Marketing

Dessert can play a vital role in retaining restaurant customers if it is sold as a star product. Several strategies are possible. It is always a temptation for customers. A little help is therefore enough for it to be sold regularly and thus help the restaurant to increase its revenue.

Perhaps you have wondered how to strengthen the role of desserts in your restaurant? Read the rest of this article and find out how to not just offer your desserts, but to sell them!

Find out how many desserts you sell

In principle, if you want to increase the sales of desserts, it is important to know the consumption of desserts in your establishment per day and per service . Perform a scan for a specific period (e.g. 1 month) to determine the following:

• The quantity of desserts sold , by hourly slices and in relation to the number of customers who visited your establishment during this period.
• The desserts on your menu that have sold the most , those that have sold the least, and during which services.

Once in possession of this valuable information, you will be able to carry out several marketing actions at the right times and at the times that need them most. This analysis will also allow you to know if your offer is working well or not.

Offer tailor-made desserts

You can go a step further and gather more qualitative and detailed information about the tastes of your customers. A management software like TheFork Manager allows you, for example, to save their preferences in a database that you can constantly update. Another idea: your waiters can gently ask customers what type of desserts they prefer, which ones they don’t like, what ingredients they are allergic to, and even which meal they crave for dessert the most. Do they favor dessert for lunch, dinner, or only occasionally? Then record the responses in this customer loyalty system.

Can you imagine what you could do with all this information? You could offer personalized desserts! You could craft a truly enticing offer that matches the general preferences of your diners , while still providing the perfect dessert for every customer. Result: all satisfied customers, who will always want to come back to taste this dessert from your restaurant that they like so much.

How To Use Storytelling To Retain Customers

Click to save your customers’ preferences and retain them with TheFork Manager

Fact: According to surveys by TheFork, restaurants offering chocolate desserts enjoy 27% more bookings.

Your desserts: neither too much nor too little

Another fundamental factor in increasing the sale of desserts is to offer a suitable quantity, so that the customer wants to try them. Indeed :

• If your menu only has 3 desserts, the customer will feel that you are not very motivated to sell this product and that is why your choice is so narrow.
• On the other hand, if you have an endless dessert menu, the customer will have a hard time making up his mind and will experience a feeling of frustration.

The idea is therefore to define the right quantity according to the types of desserts and their variety.

For example, define 5 types of recipes: pastries, fruits, typical desserts, ice cream, dairy desserts, and include one dessert from each category in your menu. You can of course combine your offer with the information on customer preferences that you have saved in your database, as well as with the desserts in vogue on the market. This will concoct a well targeted and compelling list that will sell better.

Once these points are defined, you can take action.

Customer loyalty: some strategic sweets

1- Always recommend desserts: your servers must be the first fans of your desserts. This is the best solution to make customers understand how irresistible your designs are . A good tactic is to recommend them at the start of the meal, when taking the order, advising customers to leave a small place for dessert, and take the opportunity to sell them one or two corresponding desserts. to their tastes or even the star desserts on the menu.

Another basic tactic is to invite customers to take a look at the choice of desserts on the menu after the main courses are finished . And if despite all these efforts, customers still do not decide on a dessert, the waiter can suggest that they at least order one and share it, just to taste it … by assuring them that they do not. will not regret!

2 – Display appetizing desserts at the counter : who would not be tempted by the sight of a delicious cream cake presented in this way? With such a visual boost, you are sure to blow your minds off your customers.

3 – Offer a menu exclusively reserved for desserts: it must be illustrated with appetizing and large photos, making customers want to taste your desserts even more. This tactic prevents desserts from going unnoticed in the mass of dishes on your general menu. If you have a special dessert menu, visually highlight them.

4 – Opt for creative presentations: a widespread trend is to serve desserts in small glasses . This makes them easier to taste and the different layers of textures and colors catch the eye more easily.

5 – Offer a gourmet coffee: it is always easier to sell a coffee. One possible strategy is to include specialty coffees that are more elaborate than just traditional coffee in your offer, matching them with creams, sweet liquors, sweets, fruits, spices, chocolates and selling them as desserts.

6 – Sell a special homemade dessert: another infallible action is to offer a star dessert whose recipe is as spectacular both in its flavor and in its presentation, at a competitive price, and to constantly promote it in all your communications, by presenting him as the star of your establishment. It must be highlighted in your card, or even be the subject of a separate flyer. You can be sure that customers will be very tempted to order it, more so than other desserts.

7 – Plan for low-calorie desserts: one of the concerns of customers when ordering dessert is remorse for consuming a dish that “makes you fat” or that is not good for your health. To avoid this objection, offer “light” desserts . Fruit recipes are great, but they have to be creative and delicious in order for you to win over the customer and retain them. Example: a fruit carpaccio or a natural yogurt with honey and nuts.

