Ways for Restaurant Owners to Expand Their Customer Base

As the recession continues, restaurant owners need to find new revenue streams. One of the best ways of doing this is to expand your customer base. Here are some simple ideas that you can implement to increase your customer base and as a result your profits.

Make your menu affordable to everyone. Don’t leave anybody out
Lunch time is usually a time for customers to get in and out. You’ll always want specials on the board that are quick and easy; and cheap. You need to produce efficiently to get the customers in and out as quickly as possible. Dinner time is a more relaxed experience for customers. They will take their time when choosing menu options and they will look at a wider range of choices. It is always a great idea to offer options that range anywhere from $7.99 for a Spaghetti &Meatballs to a Heavy NY Strip for $18.99. You are, therefore, opening the menu to different customers and wallet sizes.

Advertisement on a Local Radio Station
If you can find a local radio station, usually it ends up being an AM station to advertise for you, it will significantly boost your sales. I did this with an AM station every Monday morning. The disc jockey would ask me questions about specials, my background, location, menu items, do we serve alcohol, etc. I was allotted a time slot for every week. I would often mention specials for the listeners and as soon as I hung up the phone, my phone lines would blow up before I was even open for business. The cost to me was around $170.00 a month. That’s a fraction of funds compared to advertisements in local newspapers or magazines. I had drones of people coming in to meet me that heard me on the radio.

Lucky Rock Bags
Take a box of sandwich bags, put a river rock in the bag to weigh it down, and include your menu, a coupon, upcoming specials, and locations. You throw these out on people driveways. The typical reaction when people call is that they received a bag in their driveway and this was the first time they were trying the restaurant or heard of you. Unfortunately, you will have a choice few that will be upset that the bag that actually landed in their driveway was purposively thrown in a bush or on their perfectly manicured lawn. I usually shrug these people off since they have never worked a day in their life in a restaurant. After all, we have free speech and this is a way for you to get your name out. That’s all I tell them.

Participate in Food Competitions to increase customer base
I have participated in these for a couple of years now and the feedback you get is incredible. There are hundreds of people that are walking around trying local fare. You can meet and greet the locals, tell them about yourself, and hand out menus. It’s also a great way for potential customers to sample your items before they visit your location.

Write a blog to gain customers
There are so many resources available on the web for you to write about your restaurant. Most of the time these websites are free and they will get the word out about specials you’re running, location, menu items, and other pertinent information about your particular restaurant. Some of the best websites for blogging on restaurants is chowhound, cooks, and pizza.com.

Have a Newspaper write an Article
An article about your restaurant is a great source of free advertising for your restaurant and can have a real impact on your business. A restaurateur that I know had one of the most popular newspapers from his area do an article about his restaurant in January 2007. They interviewed some of his best customers and asked them to put their two cents in. They took a picture of him cooking in his chef jacket. The article described his life as a chef, his background, and his favorite items to cook. He still busy 6 months after the article came out. This was due to the fact that the article had attracted new customers to his restaurant that ended up becoming regular customers of his. People were even traveling from 2 hours away to visit his restaurant.

Make a club and Email List
For example, you could form a pizza of the month club. Then twice a month you would provide the customers with an XLarge specialty pizza, 6 garlic rolls, 2 desserts, 2 salads, and one appetizer for $39.95. It’s your club, so you can do what you want to. Be creative. You can create an email list within this club to let your customer base know what the specialty pizza of the month is going to be or upcoming events.

Wine Tastings
Depending on your clientele, this is an extremely lucrative way to have other streams of income coming in. This is, of course, is dependent on if you have a Beer and Wine License. You can combine your food with the type of wine the wine guy has brought for tasting.

Cooking Classes
Provide classes to your customers each week about a particular aspect of cooking, a technique, a type of cuisine, etc. This can be worked around your restaurant hours. This is a great way to develop relationships with your customers.

Catering
This is a lot work and often times you need a lot of employees to help. You need a form of transportation that will safely transport the food without diminishing the quality. This requires planning and knowledge. For example, you need to know the portions sizes for a certain amount of people and have to remember to take every item you need for service with you. Catering can be a great source of new revenue, whether it be peparing food for private parties (weddings) or delivering lunch for local businesses.


