How to Give Your Restaurant Advertising a Kick in the Pants

As a restaurateur, you know how critical advertising is to the success of your business. Without getting the word out about who you are and why people should come to your establishment, odds are there won’t be much traffic coming through your door. If your advertising efforts have been less than successful, take a look at the following three factors that make or break restaurant advertising to determine if the problem lies in one of these important areas.

Your Restaurant Advertising Must Be Memorable

The first step to a successful marketing campaign for your eatery is that you’ve got to find a way to make your advertisements memorable. Whether that means adopting a talking purple cow as your ‘mascot’, coming up with a catchy and memorable jingle, or associating your brand with an incredible story or person, you’ve got to find a way to make your business stick out from the crowd. Things that are humorous, bizarre, shocking, or amazing are what sticks in people’s minds most, so think about things that are appropriate for your brand along these lines and add them to your marketing campaigns.

People Need to be able to Relate to Your Restaurant Advertisements

The second critical factor in successful advertising campaigns is that your consumers need to be able to relate to your marketing messages. Take a moment to consider what emotional need your restaurant is best at filling. Is your restaurant great for busy people who just need to stop in for a quick rejuvenating lunch? Maybe it’s ideal for large families to get together. Perhaps your establishment has a relaxing, homey feel and appeals to those who want to feel comfortable while having someone take care of them. To use a well-known example, part of the reason Subway’s spokesperson, Jared Fogle, has made the company’s advertising campaigns so successful is because so many of us can relate to the struggle of losing weight.

Whatever you determine to be your restaurant’s strength at relating to people, build your marketing messages around that understanding. People will respond and remember you better when they can relate to the message they’ve seen.

Restaurant Advertising should make People Hungry

Last but not least, your restaurant’s advertisements need to make people hungry! This would seem obvious, but you’ve only got to look at your restaurant’s competition to see that a number of eateries are failing at this simple component. You want advertisements that make your customers’ mouths water, and succeeding at this goes beyond taking appetizing-looking pictures.

It also means demonstrating how enjoyable it is to eat the featured items. For example, take a picture of a gourmet chocolate cake and it may or may not entice some people to try it – but show that same cake being served to a diner who sticks her fork into the moist dessert and savors every morsel right down to the last crumb and people’s bellies start to rumble.

The most successful restaurant advertisements nail all three of these aspects on the head. The message is memorable, is something people can relate to, and makes their salivary glands go wild. If your marketing campaigns have been less than fruitful, odds are good that your messages are missing the mark on one or more of these three critical elements.

Tags: advertising, marketing strategies, relating to consumers, restaurant management