8 – Offer miniature desserts: this is a trend that is observed more and more often, because very small desserts give excellent results. This is an effective ploy because the customer feels more comfortable and less “guilty” of choosing a miniature dessert and not a full serving. This is also a good suggestion if the customer tells you they are full. Another strategy is to present your customers with a tray containing a farandole of tasting different desserts , which allows them to taste various types of desserts and thus pleasantly conclude their meal.

Of course, as with everything else in your gastronomic offer, it is essential to promote your desserts on your social networks , on your website, on specialized portals like TheFork , to publish photos in your Tripadvisor account , and in your print advertisements.

Want a little treat on the turnover side? So sell your desserts!

To regularly find customers for your restaurant and sustain your success, you must surprise, differentiate yourself, stand out from the crowd. This is especially true nowadays, even as consumption habits change very often . The solution ?

Innovate = launch new products to bring about change.

A restaurant which is experiencing a period of insufficient occupancy must introduce new elements to start filling its tables again. Just like a restaurant which, on the contrary, has a full house, it must be one step ahead of its competitors to be able to maintain itself. It is for this reason that innovation has always played a fundamental role in catering, and today more than ever.

One interesting aspect is that contemporary innovation is directly linked to the ability to spot customer needs and find a solution to meet them. Let us cite the case of the very first restaurant to have accepted to welcome customers’ dogs , or the first to have offered free wifi to its customers . These are innovative strategies that arose out of new consumer needs and that have given breathtaking results.

To innovate, you have to know how to listen

Active Watch is a concept that refers to constantly monitoring changes in the lifestyle of clients . In this regard, restaurants wishing to innovate must listen and observe, both in the real world and in the digital space, the motivations, opinions , actions and above all the demands of customers.

Therefore, before defining what to introduce into a restaurant to find new customers, it is a good idea to actively listen to consumers and answer questions like these:

• What are customers in my neighborhood, in my locality, in my area of ​​action asking? And what do tourists want?
• How can I improve the customer experience in my restaurant?

Imagine a restaurant specializing in family cuisine, located in a university district, teeming with millennials from morning to night. Logically, it would be in his interest to exploit this customer segment, but what elements could he introduce to fill the house? An active watch on social networks will allow him to extract important data, by revealing for example that a high percentage of these customers are passionate about video games and that if they can play in a restaurant during their meal, then they will. will attend every day. Do you have the answer ! If the establishment changes its storytelling and is transformed into a thematic place focused on video games, by adapting its gastronomic offer, its atmosphere and its service, it has every chance of being sold out, and it will have innovated compared to its competitors.

This is what the restaurant The Advocado Show in Amsterdam did. After having carried out an active watch to find its prospects, it ended up becoming the very first European restaurant specializing in avocado and it innovated on an entire market. The restaurant had realized that avocado was a trendy gourmet product in Europe, and that customers were starting to demand it regularly. He therefore put it on the menu, paying attention to quality, with a view to a healthy philosophy . Its innovation approach paid off and found a positive echo among customers.

How To Sell More Desserts And Retain Customers

Simplifying the customer’s life also means innovating

Of course, innovating also involves the introduction of new technologies in the restaurant, the desired goal being more simplicity and convenience for customers. Paying the bill with your mobile phone is thus one of the services that everything indicates that it will become a habit. This is a natural consequence of our new digital way of life, which now allows us to manage everything with a mobile or other digital device.

And, if this technology has become natural and intuitive for customers, another tool is starting to follow suit and is also about to become a habit: the digital card. Available on the customer’s mobile phone or on a tablet provided by the restaurant, it allows you to discover the gastronomic offer, nutritional information and indications on allergens. Some maps even display 3D representations of the dishes .

This is the case of the Bar à Huîtres de Paris , where customers are given tablets instead of the traditional paper menu , and can consult various screens to discover and choose the dishes. It is a more complete experience, which reveals to them in the smallest details what is concocted in the kitchen.

3D printing dishes to find customers

And since we are talking about innovation in modern catering, it is inevitable to mention gastronomy in 3D. Restaurants that print food? Yes, you read that right. A proposal for the less curious and which is likely to dazzle customers. And that’s what it is all about: using creativity to impress, because customers seek experiences that impact their five senses when they eat out.

The Food Ink company , whose slogan is Taste Tomorrow Today, has been commissioned by several European restaurants to carry out these experiments. Result: the chefs of these establishments offer unusual gastronomic menus produced using a 3D printer. In Barcelona, ​​they collaborated with the team of the Yours restaurant and served a 12-course dinner that left all the guests speechless.

It is clear that the big challenge for restaurants is to adapt their services to the needs and requirements of customers, who are also looking for personalized experiences using cutting-edge technologies. This is the reason why in modern catering, the most coveted professionals are those who, in addition to their skills in cooking or restaurant management, are able to carry out marketing actions and effectively use digital tools, as shown by the survey carried out by LAVIÑA and TheFork on new profiles sought in the sector.

