Top 10 Restaurants Heaven Stories of 2011

 With 2011 coming to an end Restaurants Heaven takes a look of its most popular stories of the last 12 months. Below aer our top 10 stories of 2011 from restaurantsheaven.blogspot.com

1. Marbled Pumpkin Cheesecake
2. 10 Ways you can use QR codes to promote your restaurant business
3. Apps every restaurant owner should take advantage of
4. 10 Tips on how to WOW your restaurant's customers
5. How restaurants owners or managers can increase customer satisfaction
6. 3 Must have Facebook apps for your restaurant
7. How your restaurant can make a difference this Veterans Day
8. 11 Thanksgiving ideas for every restaurant to show your customers you care
9. 7 Tips on attracting new customers for your restaurant
10. 5 Steps to build successful private party and catering businesses

Happy New Year to all!

100 Marketing ideas for your restaurant Part II

 Learn how this 100 marketing ideas can put your restaurant on the right track. If you missed Part I you can read it here.

51. Become a guest speaker
52. Magazine ads
53. Radio spots
54. News worthy press releases
55. Organize charities
56. Food bank donations
57. Sponsor local teams
58. Club and local business association's memberships
59. Organize cooking classes
60. Well trained stuff
61. Guarantees
62. Coupons
63. Contests
64. Special events
65. Branded entertainment
66. Cooking workshops
67. Location
68. Video e-cards
69. Merchandise
70. White label companies
71. Vehicle advertising
72. Comment cards
73. Monthly promotions
74. Spying on your competition
75. QR codes
76. Landing page
77. Personalized cups, napkins, plates, to go bags, etc
78. Holiday marketing
79. Holiday menus
80. Organize wine classes
81. Offer taste classes
82. Offer free food or drink samples
83. Network in and outside your food industry
84. Send tips and advice bulletins to your customers
85. Write industry based book
86. Advertise on travel brochures and maps
87. Sponsor a portion of a freeway or highway
88. Offer your product in school or non-profit fund raisers
89. Team up with a non-competing business in your area to offer a package promotion
90. Be accessible
91. Start podcast
92. Create an annual award and publicize it
93. Get a memorable local or toll-free phone number
94.  Create window displays in locations away from your restaurant. Airports, hospitals, and large office buildings occasionally have display areas they rent to local businesses
95. Release your own food truck
96. Visit trade shows
97. Set trade show booth
98. Word-of-mouth promotions
99. Customers and employees testimonials
100. Satisfied customers

How to make your restaurant stand out this New Year's Eve

 To make your restaurant stand out this New Year's eve think outside the box. Here are a couple ideas that can help you put a twist on your restaurants' specials. Happy New Year to all!
1. Create a cooking kit of your most famous restaurant dessert or appetizer. You can give it out to your customers or sell them on your website.
2. Organize a cooking or mixicology class featuring New Year's eve specials.
3. Organize end of the year food donation drive for your community.
4. Hold a contest for the most creative edible ornaments or decorations for the New Year and reward the winner with a special New Year's eve dinner.
5. Offer free champagne at midnight or small door gift prizes to your customers.
6. Create and serve only New Years inspired dishes or drinks in certain colors such as gold, silver, or white.

100 Marketing ideas for your restaurant Part I

 As a restaurant owner you should be aware of all the marketing ideas around you which can be easily used to the advantage of your establishment. Here are a couple ideas to get you going on the right track. Notice how most than half of them are free.
1. Yourself and your stuff
2.. Marketing plan
3. Personalized calendars with your image or logo
4. Personalized envelopes or stamps
5. Business cards
6. Thank you cards
7. Personal messages or emails
8. Postcards
9. Flyers
10. Community bulletin boards
11. Outside signs
12. Street banners
13. Billboards
14. Window displays
15. Table placements
16. Door hangers
17. Well design website
18. Value story
19. Gift cards
20. E-gift cards
21. Newsletter
22. E-mail marketing
23. Direct marketing
24. Loyalty programs
25. Referral programs
26. Bounce back promotions
27. Text-messaging coupons
28. Facebook fan page
29. Twitter account
30. Linkedin account
31. Google + account
32. Business blog
33. Foursquare
34. Opentable
35. Google places
36. Yelp
37. Trip advisor
38. City Search
39. Urbanspoon
40. Zagat
41. Allmenus.com
42. Forums
43. Chat rooms
44. Articles
45. E-books
46. Webinars
46. Youtube
47. Viral marketing
48. Free seminars
49. Free consultations
50. E-mail list building
To be continued in Part II

