You’ve accomplished your dream and opened your own restaurant. You even launched a new advertisement campaign that you’re sure will bring in tons of customers. You were sure of this until an entire day goes by and you only bring in a handful of customers.
While your marketing idea may have been a pretty solid one, you may have just not of displayed it in a creative enough way. Think of your marketing as you do the food you cook. People like things that pop; they’re marveled by pizazz.
To help you fill up the empty chairs in your business, here are a few ideas for restaurant ads that will add a little spice to your marketing.
If you're any restaurant worth its salt then you most likely have a social media page. This will be the key to this particular campaign idea. Every Tuesday you'll copy paste reviews that you've been given and post it on your page.
With the quote, make sure you also post the reviewer's name. You'd be surprised at how well this works because of the fact that people like being appreciated. This campaign also tells your customers that you're listening which is equally as important.
If you're trying to bring in the younger crowd then you should put a selfie station up in your restaurant. Prompt people to post the images on your social media page with a hashtag that relates to your business.
This will make your restaurant radiate a fun feeling to prospective customers who see the images. Also, when a customer posts the picture, chances are all of their friends will see it so you'll attract them too.
If you can't get anyone to actually use the selfie station spice up the campaign a little by giving an incentive. You can pick one selfie winner a week on your social media page and give the participants a $10 gift card.
One way you can market your restaurant and do a little good at the same time is to sponsor a charity event. People who attend the event will more than likely post pictures online. This means the entire world (or at least these people's friends lists) will see you doing something good.
This will generate a ton of positive press and make you feel better as a restaurant owner and a person for doing a little bit of good.
We've talked a lot about using social media to advertise your business but not everyone uses it. Your local chamber of commerce wants your business to succeed so why not use them to reach out to these individuals who aren't exactly internet savvy?
The chamber of commerce deliver advertisements for businesses every week into people's mailboxes. You should be throwing yours into the mix.
Your local sports team need funding just as much as you do. If you sponsor them this will allow them to get the equipment they need to keep playing. Don't worry, you'll get something out of this too in the form of advertisement.
You sponsor the team and the team advertises for you at the games by wearing your logo on their uniforms. If you don't know of any teams this is another opportunity to reach out to your local chamber of commerce. They'll be familiar with just about every team in town so they'll be able to give you some names.
Another thing that you can do is buy a spot in the playbill of a school theater show. This may give people an idea of where to go for dinner after the performance.
Whatever you decide to do with your marketing, you want your audience to be able to relate to it on a personal level. Make your content a little bit emotional so it can rip at their heartstrings.
You can do this by choosing a cause that you really care about like recycling, or the food waste problem and launch a campaign around it. This makes you a company that cares about the big issues which everyone will love.
While you can post your entire restaurant's life story up on social media or in the newspaper, the chances that someone will actually sit down and read it are a little slim. You have to be creative with your storytelling.
A picture is worth a thousand words so if you can advertise one of your restaurant's key points with a clever picture, people are more likely to pay attention.
When considering pictures and other forms of marketing media you need to put some thought into your colors. If you look at most restaurants you'll notice that they use very bright, upbeat colors.
That's because they radiate happiness and energy. All the things you want people to feel when they are sitting in your establishment. If you go by color psychology some of these colors like orange and yellow promote hunger as well.
If you're not bringing in the crowd that you want to your restaurant it's probably more a fault of your marketing than the food itself. If nobody knows about your establishment they can't come to it. Use these ideas for creative restaurant ads to turn your traffic around.
Have a ton of marketing questions that we didn't answer in this article? Contact us and we'll go over it more thoroughly.