This is a challenge that concerns all players in the exciting world of gastronomy, because companies like TheFork  must also constantly improve the tools they offer , to keep up with the changes in the sector.

To innovate, it is also essential for the restaurant to be active on the Internet, to communicate with customers on social networks and to apply marketing strategies on a daily basis. 

We therefore hope that innovation will come to form an integral part of your restaurant management, so that you can offer extraordinary experiences to your customers and that they return it to you by showing you unfailing loyalty.

We are already tomorrow, so let’s go, go for it!

One of the main goals of most restaurants is to retain customers. Over time, loyalty recipes have changed. Offering advantages, improving service, offering more personalized attention to customers, knowing customers’ tastes, understanding their needs and meeting them are among the most frequent actions. But is it possible to go further? The answer is yes ! And this is the case with the strategy we are presenting to you today:

Storytelling

What is it about ?

It is a technique that consists of telling lifelong stories, and which is used as a strategic tool to trigger an emotional and deep impact in customers . The idea is to capture the customer’s attention, to provoke strong emotions (joy, pleasure, astonishment) in them, and ultimately to forge closer relationships to succeed in retaining them. Put simply, your job is to woo your customers through the stories you tell them about your establishment.

Let’s start with an example

Nando’s has linked the ancestral history of the emblematic sauce of its gastronomic offer to the history of the creation of its chain of restaurants , resulting in a Storytelling playing strongly on the emotions. His story explains how Portuguese explorers landed in South Africa and discovered a chili pepper, called Peri-Peri, which they used to make a sauce that would later become an iconic part of South African culture. Then, still according to the story, in the 1980s, two entrepreneurs decided to collaborate to spread this sauce around the world thanks to Nando’s dishes. Here is a story that has all the necessary ingredients to seduce customers, with a script worthy of the big screen!

This story is omnipresent in all of Nando’s communication . On the web , for example, Nando’s details its origins, but also explains the legend behind the rooster that constitutes its logo, the source and the creative process of the typography and the meaning of the icons in its image, through texts repeating terms such as roots, family, heart, soul.

This positive corporate culture is also found on physical media: restaurant walls, promotional documents and even napkins contain emotional texts that recall this identity.

What does Nando’s get with this storytelling?

• It causes a feeling of fascination in the customers.
• He forms emotional bonds.
• It creates a community in which the restaurant and the customers actively participate.
• And of course, this results in unfailing customer loyalty.

The science behind storytelling

The human brain is made up of two hemispheres. The left hemisphere is rational, logical and feeds on material information. We can say that it is the side of the brain that will, for example, attach the most importance to the price of the gastronomic offer. Its opposite, the right hemisphere, feeds on sensory experiences. He ignores the notion of time, because he focuses on pleasure, play and the intangible. It is this side of the brain that will give priority to the creative and emotional aspect of the gastronomic offer.

One of the fundamental factors is that society is changing. We are living a transition between an industrial era founded on the values ​​of the left hemisphere (reason and logic) and an era where the values ​​of the right hemisphere (intuition and emotion) prevail, in particular in terms of habits of consumption. We are seeing this trend appear in the restaurant industry, where authenticity, proximity and creativity are the aspects that now attract customers the most .

This is why storytelling is a perfect technique to seduce your guests, thanks to stories that deeply stimulate this side of the brain that dominates today.

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How to put storytelling into practice for customer loyalty purposes?

As a rule, we are constantly telling, listening to and participating in stories. If you offer a quality story about your establishment, it’s a safe bet that customers will become attached to it and want to be part of it.

To get started, follow these three steps:

1 – get to know your customers

Although the storytelling is based on the stories of the restaurant, the heroes of those stories are actually the customers . To define your story, it is therefore essential to know the motivations of your potential customers, who are not looking for restaurants solely for their gastronomic offer. They are indeed looking for something more, which they cannot create in their own homes.

When that “something” coincides with your story, it’s won! The result is perfect customer loyalty.

To find out what your prospects are looking for, you can monitor the opinions and comments they leave on social media  and portals like TripAdvisor and TheFork , for example. You can also save your customers’ preferences when they visit your establishment. Before crafting your story, it’s essential to actively listen to your prospects’ opinions and preferences when they search for a restaurant.

Click here to save your clients’ preferences to TheFork Manager.

Imagine that your establishment is targeting millennial customers, that is, young people between the ages of 20 and 35. You probably already know that in addition to food, for example, they need a fast WiFi connection. These are two elements that they can find in other spaces of their daily life. In this case, what added value can a restaurant offer them? Original drinks, intense flavors, healthy recipes, creative events? Your storytelling should include all of these qualities so that your millennials feel like they’re part of your restaurant’s story and share it across their networks. It is only then that the retention of these customers over the long term becomes possible.

