Essential Email Metrics for Effective Marketing Campaigns

One of the factors that make email marketing campaigns so valuable is the fact that it is one of the easiest forms of marketing to get clear, concise measurements on whether or not your campaign is working. The more concise your measurements, the more able you are to fine tune your marketing efforts, which increases the return on your investment. Here are the essential email metrics you need to pay attention to in order to determine how well your email campaign is serving its intended purpose.

How Deliverable are Your Emails? Are They Getting Bounced or Junked?

The first essential email metric to examine is your deliverability. If a good percentage of your messages are getting blocked, bounced, or worse, thrown in the spam folder, it’s time to change your tactics. There are a variety of reasons that this could be happening, and the first place to look is the email service providers that your email contacts are using. (Email service providers are companies like Google Mail, Yahoo Mail, Hotmail, MSN, etc.)

An easy way to check to see if there is a problem with a particular email service provider is to create ‘seed’ email address accounts at each of them. Then, the next time you send out a newsletter, include your seeds to each of the email service providers and log in after the send out to see if your message made it safely to the inbox.

If your message was blocked or bounced, it’s not a bad idea to contact that email service provider to ask why. In some instances, you can even get a ‘Certified Sender’ status directly from the email service provider which will guarantee that your messages get safely through. If your newsletter is getting thrown in the spam folder, it might have more to do with your content than the email provider. We’ll talk more about that in the spam section.

How Often Are Your Emails Getting Opened? How Many People Unsubscribe?

The next two telling metrics are your open rate and your unsubscribe rate. Now, the fact that someone opened your email doesn’t necessarily guarantee that they actually read it, but it does give you other valuable insights. How well your subject line is working is one such example, and it can be very helpful to compare open rates between different versions of the same newsletter to see which converts more customers.

The type of people who are unsubscribing from your list can provide you with valuable insight as well and it’s important to pay attention to who is removing themselves from your list. Is it your most valuable subscribers? All women? Are they all from one demographic? Try to pinpoint trends and see if you can shift your email marketing campaigns accordingly.

Help! I’m Getting Spam Complaints and My Emails Are Getting Junked!

If your emails are ending up in the spam folder more often than not, there are a variety of factors that could be coming into play. The first no-no is buying purchased email lists – this is almost a surefire way to land in the spam folder AND lose your money. Emails also get junked if they contain too many risky words like ‘buy’, ‘free’, ‘purchase’, ‘order’, etc., which trigger the spam filter. Emails that contain only one image often land in spam country, as do emails with too many exclamation points in the title.

Bottom line: keep your emails small in size and rich with content, and don’t go overboard with the gimmicks. Using a trusted email service provider to send out messages goes a long way as well.

All in all, the metrics you get out of running email campaigns can provide you with really valuable insight about how to best make your next move. Keeping an eye on these essential statistics will give you a clear picture of your revenue and profitability, as well as a better understanding of what is truly affecting your bottom line.

Beating the Battle of Rising Food Costs

The rising cost of food and the fuel that is required to transport it has had a big impact on restaurateurs around the country. Everyone is looking for ways to buckle down and trim back without sacrificing the quality of goods and services that is offered. It’s a tricky balance. Fortunately, there are several easy things you can do to help beat the battle of rising food and fuel costs. Here are a few examples:

Use a Purchasing Consultant to Get the Best Vendor Price

With the economy being the way that it is, it only makes sense to shop around for the best deal you can get from vendors. Unfortunately, this task can be quite time consuming. You can spend hours browsing around for the right deal and the task gets more complicated because you still have to keep a hawk’s eye out for hidden price increases from your existing vendors.

Many businesses have found that it is often more cost effective simply to hire a purchasing consultant to do comparison shopping for all controllable costs – everything from your dry goods and china to the food itself. It’s often better to hire a consultant instead of designating a staff member for this task as well, because consultants usually operate on a fixed cost monthly retainer.

Reduce Fuel Surcharges by Storing more Goods

In an effort to combat their own rising costs, many vendors have started adding a fuel charge to delivery orders – usually in the ballpark of $2-$4 per delivery. Over the course of any given year, this can amount to $1000’s of extra dollars. One method of dealing with this is to simply combine your delivery orders into one shipment, so you only pay one fee.

