Promoting Your Restaurant.

In a franchise situation, the brand owner will take a lot of the responsibility of the promotion, including the creating of marketing collaterals, general advertising and a degree of local advertising specific to your location. However, as a business owner it is always important to ensure that promotion for your restaurant is being done adequately.

Promotion can start anytime, but it should begin in earnest and in a planned manner with scheduled activities from the date the final launch has been planned.

Your promotion strategy depends on the type of restaurant you will be running and the catchment area for your customers. As mentioned earlier, QSR and cafes have more of a local clientele – customers who are already in the area. Casual and fine dining restaurants attract customers from further afield. Naturally, the promotion efforts for the first two formats need to be more locally focused and the promotion efforts for the other two formats should have a wider spread.

Localised efforts are cheaper to promote and restaurants that have a wider appeal would attract the lifestyle writers of city-based and national publications and hence, knowing your targeted clientele and choosing the right promotion strategy is very important.

A web presence is extremely important too. You need to have a dedicated website, and presence in all popular social networking sites. The Internet is the best way that customers can easily find all the important information regarding your restaurant, including operating hours, exact location and the menu. In the era of smart mobiles, access to people on the move is equally important.

Getting yourself talked about is the most important objective. The appeal of the concept and the experience of your restaurant is the only way you can ensure that you are talked about in pleasant terms. That is the challenge of word-of-mouth marketing.

It would be best to work out your promotion campaign through a thorough marketing plan. The following points need to be kept in mind while preparing it:

1. Design Fresh and Consistent Communication
2. Build a Public Relations Strategy
3. Do Effective Advertising
4. Drive Social Media Conversations

You can add to the list by writing in to us.

Why Business Owners Should Take Risks.

If you believe that entrepreneurs are simply risk takers, you are wrong. If they had been perpetual risk takers they wouldn’t make for great success stories. They are known for their ability to take “calculated” risks, and also for designing “contingency plans” or alternative plans of action to a risky business situation. It is important for budding entrepreneurs to learn from the great successes of established business enterprises the ability to view risk as not negative but incredibly positive.

For most start-ups, some risks are a must, and are almost integral to their growth if one has effective strategies to deal with them. That’s what the start-ups should learn from the entrepreneurs: The strategies the latter use for success. To start with, do not consider risks as negative or just hazards, which need smart and strategic dealing. Take some risks as they are good for the enterprise’s growth and avoid the ones which are not. Here’s the list of the ones every entrepreneur should take:

Are you the First Mover? The shift in the market trend simply provides for business opportunity. The challenge is to recognise it early and have the first mover’s advantage. Since you do not know how it will fare in the market in the near future, it indeed is risky but it is worth taking.

Social Media is Here To Stay: Are you worried about your advertising expenses? Fret not. Social media has changed the rules of the game, and so have word-of-mouth and blogging. Strategically involving customers into discussions and launching your product/service on the Web is a great way, albeit risky owing to its reach, to find your niche audience on the Internet. Many companies have started to take it seriously by way of reducing their advertising spends.

There’s No Perfect Time: Start your business right now. If you think the right time is going to present itself, then you might as well keep waiting for ever. Believe in your business idea and sow the seeds today. Don’t wait for the “perfect” time. You wouldn’t want to wait until the day you see your competitor come up with the same idea and concept.

Richard Branson Says: “But aside from any business concerns, one of the main reasons my colleagues and I undertake any adventure is because it’s fun, whether it’s a bet that ends with me serving drinks to passengers in a skirt or whether it’s one that leads to the creation of a company that transforms the space industry. Should you say yes the next time somebody proposes a challenge? You bet!”

Do you have a risk-taking spirit? Tell us the risks you have faced in the pursuit of your journey has a business owner in the comments.