2 – define your story

Your restaurant story should of course answer the following questions:

How was it created? What are the motivations that led to its creation? Who are the creators of the restaurant, what is their personality? What are the most unusual, the most epic anecdotes?

Remember, however, that your story should also match the motivations of your prospects. It must therefore reflect both your real identity, but also include that particular “something” that customers expect from your restaurant.

Say your establishment is in a tourist district, but your prospects are not tourists, but locals. After investigating, you realize that they complain about the excessive commercial exploitation of their neighborhood and that they prefer restaurants capable of preserving the authentic spirit.

Now imagine that you offer an international gastronomic offer in a contemporary setting. How to convince your prospects through your storytelling? Answer: by relating your story to that of the neighborhood. Find common ground between traditional and indigenous aspects of the neighborhood and the stories of your establishment, and build on this customer need.

The good news is that your restaurant’s stories are always being created. They never end! Each of your dishes, the arrival of a new chef, the organization of a new event… everything is a matter of building fascinating stories just waiting to be told to customers all ready to be seduced.

Once you’ve defined the elements of your story, it’s time to take action!

3 – Tell your story

In your establishment :

• Place atmospheric and decorative elements that embody your story. For example, use slogans that evoke your entrepreneurial spirit, icons, etc.
• Give your dishes names that also illustrate the same concept. For example, a hamburger restaurant can give first names to its burgers, which will allow its customers to better identify with them.
• Integrate your concept into the presentation of your gastronomic offer.
• When you organize events , make sure that all the elements (dishes, decoration, promotional materials) are in line with your storytelling.

The waiters and the staff deserve a special mention , because they are the ones who must be the first to tell the story and the philosophy of your establishment at the various points of the service. Why do the recipes include these ingredients? Where did the idea for this or that dish come from? What was your experience the first time you tasted this other dish? What’s special about this drink and why is it your favorite drink? <strong> If the servers take ownership of your story </strong> , then they inspire customers to take action. They can thus systematically make them want to come back to try these dishes that they did not choose, but that the waiters described to them with so much passion.

On your digital networks

And by that term, we don’t just mean the “About” section on your website. Tell your story on all your digital channels: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter profiles, on your blog and in your newsletter. Even if the actions and publications are different on these channels, the secret of storytelling is the presence of a common thread , a common story on all.

• An effective marketing tip is to create slogans and phrases that represent your story that you can use on all of your communications.
• You can also use graphic elements that reinforce your concept and which, in addition to their physical integration into your establishment, also appear in your digital publications.
• Live  social media videos are great for telling your establishment’s stories. Tools like Instagram Stories , created specifically to develop user and brand storytelling, will come in handy.

Another idea is to interconnect all of your channels in a single marketing campaign to help your subscribed customers learn about and participate in your story. This is what the Italian restaurant  La Tagliatella did .

For his Storytelling strategy, he created a quiz contest on the history of the restaurant . Customers with the most correct answers won all kinds of prizes, from Italian gourmet products to trips with meals included in their establishments. La Tagliatella posted this action on their Facebook profile, Instagram, in their newsletter and on their website.

Remember, the idea is this: tell your establishment’s most emotional stories across all your digital channels, through your image and marketing actions.

The goal is that customers …

• Identify with your story,
• Participate in your story,
• Renew the experience (loyalty)
• Talk about your story (become ambassadors for your establishment).

All restaurants have a story… Are you ready to tell yours?

A restaurant’s Facebook page is one of the main platforms for finding customers. So much so that Facebook remains the most used social network in catering, followed by Instagram. That said, having a profile on Facebook and posting content there regularly is not enough for your Facebook page to fully fulfill its role .

In fact, we come across restaurant pages much more often than we would like to post content all over the place, and make mistakes that wipe out their best efforts. We see restaurateurs who spend hours tweaking the profiles of their establishments without being able to interact as they would like with their users.

In order not to have this problem on your restaurant page and be able to find customers more frequently through Facebook, you must avoid these common mistakes at all costs:

1 – Write long texts and in capitals

Snapchat, Instagram and Twitter are social networks characterized by immediacy and short messages that mark the trend of the moment. It is for this reason that communications on Facebook are more effective if they meet these criteria.

Some restaurants continue to write long paragraphs of text on their Facebook profiles, sometimes all in all caps, presumably to emphasize the message they want to convey, but this approach actually has the opposite effect:

• Reading long texts takes more time , and the consequence is that Internet users generally do not read them in their entirety.
• The capitals give the impression that their author is screaming or absolutely wants to impose themselves , and create an impression of virulence which, instead of attracting customers, scares them away.

Therefore, write texts that are concise, short and most importantly, that go straight to the point . Of course, you also need to use capital letters correctly, have impeccable spelling, and express yourself in a readable and pleasant style.

