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Cater an Event to Spread the Word about Your Restaurant

Oct 06
Posted by Daniel in bar tips and advice, Restaurant, restaurant tips and advice

If you have a relatively new restaurant, you already know that it can be hard to get people to come through your doors. While you might have had a decent opening, the rush after the first few weeks might be slower than you had hoped. This certainly doesn’t mean that your eatery is doomed. It simply means that you need to spread the word to more people. You will want to find as many ways as possible to keep up the buzz about your restaurant.

Something that you might want to consider is doing a little bit of catering for a special event that is happening in your town. Even if your restaurant doesn’t normally do catering, you might want to consider it for a gallery showing or some similar event. It is also a good idea to offer a heavy discount to the event coordinator. In some instances, you may even want to cater the event free of charge.

Why would you want to do this? You have to look at this as an advertising opportunity rather than as a job. If the event is large, or if it has a number of influential people attending, you are going to be able to advertise directly to them in the best way possible – through your food. You don’t have to tempt them to come into your restaurant to try your food because they will be able to do it right at the event. If they like what you have to offer, you can be sure that they will come into the restaurant, they will tell their friends, and you will increase your business.

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Conventions Mean Big Business for Bars and Restaurants

Sep 28
Posted by Daniel in bar tips and advice, Restaurant, restaurant tips and advice

If you are fortunate enough to be running a bar or restaurant in a medium to large sized city, you probably have conventions roll through occasionally. These conventions bring a large number of people into the city that are from out of town, and those people are going to need to eat and find nightly entertainment. Your bar or restaurant could do some great business if you start advertising to the convention goers early.

You will be able to find out when the convention is months in advance, and that is the time to start targeting the conventioneers. Contact the people who are hosting the convention and tell them that you want to offer special discounts and coupons for all of the attendees. See if you can send them the coupons to be placed in packets for the people attending. You can also ask to drop off stacks of coupons when the convention gets underway.

Another great way of letting the attendees know about your restaurant is to contact the hotels in the area and ask if you can place coupons in their rooms or at the front desk. If they have their own restaurant onsite, they might not be agreeable immediately, but it never hurts to ask.

Granted, the convention is only going to boost your business for a few days, while the convention is happening. However, if there are a number of conventions in your city, you will find that by promoting to convention goers, you can make extra money that will keep your eatery going during the slower times.

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Host a Karaoke Night to Boost Business in Your Bar

Sep 05
Posted by Daniel in bar tips and advice, fun, restaurant tips and advice

They thought it was a fad. They thought it would die off. They thought wrong. Karaoke is here to stay, and that means that you might want to look into hosting a karaoke night at your bar. Even if you don’t happen to be a fan, there are plenty of people out there that love karaoke. You want to keep your customers happy, and you want to gain more customers, right? This can be a great way to do it.

You will find many different types of karaoke machines that you can buy for your bar, from simple little machines to large machines with PA systems. The one you choose will depend on the size of your bar and how often you think you might be using it. Make sure that you have a huge song selection for the machine. You want to be able to appeal to as many people as possible and the more songs available the better.

Rather than just buying a machine and placing it in the corner of your bar to gather dust, you need to make sure that you advertise your special karaoke night. Start your ads several weeks in advance. Make sure that you announce it on your website and blog and all of the different social networks. Tell everyone on your bar’s fan page to let their friends know. Perhaps you can coincide the night with an extended happy hour that goes until closing time, just to boost interest. (more…)

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Customers Make the Best Marketers for Your Bar and Restaurant

Sep 01
Posted by Daniel in bar tips and advice, Restaurant, restaurant tips and advice

by Ethan Hein

Even if you have a million ideas for promoting your bar or restaurant, you might find that none of them work. That is just the nature of the game. There are so many variables when it comes to marketing that you can never be sure of what is going to work. However, one of the tried and true methods of boosting business and sales has always been word of mouth. You want to have people talking and saying great things about your restaurant or bar, and you want those people to be genuine. While your employees and you might say great things, when it comes from the mouth of one of your actual customers, it is going to hold more weight.

How can you get your customers to start talking about your establishment? You will find that many of them already do. If you want them to spread the word even further, you might want to consider offering them some benefits for preaching the gospel of your bar or restaurant. Here is a simple way that you can do that.

Print up some business cards with your establishment’s name, number and address on them. You will also want to add a space on the card where your customer can print his or her name. The card is also a coupon that offers a discount of 10 to 15 percent for anyone who brings it into your place. The discount can be for meals, drinks, or anything that you like.

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Use the Digital World to Draw More Customers to Your Restaurant

Aug 25
Posted by Daniel in bar tips and advice, Commercial Seating, Restaurant Furniture, restaurant tips and advice

What are your customers and all of those potential customers doing when they aren’t enjoying a meal at your restaurant? Well, when they aren’t at work most people spend oodles of time on the web. Of course, quite a few of them are probably on the net even when they are at work, but that’s beside the point! Once you realize how much time people spend on the web, you can see what a powerful tool it can be. If you have only a limited web presence right now, beef it up.

You need to have a website for your restaurant for starters. It doesn’t have to be full of bells and whistles, and you don’t have to spend a fortune to get it set up. However, you want to try to set the right tone with your site. It should match the ambience that you are trying to create inside your eatery.

Make sure that you have your menu up on your site so people know what they are going to find in terms of eats. You also want to have some photos of your restaurant. Have a gallery of shots of the exterior and the interior to show your restaurant furniture and seating arrangement. Highlight the best parts of your restaurant. You can hire a professional to take the photos or you can do it on your own. Just be sure to put up clean and clear photos. That means the snapshots you take with your cell phone probably aren’t going to cut it.

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Pass Out Drink and Food Coupons for Your Restaurant

Aug 21
Posted by Daniel in bar tips and advice, Restaurant, Restaurant Furniture, restaurant tips and advice

After a well deserved holiday we are back with more tips and advice on how to keep your restaurants and bars going and how to keep making profits even in these hard economical times. This time it’s all about coupons and discounts and how to make them work for you without loosing money:

Every bar owner wants to have a nice establishment where people can feel comfortable and have a great time. They put effort into picking out the right tables and seating, knowing that it is very important, and they make sure that the ambiance in the place is just right for the clientele they want to attract. When things don’t immediately go their way, they are sometimes tempted to give up. Now is the time to start promoting harder though! All of the hard work that promotion entails is well worth it. Here is a simple way to get more people to come into your bar in the next couple of weeks.

Coupon is a word that you generally only think of when you are heading to the grocery store or maybe a restaurant. You can use them for your bar as well though, and they can be very effective. When you create your coupons, you want to make sure that you offer some real incentives for people to come into your bar. Buy two get one free coupons are always nice. Offer 50 percent off appetizers if you have finger foods at the bar. You need to make sure that you have an expiration date on your coupon, otherwise people could take advantage.

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