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Email gives you the power to learn more about your online community.
Campaign reporting features can tell you who is opening your emails, what links they are clicking on, and more.
Being able to send a new message based on the customer's interaction with a previous message (opens and click) helps you refine your strategy.
When you hit send on your email campaign, usually within minutes, that message is delivered to that contact's inbox. You are grabbing their attention in that moment.
Most social media platforms limit how many people see your post, and it is not delivered as soon as it is posted.
Email lives in that contact's inbox until they make a conscious effort to open it, ignore it, or delete it. Regardless, your message was seen, even if it was only the from name and the subject line.
Why you need to build an email list and use it.
Personalization
While social media is like using a megaphone in a crowded field, email can be personalized using the contact information to merge with each connection, making it unique to that customer. Not only can you start your email with a personal greeting using their name, but by asking questions and learning about the contacts on your list, you can make sure to send them the right message at the right time.
In the book Business Made Simple, Donald uses the reference of an airplane to describe a business's components.
Most restaurants focus on the operations, the food and the service, the actual product they are selling. But just because you have an amazing product doesn't mean you are a thriving restaurant.
The engine of your restaurant is marketing and sales—this is what accelerates your business into profitability.
To have a successful restaurant, you need to invest in your engines.
But don't take our word for it; read the book. Donald Miller, Business Made Simple
With 91% of people tying your restaurant based on a friend or family recommendation, you need to build a network of superfans.
The big chains do radio and billboards, and even TV advertising cause their marketing budget is more than your revenue. They can afford to have branding in every corner. So how do you compete?
Superfans, build an engaging network that can promote your restaurant to the people you can't afford to advertise to. Reward these superfans for being engaged and referring their friends and family.
Take care of your superfans, and they will take care of you!
Last week was busy.
With Valentine's day on a Sunday and most areas having Monday off, it was the busiest your restaurant has been in months. Tuesday rolls around, and you need a day to recover, and Wednesday, you are getting caught up on all the stuff you forgot and Thursday, your back at it preparing for the weekend, and now it's Friday and your sick. Not from drinking too much but from looking at the books and noticing this weekend will not be as busy as last weekend.
You never posted, never sent out an email, now you scramble. You start to panic a bit and think, what have I been doing all week.
This is why it is essential to have your marketing communications pre-planned. Automated., Evergreen. This way, if you decided to take a minute, the foot still stays on the gas. The sales funnel is always being filled with new contacts, and those contacts are becoming paying guests.
As a restaurant operator, you rely on your staff to ensure that the guest is always cared for. How you treat your team will be directly reflected in how they treat the guest.
This is an excellent quote from Shep Hyken. His book, Amaze Every Customer Every Time, is a must-read. The concept of creating moments of magic is what every restaurant should be striving for with every guest and team member interaction.
Why is it essential to refer to the customer as a guest?
It changes the way you and your staff think about the transaction.
When you have someone over at your home, they aren't customers; they are a guest. You are providing them with hospitality.
This is the same in your restaurant. Everyone who dines in your restaurant is a guest. Yes, they are there to satisfy the basic need of hunger, but they chose your full-service restaurant because they want to be taken care of; they are looking for an experience.
When you think about your restaurant's loyalty program, you are most likely thinking of a transactional-based system.
You get so many points for every dollar spent, and then those points are redeemable for perks and rewards.
But are those guests raving fans that help promote your business?
Loyalty can be looked at differently. What about that person who only dines a few times a year but continuously tells everyone they know about your restaurant. Like every post, they share every email and talk about their previous experience with their friends and family.
How can you track that. How about a referral program? Affiliate marketing is an essential part of the marketing strategy of many companies, for example, Amazon. Amazon has independent sales people promoting their products, and they get paid for every sale.
Build your affiliate network.
Identify your superfans.
Offer them a reward if they refer guests.
Reward them once that guest has dined at your restaurant.
You bring in raw ingredients to your restaurant,
You prepare than and portion them to have them ready for service.
A guest orders a menu item, and it is put together with items you prepared.
It gets delivered to the guest for them to enjoy.
That's an operational process.
What is your marketing process to attract new interest in your restaurant? Turn that interest into a first-time guest, and then a first time guest into a superfan?
Collect permission to market by having an email collection system. Send out personalized, engaged and consistent messages. Build a following of people who have dined in your restaurant.
Wouldn't you want to have your marketing reflect this important relationship-building online to mirror the experience you provide in your restaurant?
But don't take our word for it; read the book. Permission Marketing by Seth Godin
Although it may be too late to put in a marketing strategy for this valentine's day, these are the times to capture many new visitors' information and get them to come back again.
Marketing is the process of identifying guest needs and determining how best to meet those needs.
Marketing is one of the three pillars of your restaurant.
Marketing - Operations - Accounting
Advertising is a function within the marketing process that promotes your restaurant through paid and organic channels.
The first time someone tries your restaurant, the expectations are high. They are taking a chance on spending their hard-earned dollars on a new experience. Instead of sticking to what they know, they are taking a risk giving your restaurant a try.
Making sure that this first experience is amazing is so essential.
So how do you do this?
Start a new guest program.
Have the host ask the question of every guest when they arrive.
Have you dined with us before?
If they say this is their first time, you need to make sure that this visit is extra special so that the guest feels a connection with your brand.
Manager/Owner introduces themself and brings over your best appetizer for them to try while looking through the menu.
Whether they have dessert or not, give them one of your best desserts for them to take home. In the takeout box or bag, have a handwritten note from the Manager/Owner thanking them for their visit with an incentive to come back again.
The world is all about producing content; We produce this blog every day. Did you ask for it? No, we produce it to get our thoughts and ideas out into the world in hopes that someone is listing. But our business is about helping you with your business, so providing information and content is important.
In your restaurant, you don't make money from content. Telling people a story about grandma's recipe may tug on someone's heartstrings, but what it comes down to is that people go to a restaurant to eat and have an experience.
So don't spend time and money crafting content by writing newsletters and blogs; create simple marketing messages that are consistent and allow you to track and measure your marketing efforts vs sales produced.
Save your content creation to serving the guest and connecting with them when they are in the restaurant.