2 – Incorrect use of hashtags

Hashtags are tags that allow your content to be visible to Internet discussion groups, such as other public pages, influencers, and brands. They allow you to be discovered by more people . There’s no denying that a lot of restaurants make two hashtag-related mistakes:

• They never use them and miss the opportunity to market their content to new customers.
• They use them excessively and without a specific purpose, which means that their publications do not lose in the mass.

So, should you use hashtags? The answer is yes ! But how, you will ask?

In moderation and in a justified manner. Choose 1, 2 or 3 hashtags to localize the content. For example, if you are making a post about an octopus salad that you just added to your menu, because it is such a trendy product, it is very useful to use hashtags like #gastronomic trends #poulperecipes #poulpe .

Remember that hashtags are not adjectives used to highlight the qualities of your products, but words or combinations of words that allow this content to be tagged in the discussion threads.

Namely: How to create your hashtags? It is an exercise that makes sense. Think about what words yourself would use to search for these topics and place the hashtag in the search engine of the Facebook homepage to see how many results it generates and test its popularity. The more it is used, the more Internet users who interact with this content.

Personalization In Restaurant Marketing

3 – Do not put calls to action to find customers

Some publications end up floating in a vacuum and do not seek to generate any interaction. For example, it is very common to find restaurant publications where only the blackboard appears with the daily menu, and nothing more. If we put ourselves in the Internet user’s shoes, what do you want them to do with this information?

It’s a good thing to promote whatever you cook in the kitchen, but it’s important to generate a result, because at the end of the day what we’re looking for is for the customer to identify with the brand and let him come to the restaurant, not just see the post.

It is therefore important to always include a call to action: book, vote, click on a link, participate in a contest, etc. Even if what you post is very simple, it is important to encourage the user to interact.

Note: To include the URL addresses of your website, your booking page, your blog or any other content, it is always recommended to abbreviate these URLs, via online platforms like tipo bitly which allow you to do it quickly and easily.

4 – do not answer

The very foundation of any social network is interaction. You share content, you get feedback that you respond to, and so on – it’s a cycle. When a subscriber comments on a post, they are obviously waiting for a response. To manage the interaction in the best possible way, you can create a policy for responding to various types of comments:

• If the comment is positive, respond by thanking the author and inviting them to come visit your restaurant.
• If the comment expresses any doubt, respond by providing information that all Internet users can understand.
• If this is constructive criticism, respond by thanking the author and promising solutions.
• If the comment is destructive, respond diplomatically and remain neutral. In extreme cases, consider hiding the comment to prevent it continuing to hurt your business’s marketing.

In any case, it is important to respond and not let this precious interaction, which allows you to communicate in a more human and more direct way with your customers, be lost before you get them to come to your place.

5 – Self-satisfaction

Facebook is certainly an ideal platform to promote the restaurant , but be careful, this does not mean that the content must fall into permanent self-satisfaction, because Facebook is a community that feeds on the participation of all , and especially prospects.

We must therefore avoid that publications are focused only on the establishment and its qualities, and extend them to content likely to be useful to all, for example:

• Fun posts that involve interaction. Organize quizzes, contests, games where internet users not only participate, but spend time interacting with the brand and generate empathy.
• Publications in which you share photos or videos of Internet users so that they too can be the protagonists of your establishment’s marketing.
• Interesting articles on gastronomy, lifestyle, trends and content related to the tastes of your customers.

The important thing is to balance the information in order to obtain a good balance between the presence of the restaurant and that of Internet users.

To conclude, we cannot let pass another error that we sometimes encounter on certain restaurant pages and which can be crucial in finding customers. This error is not having a direct booking button included in the profile! Do you know how many tables are at risk of going unoccupied just because of this detail? When an Internet user subscribes to a restaurant’s page, it is because he likes it, and we can deduce that he probably wants to go there. It is therefore normal that he can reserve a table without having to leave Facebook.

If your restaurant profile does not yet have a reservation button, what are you waiting for? Click here to add a button immediately through TheFork and find more customers for your business.

Providing a good meal, optimal attention, in a welcoming place, benefiting from a good brand image and active digital channels , is only the beginning of the recipe for success in today’s restaurant industry. To set yourself apart from the competition, it’s important to take restaurant marketing to the next step: Personalization.

This consists of adapting the restaurant’s offer to the concrete needs of your potential customers , and allowing them to participate in the creation of products and services, in order to give them exactly what they are looking for and to retain them.

This strategy is based on a scientific bass: When, for example, we hear our name, certain areas of our brain are activated to make us more attentive and more willing to form relationships. The same thing happens when we are treated in a personalized way: we feel special and recognized, which affects our purchasing decisions.

The current challenge in restaurant marketing is to apply the customary personalization of manipulation to retain the greatest number of customers. Give it a try! With your team, you can start testing this strategy by addressing your potential customers by name and in a personalized way. You will see the difference!