Another method is to create a larger storage space so that you don’t have to order new shipments as often. Of course, you can also always designate a runner to pick up the orders in-house – although that option still has you paying fuel.

Further Reduce Fuel Costs and Pay Less Money to Boot

Another smart strategy that many restaurant owners have begun to employ is to get their goods from local vendors. In many instances, a local vendor will actually be able to provide lower prices – especially if you are able to pay them sooner rather than later. Many vendors operate on a 90 day payment policy. Local vendors will often jump at an offer to receive payment in say…14 days in exchange for giving you a better price on the goods. Plus, the fact that the vendors are nearby often further reduces or even eliminates fuel-related delivery fees and has the added bonus of supporting your local economy, which is good for everyone.

These are just a few of several creative strategies restaurant owners are employing to combat the battle of rising food and fuel costs. There are, of course, many more options that will help you achieve the same goal. The key is to look for creative solutions, reduce, reuse, and to keep a sharp eye on what is working and what needs improvement.

How to Appeal to the Weight-Loss Crowd with Healthy Menu Items after the New Year

While having healthy items on your menus has become increasingly important no matter what time of year it is, the New Year is a particularly good time to blast your healthy options with extra marketing campaigns. The reason for this is that weight loss continues to be the number one resolution that everyone makes when they set their aspirations to start the New Year off right.

Therefore, it makes sense to highlight your healthy eating choices more than ever while the weight loss resolution is still fresh in everyone’s mind. Here are some key strategies you can employ to catch this demographic while it’s hot.

Calorie Counting, ‘Heart Smart’ Choices, and Low Carb Menu Options

Everyone has a different technique when it comes to weight loss. While listing the amount of calories in the food you are serving is one sure-fire way to catch the attention of the weight-loss crowd, it’s definitely not the only way. Many people who would like to lose weight aren’t as concerned about the amount of calories as they are simply about making healthy choices. Therefore, offering menu items that are healthy for the heart or simply even low in carbohydrates can be equally effective in catching the attention of people who are trying to make better choices for themselves.

Offer Smaller Portions and Options to Make Healthier Choices

Another effective strategy to entice the weight loss crowd is simply to offer smaller portion sizes and the option to make healthier choices when they order. For example, allow customers the option to substitute salads instead of fries or to buy a half plate of pasta instead of a full one. These little customization options don’t cost you anything but go a long way toward building a good relationship with your consumers.

Such choices make the customer feel like you really care about meeting their expectations and values. They get to leave feeling like they were able to meet their own healthy resolutions by supporting your establishment, and are far more likely to return as a result.

Don’t Forget about Healthy Menu Options for the Kids

As obesity becomes an ever increasing problem in our country, more and more parents are concerned about the nutritional value of what they are feeding their kids. As such, it makes sense as a restaurant owner to make health and nutrition information available to parents who want to know. Adding a ‘healthy kid’s menu’ can also be a particularly powerful marketing ploy to bring health conscious parents into your restaurant, and it is well known that parents are some of the best word-of-mouth advertisers you can ask for!

All in all, appealing to the weight loss crowd doesn’t have to be particularly difficult. You’ve probably already got several menu items that fall under the healthy eating category. Your only real job is getting the word out about your healthy options now, while dropping a few pounds is still at the top of everyone’s to-do list!

Sustainable Seafood: How Demonstrating Your Commitment to Integrity can Increase Your Revenue

As people become more environmentally aware of the impact their choices make, sustainably harvested seafood has come under the spotlight in restaurants around the country. Numerous fish species have been harvested to the point of decimation, and fisherman around the globe have come under scrutiny for their unsustainable practices.

As a result, people want fresh seafood and they want to know where it’s coming from before they buy. As such, it is a smart move on the part of every restaurant owner who serves fish and other types of seafood to not only ensure that there are sustainable species on their menus, but also to educate their servers and wait staff accordingly.

Educated Servers = More Sales, Happier Seafood Customers

One of the simplest ways to build your reputation (and thereby increase your revenue) in relation to seafood, is to educate your servers so that they can talk intelligently to customers about the seafood they are serving. With rapidly changing menus and a sea of information about the best choices in seafood, people are really confused about what is the right way to go.

Therefore, it’s more important than ever to demonstrate the quality of what you are serving to your customers and the care that you have taken in selecting it. The only way to do that is to provide your servers with the seafood education they need to adequately address consumer concerns.

