Tag: Mobile

Why Didn’t Anybody Tell Me?

Your best customers routinely go to your restaurant chains because it’s part of what they do.  They like the food, they like the service, and have their favorite meals and combos.

But an inherent problem arises from this: they become lazy

  • They become too lazy to try the new items on the menu
  • They become too lazy to post positive feedback on Yelp
  • They become too lazy to tell their friends about their favorite place to eat

The opportunity is there.  The customers that love your food and service are ready to go above and beyond to make sure your business is successful – you just need to make the ask.

Continue reading Why Didn’t Anybody Tell Me?

Top 3 Social Media Tools to Market Your Restaurant (Part 2/2)

Welcome back! In the first part of this series we looked at how Facebook was used to market a restaurant, int this article we’ll look at how Twitter and Mobile Marketing can be used to promote your restaurant to customers so that they always think about you.

Social Media Tool Number 2: Twitter

I’m going to say it again. It’s all about the two way interaction.
Twitter was designed so that people could interact with others but they had to do it under 140 characters. The first pitfall is that most restaurants don’t have a Twitter ID. Please go to Twitter and get one. By not having one, you’re missing out on some free promotions. I’ve been on Twitter where people asked around “Does anyone know if (name of a restaurant) has a Twitter handle?”

The second pitfall that many restaurants have is that they just send out a bunch of tweets of what’s happening in their restaurant, or what kind of deals they have, or “please retweet this message to get a discount. ” This doesn’t leave a lot of room for interaction. Customers want to feel valued, not ignored.

When you have a Twitter account, follow local people and start tweeting with them. Interact with them and respond to their comments. When someone tweets you back, start to have an online conversation with them. Retweet messages of others that may be relevant to your local community. Trust me, those that love you will tweet about you often. Check out @sweetmandarin to see how they’ve successfully interacted with customers. Continue reading Top 3 Social Media Tools to Market Your Restaurant (Part 2/2)

Top 3 Social Media Tools to Market Your Restaurant (Part 1/2)

I’ve seen it happen before. It’s the mistake that many restaurant and cafe owners make. The failure to acknowledge the importance of marketing.

Marketing is what determines the survival of a good restaurant. Even when you have a three star Michelin Chef, raving reviews for your food from around the world, and some of the best service in the city, your restaurant can still close. This was the case for the now defunct, but famous restaurants, Lumiere’s and db Bistro Moderne in Vancouver, Canada which was run by world famous chef Daniel Boulud.

What was interesting was that once people knew it was closing down, people I knew were talking about it on Twitter, Facebook, and spreading the word about it virally, including local TV personalities. Strangely, they received a lot of publicity and marketing, but at too late of a stage and for the wrong reasons.

So how do you prevent yourself from getting in the same situation? What can you do to market your restaurant so that customers think of you when they want a place to eat? Here are three social media tools to help market your restaurant so that customers always think about you.

Social Media Tool Number 3: Facebook Fan Page

I’m not going to go into the details of how to create a fan page. But I will tell you the one key ingredient to Facebook marketing. Interaction with your online customers.

It’s actually possible that a customer will “Like” your restaurant and never see messages you post again on their Facebook news feed, and that’s because of EdgeRank.  Edgerank is a formula that Facebook uses to calculate how important you are to be on a Facebook user’s newsfeed when the user logs in. If EdgeRank thinks that your restaurant isn’t important to their user, then it’s not going to show up high on their news feed. Continue reading Top 3 Social Media Tools to Market Your Restaurant (Part 1/2)