How to apply personalization to your restaurant marketing

The key to providing personalized service is knowing your customers. Initially, you will need to make sure that you have well defined the profile of your potential client, in order to know how to satisfy them.

After this first step, there are several ways to apply the personalization.

Meal

The meal is one of the most customizable elements of the restaurant. In this sense, you can make a list of your most popular recipes and offer several ingredient options to your potential customers for them to dress up.

More and more hamburger restaurants offer their customers, for example, choosing the type of bread, meat and complementary ingredients to create the perfect burger. On the other hand, we are seeing an increase in the number of shops with a healthy philosophy , in which personalization is the norm, because customers need to have maximum control over the quality of what they eat . Combining these two trends, the Big Ferdinand restaurant in Paris has adopted the following slogan: L’atelier du hamburger.

The hamburger is his favorite dish. He uses artisanal and local products, offers gluten-free formulas, vegetarian specialties, and of course, his customers can create their own burgers. It is the perfect example of current personalization.

Besides hamburger restaurants, we believe that personalization can be applied to any gastronomic offer. There are restaurants that offer a wide choice of products allowing their customers to compose their salads according to their tastes or to choose the topping of their dessert among 3 options (chocolate, caramel, red fruits), for example. Asian restaurants also offer their customers several ingredients to create their rolls.

To best adapt to the tastes of your customers, you can consult them through social networks, which will allow you to better know their favorite products and to develop your strategies for personalizing dishes. This step helps to avoid making mistakes in the preparation of dishes that would not work later.

Join The Gastronomic Tourism Boom

Decoration

The decoration is another customizable element. This strategy was applied by the restaurant Les Frères Toqués in Nantes, where they invited their customers to send postcards from their trips to use them in the renovation of the toilets. The winners received free drinks on their next visit and, of course, had the satisfaction of seeing something of their own in the restaurant. It is definitely a restaurant marketing effect, but it is proving to be very effective.

Personalized attention on social networks

It is important to respond to customer comments in a personalized manner and in a close tone. The ideal is to be able to carry out a small survey before answering the comments and the doubts of the customers who have already visited you. Hard work? probably, but the results will not be long in coming.

The key to success is consistency and the application of personalization across all digital channels.

If you receive emails or private messages, personalization is even more direct and easy thanks to a private environment. You will be able to strike up a conversation in a more natural and close way with them.

You can also personalize your newsletters. You can segment groups of customers with similar preferences, to send them tailor-made content. For example, a promotion on your latest salads for customers looking for healthy cuisine, or gluten-free dishes for your customers with gluten allergies , or even invitations for your next live concert , to your young customers, using language adapted.

Database

The database is an indispensable tool for personalization. A true bible of the restaurant, it contains the information of all the customers who are seated at your tables. The database is one of the most precious treasures. It can be used, in the context of personalization, for:

• Record all customer information. With this information, not only will you be able to call your customers by name, but you will also be able to know their preferences, to give them exactly what they want.
• Better welcome groups. Large group meals are a good selling opportunity for restaurants, but they are easily stressful for these customers because they require more organization. By using the information from these groups’ fact sheets, you can make their evenings simpler and more comfortable, offering them the foods they ask for every time and calling them by name, of course!
• Offer tailor-made promotions. By analyzing the common tastes of all customer records, you can identify patterns of consumption and offer them personalized promotions. If most of your customers like the craft beer on the menu, you are sure to get good results by offering them a promotion that includes that product, because they will feel it is aimed at them directly.

At TheFork, we use restaurant management software with a database that allows you to perform all of the actions presented above. Click here to install TheFork Manager in your restaurant , if you don’t have it yet.

In summary, remember that it’s just about putting yourself in the customer’s shoes. Wouldn’t it be tempting to receive an email from a restaurant promoting your favorite dish? Yes of course !

It is seven in the evening. A group of 10 people tour the historic city center, accompanied by a guide who describes the culinary traditions and typical products of the region and explains how they are intimately linked to its culture. They end their stroll in a restaurant where, against a background of traditional music, during a wonderful tasting session, they savor the dishes that have been described to them .

Result: the participants, delighted, leave glowing reviews on TripAdvisor, and for its part, the restaurant has won new prospects to its cause and is known through the publication of these opinions.

You have just seen gastronomic tourism in action! It is one of the recent trends which has the most wind in its sails in catering and which consists in combining the pleasure of travel and the table .

How does gastronomic tourism come into being?

Several sectors of activity are involved.

• Official bodies responsible for tourism promotion and gastronomic culture in each locality, which organize parties, festivals and events.
• Travel agencies that organize gastronomic experiences to attract more tourists.
• Restaurant owners, the main protagonists, who invest heavily to attract this clientele.