Sustainable Seafood Programs Demonstrate Integrity

There are a variety of sustainable seafood programs that restaurant owners can participate in to ensure that they are offering ocean-friendly species to customers. The Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch is one such program. Partners of the Seafood Watch commit to removing all species from the Watch’s ‘avoid’ list from their menus as well as educating their servers about ocean-friendly seafood.

This organization (as well as few others) also has a nice Power Point presentation that they will send individuals for free which details species currently on the Watch list, if you’re interested in seeing how your menu compares.

Sustainable AND Local Seafood Make an Unbeatable Combination

While it’s important to avoid species of fish whose populations cannot be harvested sustainably, it’s equally important to select species of fish that are as local as possible. Locally harvested seafood not only has less environmental impact, but it also gives you the ability to build your good reputation further by supporting the local community.

You’d be amazed how much of a draw fresh, local, sustainably harvested seafood can create for your establishment. By making these kinds of changes, you are making a commitment to integrity – which goes a long way toward making your business stand out from amongst the crowd and increasing your revenue.

By investing in education for your servers about ocean-friendly seafood, you are ensuring that customers are aware of your environmentally conscious efforts to be an establishment that operates with integrity. Making this kind of commitment further increases the chances that those customers will help you spread the word about your eco-conscious, locally sourced menu.

Seaweed in the Restaurant

When most people think of seaweed, they picture wraps of nori around a sushi roll and leave it at that. But actually, there are many types of “sea vegetables,” each with distinct and versatile uses. Chefs around the country are getting creative with these multipurpose greens (or reds, or browns as the case may be), and customers are loving it.

Seaweed has Excellent Nutritional Value

Although there are many types of seaweeds, each with distinctive taste and texture, all forms of edible seaweed are high in nutritional value with many of the same benefits as land vegetables. Most seaweed is high in essential amino acids as well as vitamins A and C. They are also one of the few vegetable sources for vitamin B-12. Seaweeds are also rich in potassium, iron, calcium, iodine, and magnesium due to the fact that these minerals are concentrated in sea water.

Seaweed has Health and Medicinal Value as Well

Seaweed has many medicinal and health benefits as well. It has long been used as a healthy substitute for salt and has recently been touted as useful for weight control.  When eaten as part of a meal, seaweed can help regulate and balance blood sugar levels because it is a soluble fiber which helps to slow the rate of digestion.

Seaweed has also shown anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory effects on animals, and numerous individuals have used it to reduce or eliminate the amount of medication needed to manage thyroid problems.

What are the Best Types of Seaweed to Use?

The six most commonly used seaweeds in restaurants are wakame, nori, kombu, dulse, sea beans, and Irish moss. Also known as sea mustard, wakame is the most common seaweed used in miso soup. It has a salty-sweet zest and swells up significantly when soaked in water, so a little goes a long way. It is commonly known as the ‘woman’s seaweed’ because it is loaded with osteoporosis-preventing calcium and magnesium and acts as a diuretic which helps to reduce bloating.

Nori is most commonly used to wrap sushi and seafood, but it can also be chopped up into little bits to flavor soup, casseroles, rice, and grains. Nori is one of the richest sources of protein amongst marine flora, and one sheet has as much fiber as a cup of spinach and more omega-3 fatty acids than a cup of avocado.

Kombu is a leafy kelp with a full-bodied, savory flavor. It is most commonly used to make dashi broth, a common stock base for many traditional Japanese dishes. It is a prized source of iodine and alginic acid which helps break down tough cellulose fiber and make foods more digestible.

Dulse or dillisk is a red algae that is often eaten dried and uncooked though it can also be added to soups, casseroles, and salads to enhance flavor. Flash frying chunks of dulse is a quick and easy way to create delicious seaweed crisps that can be used as pre-dinner appetizers.

Sea beans or sea asparagus has a bright green appearance and firm texture. It can be used raw, blanched, or boiled to add a crunchy, sea-salt flavor to food and is especially tasty in meat or fish dishes.

Last but not least, Irish moss is used as a clarifying agent for beer. If soaked, it can also act as a binding agent for sweets. In Scotland and Ireland, it’s strained to make a delicious tapioca-style dessert.

