MARKETING: How to Implement Storytelling in Your Branding & Marketing
Is your restaurant’s marketing boring? If your website falls a little flat and your social media is lacking engagement, one simple change could add life, personality, and entertainment into your restaurant’s branding. You just need to tap into your storytelling talents.
As an owner or manager, storytelling probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when you think about your branding — but it should be. Storytelling offers powerful benefits in terms of customer engagement, loyalty, and conversion. But it’s easy to overlook the necessity of incorporating storytelling into your restaurant’s branding. Without great storytelling, though, your restaurant could be missing out on guests and profits.
DID YOU KNOW…
Best Employers for Women
The list was compiled by surveying 60,000 U.S. employees including more than 40,000 women working for companies employing at least 1,000 people. The evaluation was based on several different criteria including direct recommendations in terms of general work topics and those considered relevant for women in particular. It also took indirect recommendations into account as well as diversity among top executives and the board. The 300 companies that received the highest total scores were named as The Best Employers for Women 2019.
Advanced Robotics & the Job Market
The survey involved executives and managers from 1,314 global companies in early 2019. It found that 67% of Chinese companies are expecting a reduction in the number of employees due to automation, along with 60% in Poland and 57% in Japan. Some companies are more at risk than others with only 34% of organizations in Italy expecting reductions by comparison.
Fishless Fish
Impossible Foods is expanding its growing meatless meat empire to fishless fish. The plant-based “meat” company produced an anchovy-flavored broth made from plants last month. And with 90% of the world’s marine fish stocks depleted due to overfishing, this might just be what the seafood lovers – and the sea – need.
WHOSE THERE?
Why it matters to you: Knowing who is visiting your restaurant is crucial to your marketing.
When you look out at your dining room during a busy period, what do you see? Guests enjoying an evening at your restaurant, watching a game, laughing at some unheard punchline? See, that’s the interesting part; you may be missing a deeper context in your own dining room. Enter this blog on Eater by author Logan Scherer where he recounts his experience as a gay man hanging around a hetero-dominated sports bar. It’s filled with typical tropes about the grunting masculinity of most sports bar patrons -- from condescending comments about the food to his own perception of how men are in their favorite man-friendly environment. However, what you can take from his observations is that the folks visiting your restaurant are not always what you may think they are.
In fact, the diversity of our communities are an integral aspect of who visits your restaurant. Unless you are actively looking, you may think you have a clue who is frequenting your restaurant, but do you? We have spoken about personas as a method of marketing in the past. Knowing who is populating your dining room and bar are crucial starting points to marketing your restaurant. So the next time you walk through your restaurant during volume, really look around. See who is in your joint and how they are accessing your restaurant. You are bound to learn more about your audience and, by extension, how to market to them. Remember, if you are marketing to one demo but you’re actually attracting a different group of folks, you are literally wasting your money. Take the plunge and get to know who is visiting and then make sure you market to them and not who you wish would visit.
[Source: Eater]
LABOR IS WHAT KEEPS YOU UP AT NIGHT
Why it matters to you: Don’t let staffing stop you from running your restaurant.
Since the unemployment rate dropped below 5% between 2015 and 2016, there isn’t an operator in the country that hasn’t had challenges staffing their restaurants. A recent survey of operators by Technomic reveals that 80% of operators note retaining staff as their number one concern. Additionally, 76% say recruiting is their top concern, and 75% see labor expenses as a serious challenge to their success. With this much strain against labor issues, operators are searching for ways to reduce their reliance on that same labor.
It’s a tight balance between wanting the freshest quality and having sufficient staff to deliver it. For example, in our eBook detailing How to Create a High Volume Wing Program, we focus on prep that can relieve the tension during busy periods. That’s fine with enough staff, but when you are short that may not be possible. That, however, doesn’t mean you are without options for managing around labor shortages. Pre-cut veggies are now available from most produce/grocery vendors and precooked meats like chicken tenders can reduce the strain of turnout during high volume. You don’t have to be a victim of staffing, just willing to find the shortcuts that will eliminate the pressure without compromising quality. So, reach out to your vendors and task them with helping you find labor alternatives in their food portfolio. You only have the pressure of staffing your restaurant to lose, which sounds pretty good to us.
[Source: Restaurant Business Online]