Some of the ideas in this post come from an article by Lauren Axelrod, published in Business on August 2, 2008. To read the original article, click here.

Promotional Tools to Promote Your Restaurant

As the economy takes a hit, you may feel the effect as you crunch numbers and make your marketing dollars stretch. However, you don't have to break the bank when it comes to cost-effective promotions. You need the most bang for your buck right now. These simple promotional tools will give you that extra publicity boost you need to take your business to the next successful level.

Advertising Versus Public Relations
Before you delve into promoting your busines, you need to ask yourself the following question: Do you know the difference between advertising and public relations? That sounds like an elementary question, but many business owners use the words "advertising" and "public relations" synonymously.

Advertising: A paid public promotion of a product or service
(i.e. newspaper ad or online ad banner)
Public Relations: An unpaid promotion intended to create goodwill for a person,
product or company (i.e. press conference or press release).

Now that you know the difference between advertising and publicity, it's time to implement the following cost-effective promotions into your marketing plan. Are you taking these steps already? If not, you may want to think about implementing at least one of the following publicity tools in the near future:

• News worthy press releases: Not all press releases are considered news worthy. If you are launching a new product or website, this might be considered news worthy to local media. Before you send out a press release, think about if this topic interests local media. Do not blindly send out press releases to media. Find out the correct editor or department to send your press releases to, in most cases this will be the Food or Lifestyle editor but sometimes it may need to go to the business section or local news or events. Press releases can be sent via email or fax. Check your press release for errors and mistakes before you send out to an editor. You never know - you could be called for an interview as a result of your press release. TaDa members receive professionally written press releases every month that they just need to customize with their resturant's information before sending out. TaDa can also help you create a custom press release that will publicize events at your restaurant, promotions you're running, menu changes, and your participation/involvement in the community.
• Web sites, blogs and social networking sites: These are free publicity tools (web sites can also be developed at low costs) that are readily available at your fingertips. If you haven't developed a web site or blog, then you are missing huge promotional opportunities. Social networking sites such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Biznik are effective communications tools to connect with potential leads and customers. Social media networking sites are free (you just need an email to sign up for these sites). TaDa also offers our members free technical advice and step-by-step guides on establishing a presence online, blogging, using social networking to promote your business, building a customer database and developing a relationship with customers thru email marketing.
  
• Free or low-cost special events: It's important to thank your customers and clients - make them feel appreciated. Even if it's only an inexpensive morning coffee event, it's important to put your "face" in front of your clients and customers. In this technologically-advanced age of the email, text messages and voicemail, business owners sometimes forget the personal touch. Free or low-cost special events put you right in front of your clients again.
  
• Become a good steward within your community: Even if you can't afford to make a monetary donation, your volunteer time is just as important. It also allows you to give back to your community and gives you a great networking opportunity. You can also give in-kind donations for auctions (both products and services), which is another great way to promote your business (and a tax write-off). Pick a charitable organization that has personal meaning for you, and become a good steward within your community. TaDa's Student Restaurant Ambassador program is a good example of this idea at work. It allows you to help motivate local high school students to graduate while promoting your business at the same time.

You may already implement many of these tools but business owners tend to forget that they have cost-effective promotional tools at their fingertips. Take advantage of the Internet or partner with a local charity. You have the opportunity to get your name out there and land more contacts and clients. Don't use the excuse that you don't have a marketing budget, or that you need to spend a lot of money to generate effective publicity.

Menu & Photos a "must have" for a Restaurant's Website

Here are the results from a recent survey of 2,437 diners conducted by The Coyle Hospitality Group.

Consumers Judge the Quality of a Restaurant Based its Website
Sixty-seven percent of those polled indicated that the quality of a restaurant's personal website is indeed an indicator of the level of service they can expect to receive when dining there.

TaDa Tip 1: Make sure your website looks professional. If you don't make a good impression online, you may not get the chance to actually make thir acquaintance.

Menu and Photos are a "must have" for a Restaurant's Website
Two-thirds of those surveyed categorized having a menu on a restaurant's website as a "must have" and "very important." A restaurant having its own web site was also deemed crucial with 86% putting it at or above 'Very Important'. Photos of the dining room were also cited by the majority as at least 'Very Important'.