10 Low cost restaurant marketing ideas for the Holiday season

 With the end of the year just around the corner, many restaurants have to be extra imaginative with their marketing efforts especially if they want to stay on top of their customers minds this Holiday season. To help you increase your restaurant sales and referrals, we have listed this ten proven low cost marketing ideas that can help any restaurant succeed this Holiday season.
1. Customize Holiday cards with your restaurant logo or pictures of your restaurant and your employees
2. Personalize envelopes or stamps with your restaurant image or logo
3. Personalize cookies or chocolate with your logo and serve or give out as a gift to your customers
4. Create a video e-card, incorporate a subtle use of your restaurant's products, and publish the e-card on your website, blog, twitter account, Facebook fan page, or your newsletter.
5. Create "31 days of your restaurant food specials" and feature a Holiday inspired dish each day
6. Make a real life or digital Christmas tree and decorate it with goodwill messages posted on snowflakes from your customers and stuff, make presents from your restaurant's products or merchandise, create edible ornaments, and if you have pictures of your customers taken through out the year hang them on the tree to remind your customers why they choose your restaurant
7. Make your own restaurant calendars and give them out to your customers as holiday gifts
8. Let your customers submit their favorite holiday recipes which you can publish on your website along side your own restaurant recipes.
9. Publish free downloadable "Restaurant Survival Guide" for your customers
10. Organize end of the year food donation drive for your community

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all our Followers, Fans, Users, and Lurkers!
We are thankful for all of you, all your feedback, and support!
Wishing you peace, joy, and goodwill this season!!!

How restaurants can avoid the Discounts trap

 With the holidays just around the corner, many seasoned restaurants tend to discount their services or products as a way of doing business, but for small and start up restaurants straight discounting is usually a ticket to financial disaster. Playing the discount game, usually means going into your own company every day to price yourself right out of business. To help you avoid the discounts trap, we have listed this three tips:
1. Know your margins at all times and look into lowering them where you can like negotiating better deals with your suppliers.
2. Add value instead of discounts. This can be as simple as providing incredible customer service to your guests.
3. Leverage your current resources and look for ways to increase your profit like expanding your delivery or catering services.
 Remember, don't fall into the trap of thinking that without discounts you won't have sales. Keep this tips in mind, and let other restaurants run themselves out of business.

6 Ways for restaurants to celebrate their customers this holiday season

 With only four days to Christmas and ten days left to the end of this year, it is only natural to look back and be thankful for all the amazing things 2011 has brought to your restaurant business. This time of the year, is the perfect time to show everyone who has contributed to your restaurant success, especially your customers, your appreciation. Here are some great ideas of how to celebrate your  customers this holiday season.
1. Spotlight your customers on your website, Facebook fan page, or your twitter account by posting pictures of different events you held during the year and your customers' participation in those events (with their permission of course). Thank your customers for their loyalty, repeat business, and support through out the year.
2. Enlist the help of famous local chef or a celebrity chef (if you can) and reward them with a private consultation or a private dinner prepared by the chef.
3. Offer tickets to a local winery where your customers can learn and try different wines.
4. Give out chef's table service.
5. Offer 1 year free subscription to Food and Wine magazine.
6. Give out a holiday inspired free Family meal to-go.
 There are many other ways to celebrate your customers this holiday season, so let your imagination run wild. Let us all remember this holiday season how to be thankful!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!

How to cut flank steak the right way

Learn how to cut flank the right way. The Cooking Club of America presents Chef Andrew Zimmern as he shows you his techniques of how to make the perfect cuts every time.

How your restaurant can turn daily deal buyers or bargain hunters into loyal customers

   They say that daily deal buyers or bargain hunters chase deals or deeply discounted offers, that usually they don't spend beyond their deal, and that as a restaurant owner who wants to keep the shirt on his back, you should stay away from such buyers. What if we tell you that you can capitalized on this trend with little or no competition? Find out how this 6 tips can help your restaurant turn daily deal buyers or bargain hunters into loyal customers.
1. Offer more than the perceived value of the deal.
2. Offer an invitation to your next sampling event to expose the customers to you other menu items.
3. Train your employees how to redeem daily deal coupons, how to upsell, and how to effectively promote your restaurant business.
3. Involve your new customers and ask for feedback on the given deal, what you could you have done better, or anything else you can think of that can help you gather useful data.
4. Offer email sign up for special deals like birthday dinner coupons, promotions, or discounts.
5. Send out your monthly restaurant newsletter to your new customers with useful information such as food articles, pictures of your new food menu items, or any other restaurant specials being offered for the month.
6. Once you had the opportunity to get to know your new clients, give them what they ask for just exceed their expectations.

3 Things every restaurant can learn from daily deal sites

Offen daily deal sites like Groupon and Livingsocial entice small business owners with the ability to reach large groups of prospective clients. Unfortunately,  altering traditional retail discounting can sometimes lead to unintended consequences. Learn how you can better protect and prepare your business by studying these 3 things which every restaurant can learn from daily deal sites:
1. Plan ahead- anticipating the cost of a social discount can be crucial for your restaurant success since daily deal offers can easily stress capacity. If for example you oversell your product or overbook your restaurant you risk to be operating on low margins which can lead to a financial loss.
2. Turn your daily deal clients into a full paying customers- have a step by step marketing plan in place from capturing customers demographic data, to emails, social media presences, and more.
3. Shop around for the best daily deal sites for your needs- you can't assume that one daily deal company is better than another. Instead find a platform that matches your restaurant's marketing goals. Daily Deal Media is a company that tracks close to 600 daily deal sites and how they perform which can be extremely helpful when you are making your decision.
  Social sales can be an important component especially to a small business market just keep in mind if you decide to give daily deal sites a shot to do your homework and to prepare accordingly.

