Improving your restaurant or bar’s brand recognition is no easy task. The rewards, however, are high. Becoming an instantly recognizable local bar or restaurant comes with new customers, loyal regulars, and usually higher profits. To grow your business in a trendy and fun way, check out this guide on how to improve your bar or restaurant’s brand recognition.
Social Media
Social media is a great tool for businesses that want to grow their recognition with consumers. It’s basically free advertising if you’re savvy enough. Make sure to have active social media accounts specifically for your business—this means you can’t rely on your personal accounts. Your business social media accounts should post often, but not too often. Try to limit permanent posts to once a day, but feel free to post multiple times a day on temporary platforms, such as 24-hour-long stories.
Encourage your patrons to post about your restaurant or bar on social media. Try not to make it too obvious that you want them to post about your spot. Motivate them by posting your social media handles around the bar or tables so they can easily see it to tag the location in their posts. It also helps to have a place that is really “Instagram-able” or cute to take pictures in front of. It should be unique, relate to your restaurant or bar, and be bright and interesting so people are compelled to post their photos in front of it.
Bonus Tip: Interact with customers on social media by reposting posts you’re tagged in, commenting on posts with your geolocation tagged, and liking regulars’ photos and posts regularly.
Use what you’re good at
Find what works the best in your business and run with it. If you have great staff members, make sure your patrons have a chance to learn that. Give your most personable staff members front-of-house positions and make sure to stay staffed enough that they have time to give attention to each individual at your establishment. This is a larger initial cost, but well worth it—the payout is continuous business and a growing brand. Running with your business’s natural skills is a great way to ensure you’re getting tons of word-of-mouth recommendations, which are generally the most effective.
Be easy to spot
Your brand can’t become recognizable if people don’t have a chance to see it. Get a unique logo that correctly represents what your brand looks and feels like to your patrons. Then, put it everywhere. Display it outside your shop, inside, on the napkins, on the cups, and get some personalized sugar packets covered in your logo so people will take your logo on the go. Your to-go boxes and doggie bags should also have your logo slathered all over them. This way, every time a customer sees the logo, your brand and business will come to mind.
Decide your brand personality and be consistent
Who is your restaurant? This may seem like a strange question, because your business obviously is not a person, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t feel like one. People connect best with other people. Your restaurant or bar should have a consistent personality. For example, if your spot is young, bright, and fun, all of your communications should reflect that, too.
Customers enjoy knowing what to expect from your business. From the type of food and drinks to the specialties, atmosphere, and service, customers want to know what they’re getting themselves into. Think about how much easier it is to commit to eating dinner somewhere you’ve memorized the menu than it is to go to a new place.
Consistency is key to developing a brand personality. Keep your tone in communications the same throughout all methods. Your delivery drivers should be as outgoing and kind as your wait staff and your dishwashers should be just as eager to help guests as your bartenders are. Your website and social media accounts should also reflect this personality. A great way to keep your online presence consistent is by having one dedicated social media specialist run all your accounts and write all the posts.
When choosing a brand personality, make sure it lines up with your target consumer market base. If you’re looking to appeal to the people in their early 30s, you may want a more bubbly and trendy personality than if you’re targeting the senior division.
Bonus Tip: Once you’ve chosen a brand personality, stick to it! Changing too often can feel forced and even damage your relations with your current brand-loyal regulars.
Advertise
Even if your restaurant or bar is well-established and just going through a rebrand, make sure to keep advertising. Get your business’s logo out there in the community so people think of your establishment often. Target your ads to your desired customer base. Find out where your target hangs out, what they like to do in their spare time, and what they’re into. If you know they love coffee and typically work 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. jobs, try advertising at local coffee spots or on outdoor billboards, benches, or public transit to catch them on their way to and from work.
Don’t be afraid to use the relationships you and your staff have developed over time with regulars and community members. It’s okay to ask them to post online about your business, talk to their friends and neighbors about it, or simply recommend your restaurant to those who may be looking for a new spot to try in town.
Choose what you’ll be “known for”
A secret about the restaurant industry is that nobody is organically “known” for things anymore. Every place claims to have the best burgers or pancakes in the world, and people believe whichever one tastes best to them.
Find out what you want to focus on, whether it’s a specialty drink or a dish your chef is exceptionally skilled at making. Figure out what works and advertise it. After you claim you’re “well-known” for something, make sure it lives up to the created hype. Keep the buzz going by delivering on promises.
Bonus Tip: Be careful not to overpromise and underdeliver. If customers come in to try a famous milkshake and find out it’s soft serve blended in a cup, your reputation could suffer a serious hit.
