![Branding and Marketing Series Mini Course Part 3 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/mp_36681_0_0jpg.jpg)
It is said that if you can’t get your product to the customers when, where, and how they want it, they will simply buy a competing product. This is increasingly true especially in the service business where there are a lot of competitors. There is a restaurant open on every corner of the street and in order to differentiate your restaurant from the crowd, you need to have different marketing channels. The first benefit of having marketing channels is that it saves time and money. You will be able to attract the right type of customer in an efficient way. Rather than letting them find your restaurant by luck, you create an excellent image/brand of the restaurant so that the customers can associate themselves with that brand. Another benefit is that it helps in rapid distribution of products and easy access to new customers. Having the knowledge to understand the needs of the customers, predicting the inflow of customers on a certain day; supply chain management would be easy if those things are in place. The factors of channel selections are the type of customers, the type of products, channel partner capabilities, business environment as well as competing product’s marketing channels.Everyone knows that in order for a restaurant to be successful, the location has to be great, the food has to be great, the customer service has to be great and so on. However, the owners often miss out on the most important aspect of running a restaurant i.e. consistency. No matter how great the restaurant is, if the chef is switched every single week, the taste of the food won’t be consistent. Similarly, no matter how great the marketing strategy is, if the marketing message is not consistent on all advertising platforms, it creates confusion within the customers. There will be a mismatch between what the customer sees and what they get afterwards. Therefore, it is necessary to have a solid integrated marketing communication (IMC). In this modern world, customers check your restaurant online before even thinking of entering into the restaurant. Therefore, your restaurant needs to be updated consistently on new offers, new deals, loyalty membership cards, interesting menus, BOGOF and so on. If the marketing message is not tempting enough, people will not enter your restaurant. People think psychology and consumer behaviour has nothing to do with business but this is farther from the truth. It is important especially for a business to understand the consumer’s buying behaviour. We have already discussed how to segment target markets and create a USP for that target market. So, now we need to go one step deeper. Does our restaurant attract those types of customers and their buying decision? This question needs to be answered. If a restaurant is opened in a high-class location and targets people with higher socio-economic status, are you creating that type of environment inside the restaurant? If there is no car parking, then those target customers will not bother to come to your restaurant.In order to understand these concepts, there are several factors that influence consumer’s buying behaviour. First are situational factors such as social situation, time, reason for the purchase and mood. Second is personal factors which include personality, gender, age, stage of life, attitude and lifestyle. Moving along, there are psychological factors such as motivation, perception, learning and mental positioning. Last but not the least, there are societal factors that include culture, social class, opinion leaders and friends/families. There is a difference between a famous, well-established restaurant and an independent restaurant that have just opened weeks ago. That difference is in terms of brand awareness. People do not know about the recently opened restaurant. So, the question is how do we go from a newly established restaurant to a restaurant that is filled with people who love the food, the customer service, the location and everything.There are mainly four stages of customer experience. First is the pre-consumption phase where people do not know about your restaurant. We need to communicate our value proposition through brand awareness. We let them know about the type of restaurant, the types of food we serve, the location we are in, the opening and closing hours, the ambience and everything in between. Basically, we are trying to make the potential customers aware that we are in business and you are welcome to visit us in our restaurant.