Top 10 Hottest Menu Trends for 2012

 Learn what the National Restaurant Association found out after surveying nearly 1,800 professional chefs - members of the American Culinary Federation - on hot trends on restaurant menus in 2012. Local sourcing and children's nutrition are among the hottest trends.

10 Ways negative comments, posts, or reviews can be used to your restaurant's advantage

 Today our social driven society compels most restaurants to avoid any negative responses from customers and/or employees. Negative comments, post, or reviews are usually frown upon and perceived as damaging to a restaurant's reputation. However as unbelievable as it may sound, negative criticism can be used to a restaurant's advantage. Learn how your restaurant can take control and turn an unpleasant situation into a success story. Negative comments, posts, or reviews can:
1. Increase credibility which can minimize the risk of appearing superficial and pushy.
2. Increase customer engagement and readership which can offer more exposure to positive posts.
3. Create personal connections and dialogues with your customers.
4. Opportunity to improve products or customer service.
5. Opportunity to prevent any potential future problems.
6. Minimize employees' turnover.
7. Decrease employees' training expenses.
8. Increase customers' loyalty.
9. Increase restaurants' productivity.
10. Increase restaurants' profit.
  However keep in mind that too many negative posts just like anything in excess can be more harmful than helpful. Keeping diligence in delivery, response and editing if possible are highly recommended for a successful restaurant venture.

Affordable consumer research tools for restaurants

 When it comes to entering a new market, expanding, or launching a new product it is financially imperative to gauge customers' demand and feedback through market research. Until recently such service was extremely expensive for many restaurants. Fortunately today, we have the opportunity to take advantage of affordable research tools that can help any restaurant gather important and trustworthy market research data on targeted audience. Find out how your restaurant can take advantage of this service:
1. uSamp provides custom targeting as well as predefined consumer list with 6.5 million global panel members. You can target your audience by country, business-to-business, or a specific industry such as food. Results are provided in real time, so you can observe your data as it comes in.
2. AYTM allows you to create surveys on the go which can be send to your own list or AYTM panel of 4.5 million people. You can choose a targeting criteria such as gender, or geographic region, and you can include images and videos. Results come within 24 hours.
3. GutCheck enables you to conduct 30-minute one-on-one video interview with any of the 3.5 million members consumer panel. Targeting can be done by age and income, and results are usually ready in 48 hours.
4. Zoomerang is another well known research tool that allows surveying your own list as well as their 2 million panel members using more than 500 targeting criteria.
5. SurveyMonkey is best known for enabling you to send online surveys to your own list, but it also offers custom surveys which can be send to SurveyMonkey panel of hundred of thousands responders.
 Finally keep in mind, the most important thing will be to determine which research tool will best suit your restaurant, so before you use any of the services listed test each tool to compare cost effectiveness.

How restaurants can create personal connections with customers

 Nowadays it is not always enough to create and promote your restaurant product and service. The most successful restaurant ventures are the ones that connect with their customers on a personal level, as it is known people like to buy from people they like. In this six tips guide, we reveal how to create personal customers' connections at your own restaurant.
1. Get to know your customers- using your customers names, asking about details they shared in previous conversations, or just remembering how your customers take their tea, or what temperature they like their stakes can make a world of difference.
2. Ask questions- before you launch into a hard sell, take the time to ask questions. It's easier to show your customers you can fulfil their needs if you know what they like or what they are looking for.
3. Wow your customers- to stand out from the competition and win your customers business you have to hook them somehow. You can consider for example sending a "Thank you" note for choosing your restaurant for their special occasion, and also take the opportunity and invite them back to celebrate with you.
4. Reveal something about yourself as a restaurant owner or your establishment that customers can relate to.
5. Listen to your customers- listen to what your customers have to say about your restaurant or your product.
6. Have patience- making lasting personal connection with customers can take time. Arm yourself with patience, properly train your stuff on your products and services, and never stop improving.

How to temper chocolate the right way

 Learn how to temper chocolate the right way for dipping any of your favorite fruits, cookies, pretzels, and more, demonstrated by chef instructor Peter Greweling from The Culinary Institute of America.

11 Traits to a successful restaurant leader

  Most restaurant owners work hard on their concepts, services, or finances, but they don't think much when it comes to leading their own employees. It is true successfully guiding a team through the ups and downs of running a restaurant can be one of the greatest challenges a small-business owner can face. Leadership is one of the areas that many restaurant entrepreneurs tend to overlook, but as it turns out anyone with determination can develop such qualities. Learn how this 11 tips can guide you to develop successful restaurant leader traits.
1. Make yourself available to your employees, this will enhance employee's self-expression
2. Treat your employees as you want to be treated which can easily build company's loyalty, lead to low cost training, and good will for your company
3. Listen- be at all times open to listen to your customers and employees, so you can learn more about how to serve them
4. Embrace changes
5. Be your own brand ambassador- when you believe and you are excited about your products and/or company, your employees will be excited too
6. Challenge and engage your team
7. Communicate effectively
8.Know your obstacles and when to take risk
9. Learn how to delegate responsibilities
10. Credit your employees for the work they do
11. Believe in your team and help them win