Alistair Marshall, owner of Alistair Marshall Consulting, has written the following great piece about the importance of having a useful website for any restaurant and provided some great tips for improving the site’s impact on the restaurants bottom line.
Diningverse is re-posting this information with Alistair’s permission… thank you Alistair!
Your website will be an essential marketing tool for your business. If done properly it can become one of your best ways of generating customer leads. In 2009 having a website is a “necessary evil” and a cost of doing business. As hospitality is an industry with a large number of youngsters brought up in a web world it shows them that you are a modern and up-to-date business. It is not necessary to have an expensive and flashy design, but it is more important to follow these necessary basics:
- Capture visitor data in exchange for a free voucher or download. For example, “Free bottle of house wine for couple’s dining on a Tuesday night”.
- A powerful headline to gain attention
- A body of text explaining “what’s in it for me?” This should include your unique selling points
- Proof of quality food or service – testimonials (Diningverse provides these automatically in form of patron recommendations)
- Guarantee – nothing to lose, take away the risk, offer to pay for the same meal in a similar local restaurant if they are unhappy
- Have a call to action or a postscript. Instruct your customer what to do next i.e. call for a booking, fill in the contact form etc. People actually like being told what to do next. If you are running a promotion ensure you have a cut off date, which provides urgency, or offer the prize only to the first 10 respondents to show scarcity.
- You might also consider putting on photographs of your team, particularly if they have a long period of service and are well known in the area. (Diningverse provides this through an intuitive photo albums functionality)
- Prices. Never be afraid to advertise your price. You know it is value for money. You don’t do cheap food! When you have promotions and special offers, include these on your homepage so that visitors can see what benefits you offer. This way your prospects will know exactly what to expect. Advertise your prices for a period of time to see if you receive more bookings. You maybe surprised how much faster people will call you if they know how much they are going to pay. (Diningverse allows creating and editing of multiple menus including pricing and item descriptions)
