When your clients go to your restaurant, they are looking forward to enjoy good food, good service, and usually to share a good conversation with friends, colleagues, or family members.They expect to be taken care of, and to have a pleasant experience; what they don’t expect is to be surprised.
Usually, people like consistency when they are eating out, but this can play in your favor if you can provide them with an unexpected and enjoyable surprise.
It doesn’t have to be something amazing or expensive. It is more about the “wow” factor of a pleasant non-expected act from you that will make the eating experience memorable for your clients.
I will give you an example. A friend of mine, manager of an Italian restaurant located in Seattle bought a prosciutto to eat at home. He paid with his own money but asked the providers to deliver it to him at the restaurant.
Since he loves prosciutto, he started cutting the ham to get a taste of it. Then he though that it will be a good idea to share it with the people eating at the restaurant, so he asked one of the cooks to cut fine slices of prosciutto. He then offered it to the clients with compliments from the house.
Needless to say, his idea was a success and welcomed with open arms (or I guess mouths in this case). People were really happy to get a sample of prosciutto that they didn’t order, and specially didn’t have to pay for.
To make a long story short, this restaurant gives away now regularly complementary prosciutto to their best clients, and they just love it!
This is just an example of the many things that you can do to surprise your clients. Here you have some other ideas:
• Buy some flowers and give a flower to each woman in your restaurant.
• Buy very small bottles and fill them with extra virgin olive oil (you can buy it bulk at a very good price), then make a hole in one of your restaurant’s business cards and tie it with a ribbon (or ask one person from your staff to do it) around the neck o the bottle. Give one to your best customers for them to take home. They will love it.
By the way, you can also do this with any nice container filled with a special sauce that you use in your restaurant or some spices, etc. You get the idea.
• Create little snacks made with olives, dried fruits, nuts, or some other appetizer that your restaurant may serve. Give them to people who order a wine or a cocktail. They will happily eat them and will order more drinks from you.
• Print copies of two or three of your best recipes in a nice paper and give them to people ordering the dish. Put the name of your restaurant, your website, and the phone number. They will love it and keep it. And don’t worry about giving away your secrets. Most people are too lazy (or afraid) to cook even if they have the directions so you won’t be losing any business.
• Etc.
These are just a few ideas of things that you can do for little money to surprise your clients. You and your staff should come up with many more…
To conclude: here is an idea for you: Why don’t you establish the “Best idea for a surprise” weekly context and promote it among your employees? You can offer the winner a complementary meal, a movie ticket, or any other small reward. On exchange, you will get your staff involved in the process and very motivated to help you out.
It is a win-win situation for you, your business, your employees and most important, your clients. They will leave your place very happy and will be coming to your place again and again, looking forward to get surprised. As a bonus they will tell everybody how great it is to have dinner at your place!
Happy surprises,
Jose L Riesco
© Riesco Consulting Inc.
www.myrestaurantmarketing.com
Follow me in Twitter:www.twitter.com/jlriesco
I am working with marketing in Denmark and is searching for inspiration in the digital world.
ReplyDeleteThanks for inspiration.