it. Click that link and it will take you to another page – the Facebook Pages section. Click the “Create a Page” button. This is where you begin constructing your restaurant’s Facebook Fan Page.

Step #3. Create a Facebook Fan Page
The first thing Facebook will ask you is to choose a category. Select “Local” and then choose “Restaurant” as the sub category.

Next you need to provide the name of your restaurant. You know what goes here. But be careful. You can’t change the name of the restaurant once you’ve confirmed it. Make sure the name is search engine-friendly as well. I suggest you include the name of your town or city following the restaurant’s name, so it’s easily indexed by major search engines.

Finally check the box that asks you as an authorized person for the creation of the page. Type your complete name, and then click the “Create Page” button.

Voila! Your restaurant has a Facebook Fan Page.

Step #4. Fill in required information
Facebook will prompt you to provide a few details about your restaurant. Fill this up, making sure everything is correct and accurate. You can also upload a logo of your restaurant, which I recommend. It helps give your restaurant and brand a recognizable image while the page itself serves as your digital home.

Invest some time to make the page look more professional. You could do this yourself, or you could hire someone to decorate and update the page from time to time if you’re too busy managing the restaurant. In any case, you can use your Facebook Fan Page to share insider information with your fans, exchange recipes, hold contests, or simply update them about incoming events.

That’s the basic idea – use the Facebook Fan Page to bring in even more fans.

Step #5. Publish
Click “Publish this Page” to complete the procedure. Once the page is online, click “Become a Fan” and become the first ever fan of your restaurant!

Five simple steps go a long way into opening doors for your restaurant to establishing a stronger online presence. Every restaurant owner wants internet visibility for their restaurant. Facebook has it. The only thing standing in the way is your initiative to take advantage of it.

Comments? Feedback? Leave a comment after this post.

Put Yourself In Their Shoes: Why You Should Become A Customer In Your Own Restaurant

For some reason, the title of a short story I read a long time ago called “Put Yourself In My Shoes” came to me as I sat down to write this article.

Last month I came across an article by Rohit Bhargava on the internet. The article had an interesting title, “Forget Eating Your Own Dog Food - Just Try Buying it…” Rohit believes the best way to understand the customer is to experience your own product and services yourself – from the initial awareness up to the purchase period. That means every single step of the way.

It makes sense. If you put yourself in your customer’s shoes, you’d see things from their perspective. It might explain why your restaurant business is booming, or being unprofitable.

So how do you put this into practice?

The first step is to create a portrait of your ideal diner. What is her social status? Has she eaten at your restaurant or is this her first time? Is she a local or an out-of-town visitor? Is she here to conduct a business meeting or is the meal purely for leisure?

Answering these questions will help you put together an image of your prospective client.

Next stop is establishing a visible online presence. A successful restaurant internet marketing plan is when your restaurant is visible no matter what the ideal client is looking for. If your restaurant is only visible to those looking for it, then you need to reconsider your online marketing mix.

Search for restaurants in your city using Yahoo!, Google, Ask—any other popular search engines. Are you in the Top 20 list of local restaurants? Too bad if you’re not – your online visibility is minimal. If you’re in it, are the descriptions about your restaurant accurate and appealing to first-time diners?

Also look for your restaurant on Facebook and Twitter to check the social media community for fans and detractors.

Last but not the least, it’s time to check your website’s usability first-hand. Pretend you’re a potential diner looking for a place to eat and came across your restaurant’s website.

• Is the address, phone number and email address clearly visible on every page of the website?
• Do you have a dedicated page showing directions to your restaurant’s location?
• Is the menu available online? Is it in an easy-to-read format?
• Can you order online?

It’s probably going to take a while to get all of this done, but believe me, and Rohit Bhargava, it’s worth every ounce of effort and penny you put into it. The idea is to thrust your restaurant’s name out there on the World Wide Web, and eliminate every obstacle that stands between the ideal diner and your front door.

Put yourself in the shoes of your customers. You might just find something useful – a new marketing idea or opportunity – you didn’t know was there from the beginning.