It is a production cycle from which everyone comes out winners . The culture of the different localities that have bet on this trend has everything to gain in particular.

There are many ways to participate in food tourism. The main thing is to have an argument, an offer of quality products and, of course, tourists eager to live this experience.

Is this the case with your restaurant? Read on and discover different ways to join this fabulous boom:

Themed meals

If your restaurant is located in a particularly touristic town, the ideal is to reserve at least one evening with typical products and to accompany your dishes with an atmosphere and visual marketing that recreate the culture of your region, and thus to offer a complete experience to customers. One strategy to put in place is to enter into partnerships with agencies that offer gastronomic tours.

In Copenhagen, for example, a city that has become the benchmark gastronomic capital in recent years , more and more restaurants are taking advantage of this vogue and creating special menus that reinvent typical Danish dishes, in the lineage of Michelin-starred restaurants that have made the city fashionable.

This is what the restaurant Aamanns Etablissement did , by chef Adam Aamann, famous for its revised and corrected version of smorgas (the typical Danish sandwich), using local and natural products. Today, more and more tourists are coming to Copenhagen to discover the city’s culture through its gastronomy.

Increase Your Sales With A Food Truck

Showcooking

Another way to take your tourism offer to the next level is to offer demonstrations of the preparation of your typical dishes, accompanying them with interesting anecdotes on the history of the ingredients and their cultural origin. To do this, opt for showcookings made by one or more cooks, chosen for their talent to fascinate customers with their stories and of course for their culinary dexterity.

This type of offer represents a plus for tourists, who can taste traditional dishes but also discover the recipes and preparation methods, and know the path taken by all the ingredients until they arrive on their plate.

The advantage is that customers’ passion for gastronomy is booming and that more and more foodies are interested in the wonders hidden in the heart of kitchens. Organizing a showcooking is therefore a sure solution to participate in gastronomic tourism and of course, to increase sales .

Wine tourism

Wine tourism offers visits to wineries, museums, attractions and of course restaurants whose star product is local wine. It is a rapidly expanding form of tourism. According to the UNWTO (World Tourism Organization) , France, Spain and Italy were the most visited countries in Europe in 2015, figures which were maintained in 2016 and 2017. Part of this growth is due to the wine-making tradition of these countries, which receive tourists attracted by the discovery of wines.

The region of Tuscany, Italy, for example, is a wine tourism paradise . Located on one of its wine routes is the Badia a Coltibuono restaurant , in the heart of the Chianti vineyards, where everything revolves around wine . Tourists go there to savor its tasting menu of 4 courses and 4 distinct wines, each perfectly paired with the other .

If your restaurant is located in a wine region, the ideal is to partner with local producers so that tourists come to visit you and taste the local wines and your special recipes concocted to accompany them. Your restaurant can be the highlight of a wine route , where tourists experience the process from A to Z, from the vineyard to the table. You can also partner with wine bars or specialist wine stores to recommend that tourists go and taste their products in your establishment.

Marine experiences

If your restaurant is close to the sea, or right by the sea, you have a superb asset to enjoy gastronomic tourism. You can offer your visitors special dishes prepared with fresh local produce , and combine your culinary creations with storytelling that tells the story of regional culture .

You can partner with agencies organizing hikes and sea excursions to include a memorable end in their trips in your restaurant where diners will taste the delicacies of the local fishing. It is a solution to find customers in summer and spring of course, but also during other seasons, especially in winter, with a special offer sure to entice tourists.

Local festivals

Food fairs and festivals are great events to take advantage of this type of tourism. During these events, your restaurant will not only have the opportunity to be among the featured local establishments, but your cooks will be able to organize cooking workshops , showcookings, and you will be able to propose miniature versions of your dishes , and sell them. during concerts and various other activities.

In Spain, for example, each year a city is elected gastronomic capital of the country. In 2017, the honor goes to Huelva , whose gastronomy is based mainly on fish, seafood and Spanish ham dishes. Throughout the year, the event organizers schedule a flurry of activities focused on these products and the number of visitors is skyrocketing. It is a solution to promote your restaurant in your region and in the world.

Tip: If your restaurant is not located in a particularly touristic region, remember that this is still an opportunity to choose gastronomic tourism. The idea is that the competition in tourist areas is strong and involves putting more effort into making your restaurant stand out from the crowd. On the other hand, if your restaurant is in a lesser-known, but equally interesting, region, there are still fascinating stories to be told through food . An iconic street, a historic building, special neighborhood anecdotes, everything can be used to attract tourists. If you have access to this unique dimension … take advantage of it!

A fundamental aspect for your actions to bear fruit is to make them known on all your digital channels. Your website , your social networks and especially your profiles on specialized portals are the ideal platforms for tourists to discover your establishment and visit you. In your TheFork profile, these customers can discover your gastronomic tourism offers and book at the time of their choice, via our app and on their mobile phone.

