In the past there were sure-fire restaurant marketing techniques that filled the seats without fail. Lately, these common methods of restaurant marketing which include yellow pages, postcards, and coupons are less effective than they were in the past. They have faded away like the 8-track tape.

If you want immediate increases in sales with a small investment you should consider the newer, hipper restaurant marketing techniques that generate more sales at a very affordable price. There are some great new restaurant marketing techniques you should consider.

The first restaurant marketing technique that is working well for all types of restaurants is SMS or mobile text marketing. You can send texts to phones and generate a desire to come in for a meal. Look around. You see people texting and looking at their phones. The fact is that texts are read immediately and texts get. Restaurants add to their menu and everything they print things like “Join our VIP club…text VIP to 65342.” Some restaurants offer a free dessert or some perk when you join the club by texting.

When people text, they automatically join your database of mobile phones. There are services you can use that allow you to text your database with the push of a single button. Imagine having a special item on your menu that you want to tell people about. Now you can text as many customers as you have on your list for about 5 cents each. It’s fast and effective. They read the text and call for a reservation. Now that’s restaurant marketing! This method works well for everything from pizza to upscale restaurants.

Another very effective program allows you to make recorded phone calls to thousands of people with the push of a single button. It takes less than 5 minutes to set up your message and to get a list of local people to call. The system does the rest while you work or play. Imagine if you received a phone call like this:

“Hi, this is Chef Paul at the Burkwood Steak House on Rath Road. I am calling to invite you and a friend to a very special dinner I am preparing for you and I’ll even buy the desset. This dinner is not from our regualar menu. It is a romantic dinner of special recipes that have been in my family for generations. The dinner is by invitation only on March 12 from 6:00 on. I even have a fabulous price of only $39.95 for a complete 5 course gourment treat for two. You deserve a romantic dinner for you and a special someone. Press 1 to find out more or to make your reservation.”

When they press 1, your phone rings and you take their reservation.

Now ask yourself how many people who received a call like that would be interested. The great news is that it costs only about $10.00 to call 1,000 people and it takes only minutes to set it up. The system makes the calls. You take the reservations.

As you can see, technology is making it easier for restaurants to fill their seats. Don’t be left behind. Use these inexpensive and very effective methods to increase your sales.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/business-articles/restaurant-marketing-fill-your-restaurant-tomorrow-with-these-new-techniques-4235932.html

About the Author
Get a free video explaining better restaurant marketing techniques with Carl Davidson at http://www.restaurant-marketing.us 716-580-3384

Now is a great time to review the performance of your restaurant menu.  Famed New York restaurants like Jean-Georges and Aquavit have launched popular fixed-priced menus.  Applebee’s is now offering  two courses for a party of two for just $20.00.  With it’s own twist on value, The Cheesecake Factory, recently launched a small plate menu with items ranging from $3.95 to $6.50.   If you haven’t already considered leveraging your menu to drive sales, lower costs, or strengthen your position; what are you waiting on?

I have created and launched new menus for national brands like Olive Garden and Applebee’s, Cruise Lines like Royal Caribbean Cruises, independent restaurant start-ups, and corporate dining companies.  When done correctly, a new menu can dramatically improve your business.  In fact, a well executed menu launch can increase guest traffic, strengthen or reposition your brand, create buzz, and improve employee morale.  Not to mention it can allow you to take advantage of emerging food trends and purchasing opportunities.

My menu development team and I helped repositioned the Olive Garden brand by importing dishes and cooking techniques directly from Tuscany, Italy.  We launched sales enhancing promotional menus for Applebee’s.  At Royal Caribbean, we reversed five consecutive years of flat food satisfaction ratings and saved the company millions of dollars in food cost, along the way.  On each occasion “Smart Menu” principles were at the core of the successes.

The four smart menu development filters that I will cover originated as a means of integrating input from various corporate players into a single menu development process.  Once the process had been proven and prefect, I realized the four filters could be used in any menu development situation. I have used them with enormous success every since.  The four filter that any successful menu change must past through are:  1) The Brand Filter, 2) The Culinary Innovation Filter, 3) The Operations Filter, and  4) The Financial Filter

The Brand Filter exists to ensure that there is absolutely perfect alignment between the brand strategy and the menu strategy.  In dysfunctional companies the brand vision and the menu vision is often at odds.  In the worst examples, neither is aligned with market opportunities.  I have seen restaurant companies, large and small, wander into the menu wilderness because the brand and menu strategies did not mesh.  For example, McDonald’s tinkered with their menu almost non-stop until they finally landed on a core menu, complemented by fresh salads and healthy sides for children.  All great menu development initiatives must start with crystal clear brand parameters.