hospitality expert 101
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurant Episode 19 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/mp_32128_0_0jpg.jpg)
Pricing is always a tricky subject. If we price our products too high, we risk losing customer demand whereas if we price them too low, we risk not making a profit at all. Therefore, there needs to be a fine line when it comes to pricing anything. That being said, there are specific steps that you can follow in order to help in your pricing framework. First is setting price objectives. Why are you pricing a product the way you are pricing it? In other words, what is the objective behind that pricing decision? Is it profit-oriented, sales-oriented, status quo and prestige oriented? Similarly, the second step is to estimate the demand accordingly. Establishing a premium restaurant with higher prices would mean that the demand will be less than that of a medium restaurant. Conversely, fast food restaurants will have a high demand due to the nature of the business. Then, we move on to determining the cost. What are the expenses like? Expenses include fixed assets such as furniture and kitchen supplies and interior decors as well as variable expenses like rent, salary, marketing cost and so on. Understanding the cost and then putting a profit margin on that cost is a better way to see whether the price will be competitive in the market or not. Then we also need to determine the pricing strategies that we want to use. We could either use a price skimming strategy where we raise the price from the start to cover up the investment cost or price penetration strategy which allows us to capture a lot of market share. Using cost plus pricing, leader pricing, price bundling and so on are all part of giving an incentive to the people in order to capture their attention. We can later give them offer and make price adjustments as needed. Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurant Episode 18 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/mp_30619_0_0jpg.jpg)
If you search on google about marketing and what marketing comprises, you are going to hear a lot about 4P’s. 4P’s are the fundamentals of marketing and it consists of, you guessed it, 4 P’s which are place, price, product and promotion. Let’s discuss it one by one. First comes the product. Restaurants sell foods and drinks and they are able to sustain themselves through these sales. If enough people come to the restaurant within a month and all of the expenses are covered, then the restaurant goes into profit. Then comes the place. Where you place your restaurant determines how expensive or cheap the rent is going to be. You need to do good marketing research before searching for a location. Opening a pork-styled restaurant in a neighbourhood of vegans is not going to work. We move on to the price. Price is determined by where the restaurant is located as well as various other factors. If your restaurant is opened in a high-class area, you can charge a premium price on the menu dishes. However, everything else should also live up to the potential such as excellent customer service, nice decor and ambience, ample parking space, great food quality and taste and so on. Finally, we come to promotion which basically means advertising. What are you doing to make sure that people know about your restaurant? Without advertising, your reach will be limited to your friends and families alongside people close to that area. Therefore, in order to reach more people, you need to heavily invest in marketing your brand. The other 4P’s especially in the service industry are People, Programming, Partnership and Physical Evidence. Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurant Episode 16 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/mp_29671_0_0jpg.jpg)
There is a difference between a famous, well-established restaurant and an independent restaurant that have just opened weeks ago. That difference is in terms of brand awareness. People do not know about the recently opened restaurant. So, the question is how do we go from a newly established restaurant to a restaurant that is filled with people who love the food, the customer service, the location and everything. There are mainly four stages of customer experience. First is the pre-consumption phase where people do not know about your restaurant. We need to communicate our value proposition through brand awareness. We let them know about the type of restaurant, the types of food we serve, the location we are in, the opening and closing hours, the ambience and everything in between. Basically, we are trying to make the potential customers aware that we are in business and you are welcome to visit us in our restaurant. Moving along to the second stage, which is the purchase phase. This is the time when the customers remember that ad that they saw of your restaurant. They decide to search more about the restaurant. How are the customer reviews? What’s the social media handle like? Is it car parking in the restaurant? What food do they serve and many more. In this stage, your restaurant should remain true to its value and showcase its value proposition in the best way possible. On the third stage, which is the consumption phase, these people actually come to your restaurant. They order food, maybe bring along some friends, have a good time and leave the restaurant. You as the restaurant owner need to make sure that their experience should be flawless from the time they enter the restaurant to the time they exit out of it. This means that the decor and the ambience must be on it, the waiting staff should behave nicely, the food should be warm and well-presented, the waiting time for the arrival of the food should not be too long and many more. The fourth stage is the post-consumption phase, where the customers have the option to either say that the restaurant was good and tag this restaurant on their social media or say that the restaurant was bad and the service was long, the waiter was rude, the music was too loud and so on. The response that you get from the customers is going to determine if the restaurant is going to stay in business for a long run or not. Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurant Episode 15 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/mp_29454_0_0jpg.jpg)
