Regular communication is key to remind patrons of your offering and entice them to choose your restaurant for their next dining experience. Here are some marketing ideas to help boost trade…

Email updates provide a cost effective way to keep in touch and drive bookings to your restaurant. Ideally you should build you own email list through opportunities to sign up in your restaurant or on your website. Regular email updates with interesting, relevant content can boost business. Share news, views, events and offers in a pithy, soft touch way.

Email Automation is a series of personalised automated emails that can be sent to customers at specific times or in response to specific triggers. It can also be a great way to reward loyal customers, for example a discount voucher or free drink on their birthday. Just make sure you ask for their birthday when they sign up.

Social Media is a great way to keep in touch with existing customers and raise awareness of your offering to prospective patrons. However, different customers prefer different social networks. Focus on the platform(s) most relevant to your existing customers and then measure your effectiveness in terms of elements like conversations (replies and comments), applause (likes) and amplification (shares and retweets) rather than metrics like followers.

Your Website is a great place for new customers to find out about you. For new customers, your website will set the tone and determine whether they will choose your venue. In particular, you should provide contact details, directions to your restaurant and a booking form. Regularly update your website with news, events and current menus. Your website also needs to be mobile responsive so that it works as well on a smart-phone as it does on a traditional PC or laptop.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Spending time optimising your website so that it ranks higher in google search results will enable new customers to find you and raise awareness of your restaurant. Free SEO checking tools like Woorank are useful for providing a to do list to improve your SEO whilst the Yoast plugin for WordPress can help optimise your website.

Google Adwords and Remarketing Paying for Google Adwords can promote your business to new customers whilst remarketing, or stalker adverts as they are commonly known, are a cheap, effective way to keep your restaurant front of mind for potential patrons after they have left your website.

Google Maps Ensure your free listing on google maps is up-to-date and reflects your offering. It will ensure that new customers can find you using Google Search and the Google Maps smart-phone app.

TripAdvisor and Google Reviews Love it or loathe it, online reviews are an important tool for new customers to find out about your restaurant. Embrace it and manage it. Set up robust processes to deal with dissatisfied customers, and make improvements from the feedback provided.

If you do not have the expertise or time to spend on these activities please give us a call on 01327 810003 or fill out our contact form and we will be in touch.