Awesome Restaurant Marketing Ideas!

If Steve Jobs was the CEO of a restaurant company vs. a software company, what might he have done? 10 commandments Steve Jobs had for his companies you can apply to your restaurant:

Quiznos restaurants are having hard times.  The news highlights and hypes up the stress and potential disaster on a daily basis.  Here is a short list of what the articles talk about:

Put the staff on a pedestal.  If those on the staff are not true believers, the restaurant marketing campaign fizzles.  The staff must believe that the management has their best interest in mind when making decisions.  It is important for them to believe that the "ownership" is watching out for their income. 

Too frequently the restaurant owner says: "Not too much restaurant marketing.  Don't want to be too busy."  When the restaurant owner is 10% of the staff and picks up the ball when there are staff members who are sick, late, stupid, selfish or undependable, the restaurant owner in survival mode is not interested in more work. 

Simon Sinek's innovative views on business and leadership have earned him invitations to meet with an array of leaders and organizations, including Microsoft, Dell, SAP, Intel, Chanel, Members of the United States Congress, and the Ambassadors of Bahrain and Iraq.

Is signage a part of the restaurant marketing plan or simply looked upon as another piece of equipment?  Are menus in a restaurant a functional tool or a powerful marketing tool to influence, persuade and grow sales? 

Investing in new restaurant signs and menus can be a costly investment and difficult at times to measure the return on investment.

Guerrilla marketers see big opportunities every year when it is time for neighborhoods to celebrate with fireworks.

American Express has formed a partnership with Foursquare and others to change coupon offers from traditional to digital.  Eliminating the scissors and envelope to automation will speed the transactions and improve data collection.  (and reduce employee fraud?)  

American Express and the social networking service Foursquare have launched a partnership that enables American Express card members who link their Foursquare profiles to their cards to "load" to mobile devices and redeem merchant specials without the need for coupons or special codes.

There are rumors about restaurant marketing tactics which are spread around the Internet.  The message is very clear that restaurants are trying to "pull one over" on their guests.

If your restaurant strategy is to create marketing messages that misdirect and minimize information, then over time you will become untrustworthy.

A successful business owner who relies on guerrilla marketing listens first.  Restaurants are no exception.  If your restaurant is in New Hampshire, pay attention to the Beer Institute's Brewer Almanac.  In this special report (which is in essence a spreadsheet) you will learn that the highest consumption of beer per capita is in New Hampshire at about 32 gallons annually and is twice that of the lowest in Utah.

Guests who come and go from a restaurant continue to be forgotten before the food is even served. To change this reality, my preference is to think beyond "restaurant marketing" and instead turn to guerrilla marketing.

 The term was coined and defined by Jay Conrad Levinson in his book Guerrilla Marketing. The term has since entered the popular vocabulary and marketing textbooks. 

The concept of guerrilla marketing was invented as an unconventional system of promotions that relies on time, energy and imagination rather than a big marketing budget.

Guerrilla marketing is about using time, energy and imagination. This applies to the touch points in a restaurant. Let's look at the many touch points a restaurant has.

Zillow is a free tool online that almost anyone can use to create a quick and simple restaurant marketing campaign in their local community. You may think of this tool as a real estate website but a guerrilla marketing expert sees opportunities for restaurant marketing in the most unexpected places.

Below you will see maps from Zillow.com.  Each map will show yellow dots showing which house have been sold recently.  There is an option to choose how recently the homes were sold.  This guerrilla marketing tactics for restaurants will come in handy because in essence there is a very targeted market to folks who may not have boxes unpacked, who don't know the area and may have literally no friends yet.