People think psychology and consumer behaviour has nothing to do with business but this is farther from the truth. It is important especially for a business to understand the consumer’s buying behaviour. We have already discussed how to segment target markets and create a USP for that target market. So, now we need to go one step deeper. Does our restaurant attract those types of customers and their buying decision? This question needs to be answered. If a restaurant is opened in a high-class location and targets people with higher socio-economic status, are you creating that type of environment inside the restaurant? If there is no car parking, then those target customers will not bother to come to your restaurant. In order to understand these concepts, there are several factors that influence consumer’s buying behaviour. First are situational factors such as social situation, time, reason for the purchase and mood. Second is personal factors which include personality, gender, age, stage of life, attitude and lifestyle. Moving along, there are psychological factors such as motivation, perception, learning and mental positioning. Last but not the least, there are societal factors that include culture, social class, opinion leaders and friends/families. Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurant Episode 13 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/mp_25631_0_0jpg.jpg)
It is said that if you can’t get your product to the customers when, where, and how they want it, they will simply buy a competing product. This is increasingly true especially in the service business where there are a lot of competitors. There is a restaurant open on every corner of the street and in order to differentiate your restaurant from the crowd, you need to have different marketing channels. The first benefit of having marketing channels is that it saves time and money. You will be able to attract the right type of customer in an efficient way. Rather than letting them find your restaurant by luck, you create an excellent image/brand of the restaurant so that the customers can associate themselves with that brand. Another benefit is that it helps in rapid distribution of products and easy access to new customers. Having the knowledge to understand the needs of the customers, predicting the inflow of customers on a certain day; supply chain management would be easy if those things are in place. The factors of channel selections are the type of customers, the type of products, channel partner capabilities, business environment as well as competing product’s marketing channels. Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurant Episode 12 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/mp_24970_0_0jpg.jpg)
Positioning is an expression of how a product with differentiation fills the need of a particular customer segment. If your restaurant does not stand out from the rest, it means that you do not have any positioning advantage. People have the freedom to go to any restaurant and the probability that they will come to you will be based purely on luck. Whereas, on the other hand, if we flip the scenario and your restaurant is one of a kind that serves authentic and special handmade Italian pizza with thin crust and flavorful toppings. Pizza lovers will definitely want to come to your restaurant for this experience and this is how you can position your restaurant as the best pizza restaurant in the town. Without positioning, people will lack the top-of-mind awareness of your restaurant. Even if they had seen an ad on social media or the billboard, people are not going to remember about that for very long. Customers don’t know how your product is different from others, and what needs should be fulfilled. Without positioning, your restaurant has to compete with every other restaurant in the town.Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/
![Branding & Marketing Series for Restaurants Episode 9 [Video]](https://video.getpvd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/mp_15592_0_0jpg.jpg)
Market segmentation analysis is basically the process of grouping customers into segments who share similar needs. It can be done in basically two approaches – either through common sense segmentation or data driven segmentation. One leans more towards being intuitive and another leaning towards customer survey and analytics. The step-by-step process of MS analysis goes like this:First step is to decide what not to segment. We might think like our restaurant is for everyone and that might even be the case. However, let me give you an example. If your restaurant is a family theme restaurant and the food is prepared accordingly, the seating is arranged accordingly, the music and the ambience is set accordingly. If in this restaurant, youngsters and college students start to hang out more, the whole restaurant will fall apart. This could mean two things. Either the area that the restaurant is opened has a lot of foot traffic from students which means there are colleges and universities nearby. Or, maybe the restaurant attracts more younger people as opposed to the customers we are targeting. Second step is to sketch your ideal segment. Whom do you want to target? Make a detailed customer profile which describes their age, gender, hobbies, income level, preferences and so on. The more precise it is, the easier it is to find those types of customers for the restaurant. Once you have an idea on whom to target, you should start collecting data.You can either hire a sales team to gather information around the locality or do it yourself. Prepare a questionnaire which contains questions which ends in Yes/No answer or rating from 1 to 5 scale. Have specific questions which will help you to understand the customers and their preferences. Then you start to go through that data and see whether there is a market for your target audience. For example: If you have a question on whether they prefer family restaurants over other restaurants, and the majority answered No. You might have to avoid opening a family theme restaurant as there isn’t much market for it. You can also decide to go against the data and open a family style restaurant that challenges the traditional notion.Moving on, we now have our hypothesis on what we want and also what the customers want. We will try to overlap the common theme and then work for the remaining ones. Suppose your target audience is office workers and a lot of office workers actually love the idea of having a restaurant which caters to them, this is a plus sign. You have just proven your hypothesis and now you can focus on other aspects such as lighting and seating and so on.Once you have selected the target segment, we start developing a marketing mix for that target segment. Marketing mix, commonly known as 4P’s, focuses around price, place, promotion and product. Having a target segment will make it easier to build upon these marketing mixes. For example: Knowing that our target market is office workers and business people, we can increase the prices of the food since they are willing to pay more than the average consumers. We can open restaurants near offices and corporations to increase foot traffic. We can promote our restaurants by introducing special offers and packages for office people. We can sell healthy food items knowing that office people need to work longer hours and need carbs. Follow me on social media:Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/hospitalityexpert101/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/hospitalityexpert101/YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4_1lKKUNWebsite – https://www.hospitalityexpert101.com/