In regards to the Culinary Innovation Filter, Culinary Research & Development as a organized discipline has exploded over the past ten years.  The Culinary Institute of America (My alma mater) now has an entire department devoted to training chefs in this area.

The focal point of the most Culinary R&D has become the “Development Process”.  Although I am a huge supporter of process driven development, I offer two notes of caution to senior executives and decision makers.  First, most of the process charts that I have seen are far to complicated.  If your company’s culinary development process can’t be explained to a fifth grader using a single slide, it to complicated and costly.

Secondly, remember GIGO, garbage in garbage out.  The best conceived process does nothing to ensure culinary innovation.  Your process, at best, is an excellent funnel.  It can sort the great ideas from the good ones.  If only uninventive and uncreative ideas go into a culinary development process, don’t be surprised if little value comes out.  If a lack of culinary innovation is your concern, the goods news is that there are reliable methods to spark innovation and numerous ways to out source it as well.  The bottle line with Culinary Innovation is, you must bring something new to the party if you want guest to be “Wowed”.

The Operations Filter exists to ensure that dishes created in a tested environment can be consistently reproduced under normal restaurant environment.  I will offer two important tips in this area.  To begin, test under normal conditions.  If you run a multi-unit company don’t test exclusively in your best performing units, and then, wonder why all your average units struggle upon final roll-out.  Likewise, below average units can derail a potentially good menu.

Secondly, be certain to conduct test during peak periods.  Test conducted during non-peak period can fail to highlight basic problems with equipment, general capacity or other resource.  In any case, it is self-defeating to create a new menu that can be consistently produced for guests at a high level of quality.

The Financial Filter is the most important of all.  Determining what impact a new menu will have on your bottle line is critical.  This part of the process must be monitored at the highest level of a large company or the owner of a small business.  I advise having a single individual be in charge of the menu’s financial model, calculating the cost of all recipes entered into the menu model.  Field test the menu’s financial model throughout the process.   Invariably, with any significant menu change, there will be unpredictable outcomes.  The sooner the outcomes are properly determined the sooner the menu can be implemented with confidence that it will have a positive effect on sales and profits.

Now I’ll admit that developing a great new menu is no simple task.  However, following the steps that I have outlined will ensure the results well worth the effort.  Obviously, the process can be dramatically scaled down for small operations and tailored to specific need.  For example, it is perfectly feasible to create and test a dynamite new signature entree for a single unit over the coarse of a weekend applying all four filters.  Which is to say, don’t be deterred by the road to smart menu success.  Remember, the benefits are well worth the efforts.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/ask-an-expert-articles/intelligent-menu-design-how-a-smart-menu-can-ignite-sales-profits-and-your-brand-922804.html

About the Author

Shed Wallace is the founder of www.EateryCoach.com and the www.EateryTribe.com blog. His career highlights include culinary and food & beverage director roles with leading hospitality companies like Darden Restaurants and Royal Caribbean Cruise Line.

A key part to any restaurant marketing plan is often overlooked because it’s right in front of everyones eyes: the menu. It’s very important to have a well-crafted menu because it’s one of the first things customers look at when they sit down. A menu will reflect the taste and the personality of a restaurant while selling the meals that are available by offering well-written descriptions of plates and drinks. Plus, as you’re designing a menu, you’ll be able to figure out if you’re selling meals that will cost enough to cover your budget, or that will cost so much that it will turn away your target demographic. So, as important the menu design is to the customers who read it, it’s also important to the restaurant itself as it is being put together.

Before you actually start to put together your restaurant, you need to do some research in order to be able to make it the best it can be. Take this into consideration when you’re planning your menu: 80% of your typical customers will come from people living within a 10-minute drive of your restaurant. So, take a look at the neighbourhood around your restaurant. Get to know what type of people live there and also look at the other restaurants in the area. You can compare prices of other restaurants as well as the types of food that’s being served. This way, you can be able to tailor your menu to be affordable and unique, and therefore attractive to the people who happen to live around you.

Now onto actually creating your menu, which takes steps that are both creative and systematic. Menu design for a restaurant isn’t rocket science, but it’s best to keep things in a certain order, one that mimics the dining experience. Start by listing the appetisers, soups, and salads, then move onto the meals, then the desserts. If there are items that you want people to pay particular attention to, make sure they stand out. List them in a different font, place an asterisk near them, or print a picture next to the item’s name. You can do the same with new dishes as well, once you get your restaurant underway, so repeat customers will know if you’ve added something since their last visit.

You should also design your menu to reflect the personality of your restaurant. If you are a simple, down to earth establishment, let your menu reflect that. Make it simple, less image-intensive, and easy to read. If you are a lavish, upscale restaurant, give your menu some elegance to it. Colour it and design it to appeal to customers who will probably be a little more scrutinizing. If you know the personality of your restaurant, you’ll find that putting together and designing a great menu will come to you easily.