The data suggests potential diners are seeking to do what actual diners do: They begin by reviewing the menu and looking around the dining room.

Diners, when researching a restaurant online, are seeking hard facts about your menus and pricing. It appears that presenting even a basic website with menus and some photos is a big help. For many diners this is the easiest way to get directions, check hours, and yes, even dial your phone number.

TaDa Tip 2: Your logo shouldn't be the only graphic on your website. Make sure that your website includes at least one photo of the exterior and the interior of your restaurant. Give people a preview of what its like to walk thru your door.

Let Your Customers Speak For You
When those surveyed were asked what influenced them most to dine at a particular restaurant, word of mouth still reigned supreme. It was followed by user reviews, then professional reviews, and finally newspapers. This tells us that diners begin researching based on other diners’ experiences. Whether they are friends, acquaintances or simply others who have dined at the restaurant in question, people are looking for real-life experience to base their dining decisions on - either in person or on the web.

TaDa Tip 3: Include reviews by your customers on the "About Us" page of your website. Potential customers would rather know what other real people have to say about your restaurant then read the chef's bio.

Industry Trends: Letting Diners Pay What They Want

Some brave restaurant owners are trying out the idea of allowing customers to pay what they believe a meal is worth.

Take for example a restaurant that was featured in a recent http://www.reuters.com/ article "that is combating the recession with a menu ranging from Wagyu beef pie to fresh lobster that lets diners decide the price. Like scores of restaurants in Sydney, Sobo on Bondi Beach has been hit hard by the economic downturn, which has driven many Australians to trim spending and cut back on eating out. To bring the clients back again, restaurateur Adam Gerondis is offering, for a limited time, a menu that contains empty boxes where the price of each dish usually is.

Diners fill in the price they want, and the bill is calculated accordingly.

"My main goal is to have a full restaurant every night and for people to enjoy it so much during the promotion that they will come back afterwards," Gerondis told Reuters.
The promotion that starts on Tuesday and runs until April 9.

"People have been watching what they spend and like all restaurants ours has been quiet, so we just want to give them the opportunity to pay what they think it's worth," he added.
Starters on the menu include blue cheese tart with caramelized onions, mains range from beef to salmon and there are also desserts such as creme brulee, as well as daily specials. Drinks, however, must be paid for.

Sobo main dishes are usually priced between A$24-A$36 ($16-$25), but Gerondis said he would be happy with whatever diners decide to pay for their meal.

"We have no preconceived ideas of what we will get," Gerondis said. "Whatever people pay, is whatever they pay."

As the credit crisis bites all over the globe, several establishments are asking people to pay what they want to keep their business going. "

Ultimately, we're still waiting to see whether the risks outweigh the benefits with this type of promotion. But it shows that restaurant owners are willing to try new things to keep people coming thru the doors.

Click here, to read an article from the Wall Street Journal which further explores this idea.

One-Night-Only Eateries and Reach Out to Community Groups

One-Night-Only Eateries

Restaurateurs are getting creative with their new ventures. As a way of experimenting with new businesses despite the economic downturn, share-space-restaurants that are only open one or two nights a week are becoming the newest craze. These new restaurants are sharing the kitchens of already established restaurants during their off hours and off days.

Even Rachael Ray is getting in on the trend with her new Cafe Una Notte, which uses the kitchen of New York's Barbuto.

We have been seeing some retail stores recently buying store front space in short time segments (everything from one day to three months), but now it seems the restaurant industry is catching on to the idea.

This is a part of the greater "Carpe Diem" trend we are seeing today. People are sick of waiting for thing to turn around economically and thus are finding ingenious ways of starting their new ventures today.

This may not be something you want to try, but let it inspire you to think outside the box.


Reach Out to Community Groups

Consider inviting a book group to have their meeting at your restaurant or hosting a networking event for a community organization, like the chamber of commerce. Many organizations have monthly events for their members, so why not contact them and see if they need a location for any of their upcoming meetings or might want to have the event catered by your restaurant.

Don't be afraid to initiate contact with these groups and organizations. It's worth it to offer them a small discount on catering an event for them, or on any orders placed by members when they meet at your restaurant. You might just gain some new customers and a whole lot of positive word of mouth advertising.