As you can see, seaweeds are an incredibly versatile and multifunctional source of food. It’s no wonder restaurantsaround the country are finding creative ways to put it to use!

Understanding the Gluten-Free Diner

People who are born with a food allergy or intolerance or develop one later in life often approach dining out with a certain amount of trepidation. This fear is well justified considering that accidental consumption of the offending substance can cause serious illness and even death. Gluten allergies, in particular, can be especially difficult to manage.  As a restaurateur, it’s important to understand the needs of your gluten-free customers and to provide thorough training to your employees to avoid mishaps.

Wheat Allergies, Gluten Sensitivities and Celiac Disease – What’s the Difference?

Allergies and intolerances come in many different forms, and one of the first things to realize about gluten is that gluten intolerance and wheat allergies don’t always go hand in hand. In fact, many diners who are allergic to wheat can actually eat several other types of high-gluten grains, such as barley and rye, without problems.

Celiac disease is a lifelong autoimmune disorder that damages and inflames the lining of the small intestine. Diners with this condition must avoid gluten at all costs or suffer severe health repercussions.  These individuals are highly sensitive to even the tiniest amount of gluten, and along with avoiding likely suspects such as beer, pizza, and bread, they are susceptible to gluten cross-contamination from places like cutting boards and fryers.

Although gluten intolerance or sensitivity is not the same thing as Celiac disease, the symptoms are similar and individuals with gluten sensitivity often have to follow the same type of diet. Unlike Celiac patients, however, those with gluten intolerance can sometimes consume gluten – depending on their level of sensitivity.

Keeping the Monkey Wrench Out of the Gears by Training Employees about Gluten Allergies

While it’s important to train employees to take gluten allergies seriously in order to avoid mishaps with customers, it’s also important to be able to accommodate gluten-free diners easily without throwing a wrench in the gears of your operation. Restaurants serve hundreds of plates a day, and the only way to ensure that a gluten-free request does not disrupt the flow is to train employees well about how to handle the request. Many restaurants do this by creating a ‘gluten-free’ station to avoid cross-contamination and by designating one employee to be in charge of cooking the gluten-free food to ensure quality.

Creating Foods that Gluten-Free Diners Love

Most people with gluten allergies have given up breads, pastas, and fried foods as a lost cause long ago – and usually, not by choice. As a result, restaurants have a unique opportunity to treat gluten-free customers by providing them with the opportunity to eat gluten-free variants of these types of food.

For example, a little experimenting with a mix of white and brown rice flour, tapioca flour, and potato starch can yield crispy, crunchy, and delicious fried chicken that you can’t even tell is gluten-free.

Thanks to the rising awareness of gluten allergies, there are tons of delicious, gluten-free recipes out there. A little experimentation and a commitment to meeting the needs of your gluten-free customers can make all the difference in how often this demographic of diner frequents your establishment.

Why Restaurants Need Restaurant Management Groups

Achieving success in the food service industry doesn’t happen overnight, and it can be especially challenging into today’s economic environment. Many restaurant owners are struggling to make ends meet and even those managing well enough on their own can occasionally benefit from assistance. That’s where restaurant management groups come in – to provide whatever kind of assistance is needed to help you achieve success in the restaurant industry.

Restaurant Assessment and Consulting Services

Every aspect of your business affects the bottom line, and there are always ways to improve your operation so that it is more efficient and successful.  Areas where you can receive consultation assistance and advice include everything from changes to your décor or your menu to advice about your operations, profitability, and risk management.

You can get assistance creating marketing strategies, doing market research or positioning your brand, receive extensive assessments targeting operational areas in need of improvement, or even develop strategies that lower employee turnover by making your business a better, safer place to work.

If you’re considering franchising your restaurant or simply expanding to new locations, restaurant management groups can help you with your development and implementation strategy there as well, further rounding out the extensive list of positives to working with a restaurant management group. No matter which facet of your business you’d like to address, restaurant management groups can provide you with the expert assessment and consultation services that you need.

Assistance and Advisement for Matters of the Bank and Court

The kind of assistance you can receive from restaurant management groups isn’t limited to operational assessment and consultation. In fact, it’s dealing with troubling financial or legal matters that end up bringing businesses to a management group’s door more than anything. This is the case for good reason. A restaurant management group can provide you with such services as court appointed receivers, bankruptcy advisors, examiners and trustees, borrower analytics, and due diligence lender and acquisition services as well.