Is your restaurant on TripAdvisor ? Hope so! It is the most visited traveler portal in the world, on which restaurants enjoy maximum visibility for tourists from all over the world. In the profile of your establishment, do not forget to publish all the events that you organize , and to encourage tourists to leave their opinions of their experience in your restaurant. Internet advertising is vital for food tourism.

To plan your gastronomic tourism activities, remember that you have TheFork Manager, a reservation management software, which helps you organize your tables to efficiently serve both regulars and tourists. Click here to get it for free.

The dream of any restaurant is to be able to find customers who love their establishment, repeat their visits regularly, appreciate the dining experience on offer and recommend it to other customers. Utopia? Not at all ! This is a very achievable goal without resorting to magic formulas.

The secret is to know who are the most suitable customers for the establishment and to target them.

In marketing, this type of customer is called a “ buyer persona ”, a concept which designates the ideal customer prototype for any business, and whose profile must be clearly defined in order to be able to focus all strategies on him. Do you know who is the perfect customer for your restaurant? To find out, follow these steps.

Step 1: Define your services

The first step in determining your ideal clients is to know who you are. It is therefore essential to be able to confidently answer questions of the following type:

• What type of restaurant are you?
• What gastronomic experience do you offer?
• What services are available in your establishment 

You should also be able to answer the following questions:

• What type of restaurant are you not?
• What services do you not offer?

Follow The Trend Of “Sharing” To Find Customers

When setting up your profile, you may find that different types of customers frequent your restaurant. Example :

Asian gastronomy restaurant. It offers a varied menu and knows how to adapt to trends. The house specialties are duck and a whole range of Japanese dumplings, gyozas, but the menu has recently been enriched with new dishes such as ramen pasta soups, which allow it to find new customers. The restaurant mainly attracts 3 types of customers: executives working in the neighborhood who come to lunch for lunch, women aged 35 to 45 serving the evening and foodies of Generation Y attracted by the trendy dishes.

Faced with such a varied panorama, how do you know who your ideal client is? To find out, go to step 2.

Step 2: Collect the information

This is the most important step in the process. It consists of compiling information from all sources related to the restaurant, using various methods:

Conduct surveys and have forms filled out

You can organize surveys on your digital channels (Facebook, Twitter, website) or offer more sophisticated forms in your email or SMS campaigns. The bottom line is that you can ask questions that help you get all categories of information.

Basic data: Civil status, number of children, studies, level of income, profession.

Information of a more qualitative nature: What are your tastes and your motivations? What guides you in your choice of a restaurant? What needs are you looking to meet in a restaurant? Who do you enjoy going out to eat with? How often do you go to a restaurant? Do you make reservations online? If so, on your mobile phone or on your computer?

Direct information about your establishment: What products do you like in our restaurant and which ones do you dislike? What do you think of the service? What would you change? Why do you prefer our restaurant to other establishments?

Leverage your database

For a while, in the file of each customer who has reserved one of your tables , write down information on his consumption , the type of drinks and dishes he prefers, the places he likes to sit, the products that he rejects, in short, all his preferences.

This way you will get to know the customers who are already frequenting your restaurant better. If you involve all of your staff, especially the servers, who are in constant contact with customers, you will be able to build up a valuable database that will help you find customers.

TheFork Manager software makes your job considerably easier. If you don’t have a customer database yet, click here .

Analyze your social networks

Facebook and Twitter’s marketing tools allow you to collect and analyze various data that provide you with additional information about your subscribed customers. Some data are elementary (age, sex, profession, address) and others are more complex: tastes, thematic interests and content that they consult the most . You might find that the majority of your followers are middle aged women who love cooking recipe videos . Ideal index to encourage you to create your own videos, publish them on your profiles and thus manage to find these customers.

Step 3: Create the profile that will allow you to find the perfect clients

Once all the information has been gathered, you can begin to create the character, his story, and the characteristics of his personality and consumption habits . A good method is to create the profile in several phases:

• First, determine who your customer is.
• Second, determine his goals and motivations.
• Third, determine how your restaurant can meet its consumption needs.

Example :Women. 39 years old. Married. Without children. Framework. She has average purchasing power and willingly spends in restaurants. Her favorite social network is Instagram. She posts photos of the products she consumes and of her travels. She goes to a restaurant 3 times a week. On weekdays, she goes there with her co-workers and on weekends, with her friends and her husband. She likes spacious and modern places. She enjoys the wine. She doesn’t hesitate to try new dishes. She enjoys personalized and prompt service. She sometimes books her restaurants online.

The final objective is to focus your marketing actions on a customer profile as detailed as possible in order to be able to find these customers and retain them. All this information also allows you to tailor the menu, prices, decoration, events and service to the needs of that perfect client who will return regularly to sit at your tables. It is a job that takes effort and determination, but the results are well worth it.