There are a number of mistakes that people tend to make when designing a menu as well. If you know what these are, you can stop yourself from making the same mistakes and ruining a menu. First, make sure that your menu is easy to read. Lettering should be big enough for people to see clearly, and the language you use needs to be clear as well. If a customer questions what he or she is ordering, it may create conflicts when the food is actually brought out. If you are serving foreign cuisine, make sure to have English-language translations for all the words people might now know. Again, this will clear up any confusion.

As you can see, there are quite a bit of things you need to think about when designing the menu for your restaurant, but in reality it will be very easy. As long as you have done research into what other restaurants do with their menus and you have a very clear vision of what you’re selling, the perfect menu can be easily crafted.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/management-articles/good-menu-design-requires-creative-as-well-as-a-systematic-approach-271782.html

About the Author

Robert Bylett helps managers who are open to new and innovative ways of looking at solutions to food service problems focus energy, optimise performance, and achieve their objectives faster and easier. More info: Just Consultancy

The most effective way to attract clients and boost your restaurant sales is by designing an appealing menu that is just too good to resist. A well-designed menu can help to significantly promote your business

and it can also be the most-effective sales to that you have. It can help your restaurant to stand out among competitors and also help to fight off national chains that may constantly steal customers from your business. Your takeout menus will brand your business and create a name for your restaurant, which will ultimately prove to be of the utmost importance when it comes to future growth potential. So, when designing your menu you need to take a few things into consideration and start with a free menu printing template.

Always plan a good layout for your menu design. You must divide your menu into sections, usually food categories (ie: starters, salads, dishes, beverages, etc). Categorize your different food items, so that they can be located easily and do  not cause eye strain. Select a professional layout for your menu and then customize it to match the atmosphere of your restaurant.

Select a design that will add to the theme of your restaurant. The font type, style, and colors must harmonize with your restaurant decor and image.  For instance, if your restaurant has an “old world Italian” theme, then you need to apply imagery of high quality cheeses, tomatoes, and perhaps even Italian canals or vineyards.

Try to use appealing food descriptions to describe your dishes on your restaurant menu.  Add tempting and appetizing photos with your item descriptions to visually promote your best-sellers or most profitable items. Such a method will help to mesmerize your customers and increase their appetite for delicious food. For example, if a large pizza is your most profitable item, draw attention to that product with the use of images and coupons.

If you are still not feeling confident in restaurant menu design abilities, it is best for you to check out free menu printing templates available online through simple searches. See what other similar style restaurants are using successfully and derive inspiration from their works.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/printing-articles/menu-printing-effective-menu-design-to-attract-more-customers-4245935.html

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When it doubt, work directly with your menu printing company’s design team to get professional results. Over time, it will quickly pay for itself as you will see a notable increase in sales and profitability.

There are ways that you can attract more diners and augment the sales of your restaurant by creating an enticing food menu design for your restaurant. An effective menu can market and create a brand for your restaurant as well as your dishes. The menu is what represents your establishment and its character overall. There are a few things that you can do to create a menu with a valuable and eye-catching design.

Make sure your food menu design has a good layout. You should use borders and section dividers in your menu design. Using categories is a good way to divide the different types of items on your menu. Having a perfect and professional looking layout for your menu will set the atmosphere and develop the image of your restaurant. Layouts that flow and are easy to read will be better for your patrons.

A food menu design that complements the theme of your restaurant will help in branding your establishment. The colours, font type, and style that you use on your menu should be aligned with the colours and theme of your restaurant. If your theme is French, then you should try using some French words or images on your menu to send out that impression to your customers.

It is essential to have the right groupings and lists of menu items on your menus, so that your customers can clearly see the different sections of food selections. You should group together similar items in your food menu design. Items such as beverages, desserts, entrees, and appetizers, as well as any others, should be grouped together with a border and header that identifies them. Try to keep the items in one column and use more pages instead of making multiple columns on one page. This way your menu will be easier to read.

Be sure to use enticing menu descriptions when describing your available dishes. Make the customer want to order something by using words that will entice the customer to order that dish. By using savory words and descriptions in your food menu design, you can convince a customer to order something that they would not normally try. Having a more descriptive food description may often increase the number of visitors and the food sales in your restaurant.

Look at the menus of the restaurants that you compete for business with to see their prices and food menu design. You can also look at their menus to see if there are many similar items that you both offer. If so, you can consider offering some more unique dishes and items in order to have a more competitive edge over them. If you don’t change what you offer completely, at least add a special twist to some of the more common items in order to make them stand out.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/marketing-tips-articles/how-to-create-an-effective-and-creative-food-menu-design-3471211.html

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If you’re looking for high quality and professional design, then visit Interactive 10 for a free no obligation consultation.