Turnaround Management Specifically Designed for the Restaurant Industry

Many business owners and executives don’t seek assistance until the situation is dire, and it’s at this point that the business needs more than consultation and advice – it needs full scale turnaround management.  The most effective way to do this is to take a comprehensive, bottom-up approach, strategically identifying and eliminating the factors that are inhibiting your business’s success. This type of comprehensive turnaround management is perhaps one of the most important services a restaurant management group can offer.

Furthermore, there are many turnaround management companies out there, but few who specialize exclusively in food service operations. Because the factors that affect the food service industry are unique, it’s of utmost importance to be working with management teams who specialize in all areas of food service operation.

Whether you’re a restaurant owner who just needs a little advice or a financial executive worried about a distressing restaurant obligation, restaurant management groups are the expertise you want to source. You’d be surprised how effective implementing just the right changes to your operations can be!

What Today’s Consumer Wants to See in a Restaurant

As consumers become more conscientious about their costs, their health, and their sources of food, restaurants have to adapt accordingly or suffer the consequences. Today’s consumer expects far more from restaurants in terms of quality and value as compared to earlier eras. While a desire for lower cost remains the number one area where consumers would like to see improvements in restaurants, there are several other features today’s customer looks for in a dining establishment.

Greater Variety of Healthier Items

As understanding of how diet affects lifestyle grows, people are naturally looking for healthier ways to eat, and this includes the selections they make when eating out. As a restaurant there are several easy ways to accommodate this desire. Start by adding a section to your menu which features healthy items and provide some information about what makes it healthy (under X calories, heart smart, low-carb, etc.).  It can be difficult to know what to eat when you’re trying to change your diet, and customers really appreciate being able to choose from a ready-made list of options.

Another way to accommodate the healthy aspirations of your customers is to allow healthier substitutions for menu items – salad instead of fries, wheat or wholegrain bread instead of white, steamed vegetables instead of mashed potatoes – you get the idea. If you can do this without having to charge the customer for it, all the better.

Smaller Portions, Higher Quality Food and Ingredients

The next two areas that consumers would like to see restaurants improve have to do with the quality of the foods, ingredients used, and the ability to have the option for smaller portions. While the desire to have higher quality food and ingredients could be a result of the general move toward healthier eating we just discussed, it also has to do with the desire to experience a higher quality meal than what one might cook at home.

Higher quality food is generally also higher in nutrient value, which further appeals to the healthy eating crowd. Plus, customers are generally willing to pay more for a meal if they know that what they are getting is of high quality.

The ability to choose smaller portion sizes is another common area consumers would like to see restaurants improve. Fortunately, this one is fairly easy to implement (it’s no more difficult to load a plate with two scoops of pasta than it is three and charge less accordingly), and the customer responds well to having this choice available.

More Locally Sourced and Local Food Options

Featuring local food options is always well received, even more so if those options were cooked using locally sourced ingredients. Getting your produce locally is an excellent way to reduce the cost of transport and support the local community while offering fresher goods. People’s environmental conscientiousness has risen in tandem with their awareness of healthier choices, and taking a ‘local approach’ can be a powerful way to appeal to this consciousness.

While some of these changes will take some effort, others can be implemented today with little or no cost. With consumers eating out less and being more deliberate in their choices when they do, recognizing and adapting to their changing needs is critical to your restaurant’s success.

How to Lure Travelers to Your Restaurant, and Why You Want ‘Em

While growth in the domestic travel sector was slow but steady in 2012, international travel to the U.S.  flourished with international visitors spending around 100 billion dollars on tourism related goods and services, including restaurants.  According to the National Restaurant Association, international and domestic travelers account for as much as 40% of fine dining restaurant sales and 20% of casual dining sales, underscoring the need for proprietors in these sectors to make sure that their establishments are on the traveler’s radar.

Get in the Media to Grab Attention

Getting your business in media that travelers will see is an important way to bring them in to you restaurant. Obviously you can pay for advertisements to achieve this goal, but there are several free ways to generate publicity as well.

For instance, participating in major food festivals, competitions, and restaurant awards are all great ways to get free publicity and build your business’s reputation at the same time. Similarly, hosting charity events generates a lot of media attention and provides an opportunity for your establishment to demonstrate its good-will and commitment to serve the community.