The Truth About Yelp And How It Helps (Or Hurts) Your Restaurant

I’ve been talking about social media—Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc.—as means of establishing presence on the internet. Do you own a small restaurant business? There’s no better way to spread that piece of good news than to create a fan page on Facebook or get fans to follow you on Twitter.

I’ve also worked with a few clients whom I asked the question, “So what’s your take on Yelp?” only to get this look on their face as response.

If you don’t know Yelp by now, then you need some catching up to do.

To make a long story short, Yelp is an online review website for bars, restaurants, retail stores and other commercial establishments. Customers sign in and post reviews and tell this and that thing about your restaurant.

In other words, Yelp could be helping or hurting your business right this minute, and the scary thing is you just found out about it.

Here is the thing. Yelp’s review system makes it possible for your competitors to put out a bad word about you by posting “fake” reviews of your restaurant. You can suppress these bad reviews by “sponsoring” Yelp at $150 a month minimum, which is another way of saying “corporate blackmail.”

This “sponsorship” system is Yelp’s primary source of income. But even so, more or less only 1% of businesses on Yelp became site sponsors, which has more to do, I believe, with the owners being unaware of Yelp as a review website than not wanting to shell out the money.

Look at eBay, Amazon, Epinions.com. Online reviews are here and they could burn your restaurant right down to its foundations if you continue to pretend they won’t affect you and your business. As a restaurant owner, it’s important to know what’s being said about your establishment online, and address these praises, issues and complaints appropriately.

Why not conduct an in-house survey? Ask customers if Yelp had anything to do with their being in your restaurant. If it turns out the majority found you on Yelp, then maybe you should consider sponsoring the website.

The younger your target market niche, the more likely they found out about you first on Yelp.

So what’s your take on Yelp? Tell me your experiences with Yelp by leaving a comment below.

Here Is A Method That Is Helping Small Restaurant Owners To Compete With Big Name Businesses

Let’s talk about online restaurant marketing.

I have friends who had made a good start with their businesses and are now enjoying a steady flow of transactions from both old and new clients.

Their line of services falls under different industries, not just foodservice. But they all did one thing in common, which I suggested to them on their very first day—that is, to make friends online and hopefully turn leads into regular customers.

This is called internet marketing, and as a restaurant owner you ought to call yourself lucky for being “just in time” to take advantage of it.

The one thing I like about online restaurant marketing—or online marketing of any commercial service—is that it levels out the playing field between small business owners and big name corporations. Before the internet, the majority of marketing is done on TV or magazines and newspapers. This means you’ll be spending millions of dollars just to let people know you are opening a restaurant.

For small business owners, this can be killing.

Modern internet marketing, on the other hand, is fought with ideas, not money. You could advertise your restaurant on the internet and not spend a single cent. Your competitor’s fat wallet isn’t a big factor here.

A tried-and-true formula is to advertise your restaurant on social media. Why not invest on a monthly cooking show to be shown, for free, on YouTube? Like my friends, why not sign up on popular social media such as Twitter and Facebook and get to know your market niche better so you could serve them what they want?

A successful business venture is one that takes the time to listen.

Money still plays a role here. Don’t take it the wrong way when I said it’s “free“. But even so, it doesn’t play as big a role as it does when advertising on any other medium outside the internet. You can pay for an online ad space, sure, but you can’t buy the sense of trust and intimacy between brand and client that result when you, the restaurant owner, form a relationship with your customers.

Did you know that only a handful of US restaurants use social media to get their names around? Don’t be one of them. Leave a comment below and tell me how you intend to make a difference by going online.

The Ugly Truth About Restaurants And Social Media

Who hasn’t heard of social media? My kids love their MySpace, I mingle on Twitter from time to time. Even my wife plays her farm and restaurant applications on Facebook.

But here’s the real thing: are restaurants actually using social media? I’ve been raving about them ever since I started this blog, and I’m sure every other consultant and business coach out there is doing the same – trying to emphasize the importance of social media in today’s business environment.

The sad news is that most restaurants don’t seem to be getting the same message about social media.

Chalkboarder.com recently surveyed restaurants in the better parts of San Francisco, New York, and Portland. The survey wasn’t about food preparation or anything like that. They were only interested in one thing: do restaurants actually use social media?

About 80% of restaurants in Portland and New York maintain their own website. Pretty good. But not considering that San Francisco only compares by as much as 50%.

The city is home to Silicon Valley, considered the cradle of the internet. If so, then why is it that only half the restaurants in San Francisco are using social media? I don’t get it either.

This is where it gets more interesting. In all three cities, only 10% of restaurants, just about, are using Twitter and Facebook as a free online marketing tool. This is San Francisco, New York and Portland we’re talking about – not Timbuktu or any other location where internet access is either scarce or banned.

The reason why these restaurants aren’t doing anything is beyond me.

Maybe it’s got something to do with the owners coming from an older generation before the internet. The restaurant is going well even without social media marketing, or they can’t afford to hire someone with the marketing expertise. Or the restaurant owner simply doesn’t believe in the kind of influence social media could have on people.

Since I’m here anyway, I’d like to make one point clear. Put social media to good use. It’s convenient, it’s accessible, and most importantly, it’s free. Trust me. If you don’t take advantage of social media now, you’ll be kicking yourself in the #@$& later on.

Are you using social media to introduce your restaurant? How much do you think is it affecting your business?

Leave a comment below.

Marketing Tips For Restaurants: Do You Struggle With Social Media?

Social media is both familiar and unexplored lands for restaurant operators. It’s been around some time, yet any online marketer will tell you there are still vast uncharted opportunities in social media waiting to be tapped. Problem is, you already signed up for Twitter, Facebook, and even YouTube, but for some reason customers just don’t seem to come in. You are losing money, you are losing hope on your restaurant business, and this whole social media thing.

Let me quote a simple fact about online marketing.

If content is king, then conversion is queen.

John Munsell, CEO of Bizzuka.

I’ll tell you one thing. Marketing your restaurant through social media –Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, etc–has more to do than just signing up an account and introducing today’s wine dinner or next week’s lunch specials. Conversation is key. You need to bridge the gap between your brand and your customers, and social media, if done right, can help you with just that.

Here are some marketing tips for restaurant operators looking to advertise through social media.

1. Devise a plan (or know what you want to do before you do it)
Advertising on social media requires more thought than it looks. To paraphrase the CEO of M Strategies Inc. Michelle Smith, it isn’t strategy just being there.

The first crucial marketing tip for restaurant owners is to know their audience. Are your customers or market niche on social networks? Which social network?

Then proceed by establishing a friendly relationship with them through dialogue. Tell them about your brand, the latest news and events happening in your restaurant. I’m sure everyone one of us is a customer, a consumer, and isn’t it wonderful when a certain brand takes the time to hear us out?

2. Listen to your brand feedback (or get ready to mingle)
People hate filling up customer feedback forms, but they seldom hold back saying what’s on their mind on the Internet, especially in social network forums. Any marketing tips for restaurants article or blog will tell you that.

As a restaurant operator, this is incredible customer data, and you don’t even have to offer free dessert. In social network forums, customers will say what they liked, what they didn’t like, what they’d have wanted to see but didn’t, etc. Since most social network forums have IM features, it’s easy to reach out to them.

3. Invest time to do the task (or don’t do it if you don’t have time to do it)
Kogi BBQ is a small, albeit very successful, food business that roams around Los Angeles on a van selling tacos. But here’s the real piece of news: Kogi BBQ has its own exclusive social media manager staff - Mike Prasad. His sole responsibility is to handle the brand’s presence online.

When advertising on social media first started out, it was okay to assign an intern on it. But times change, and competition only grows over time.

Nowadays it’s brand suicide, almost unethical, for a restaurant operator to put a kid on the job. These days it’s best, as a marketing tip for restaurant operators, to invest time and money to hire someone with the right skills and knowledge. And make sure this person can tie it all together. So your restaurant website, newsletters and microsites all track back to Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and all other social networks with your presence.

An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.

Benjamin Franklin.

This is it for now. I’ll give you time to digest everything so you could get started on planning your social media efforts.

Check back later this week where I’ll discuss more social media marketing tips for restaurants.

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