Another great way to get in the news and attract visitors is to provide a novelty of some sort. This could be featuring local dishes, being the only restaurant to offer a particular kind of food, providing a unique atmosphere, or even taking a niche-market approach such as having only fresh or organic produce. The key is to make your establishment stand out somehow by featuring something that is newsworthy and novel enough to make travelers seek out the experience.

List Your Restaurant with Destination Management Companies, Travel Websites, and Visitors’ Bureaus

Getting your restaurant listed in as many places as possible is another important technique to bring in travelers. Many restaurants utilize what is known as destination management companies, or DCMs, to reach out to international visitors. Listing your business with travel websites, concierge services in your area, and local visitors’ bureaus are also effective approaches which can yield a large potential return for your efforts.

Networking with businesses that deal regularly with travelers is a great way to build relationships and a positive reputation as well. Not only do you have an excuse to periodically drop in and leave gift certificates or info, but the concierges and bureau workers you encounter will also be more likely to personally recommend your business if you take the time to build a relationship with them.

Optimize Your Social Media and Online Presence

Having a strong online presence is important in today’s era regardless of the customer demographic you’re targeting, but it is even more critical if you’re trying to attract travelers.  The odds are pretty good that those travelers will be searching online for places to eat in the area that they are staying and will be relying almost solely on online information and reviews to make a decision.

Thus, it is critical that your website is optimized so that it shows up in search results for its particular food and service category.  Similarly, it’s important that you have positive reviews for your restaurant available on major review sites. Your publicity and networking efforts will pay off here too as two of the factors determining search engine rank are the number of links and the amount of ‘buzz’ there is for your establishment from exterior sources.

Great dining experiences are one of the pleasures that most travelers seek out when they visit a new location. As such, it makes a lot of sense as a restaurant owner to target this lucrative group!

Leveraging Holidays and Special Occasions to Boost Sales

Holidays and special occasions such as graduation parties, birthdays, and weddings represent special opportunities for restaurants to significantly boost their sales. Whether you offer full-scale, private party catering or simply provide easily available digital gift cards, offering promotions that parallel with holidays and special occasions is a savvy marketing technique worthy of pursuit.

In-House Catering for Large Groups

One method many restaurants use to diversify their revenue streams and tap into the holiday cash flow is to cater to and host large groups of people in-house. This can be done either by sectioning off a portion of your establishment or by making it available off-hours for private rental.

While it’s true that space for meeting and eating is popular any time of year, it is especially sought after during the holidays. Businesses and individuals alike are looking for a place to host their holiday functions, and it would be folly not to market to those groups if it is within your capability to do so.

Cater for Private Parties, Offer Extended Holiday Delivery Hours

As more and more people entertain at home, restaurants have to shift the way that they offer service. In-home, private catering is in high demand, especially during holidays and special occasions. One method of increasing sales for private catering is to station a catering representative at the door of your establishment to greet guests, hand out menus and promotional materials, and gather business cards. Encourage guests to sign up for catering service early by offering discounts and incentives for doing so.

Extending your holiday delivery hours is another method of tapping into increased holiday sales.  Many people who may not be interested in full-scale catering might instead be interested in having food for their holiday feast delivered right to their door. Extending your delivery hours during the holidays can be a simple way to accommodate that desire.

Gift Cards Mean Business

Gift cards are an additional way to tap into holiday sales and are especially appealing to last-minute shoppers. It is estimated that approximately 5 billion dollars was loaded onto restaurant gift cards across all sectors in 2011. Since gift cards are one of the most requested holiday gifts, creating a holiday gift card incentive program is a smart way for restaurants to tap into that market.

Further illustrating the viability of using gift cards to leverage holiday sales is the fact that gift cards can now be offered digitally. This means that customers can instantly receive the gift through their mobile phones, email, or social media creating the perfect last minute gift. Digital gift cards are also nice because they can be promoted long after the window for booking holiday parties or buying the physical gift cards has closed.

All of these techniques can help diversify your income stream and leverage an increase in holiday sales. Offering carefully timed holiday promotions along with compelling incentives that encourage customers to buy or book in advance is a smart way to ensure that  your business receives a piece of the proverbial holiday pie.