"Before you begin marketing through a VIP Club, you need
to take a step back and look at your restaurant. Make sure
that you are ready for increased business. Don't attempt to
market your restaurant unless you have above average food
and service. Good marketing can actually put a restaurant
that provides poor food and service out of business faster
because more people will have a poor dining experience,
and the negative word-of-mouth will cause them to fail
faster than if they do not market at all," says Brent Davis,
Director of Coaching Services for
RestaurantMarketingGroup.org (RMG) a company
that specializes in helping restaurants to build sound,
trackable marketing systems through its easy-to-use
software, "How-To" marketing manuals and personalized
coaching.
Gathering the Data:
Once you have taken an internal inventory and feel good
about the food and service that you provide, it's time to
start using and building your database of existing
customers. Remember that in most restaurants 30 percent
of the customers are bringing in 70 percent of the business.
For the sake of our discussion, let's say that Joe's Family
Diner has 10,000 customers a month. That's 322 customers
each day. Seventy percent of the diner's monthly customers
would be 7,000. If the restaurant's VIP Club marketing
creates only one more visit per year per customer at
an average check of $25, the volume will increase by
$175,000 per year or $14,538 a month and that's with only
one extra visit per existing customer per year. You can see
why it's important to go after additional customer visits.
"Don't forget that your existing customers are your
neighbors. A VIP Club enables you to market within your
neighborhood to existing customers. It's permission based
and therefore considerably more effective than if you did a
blanket coupon offer to all of your neighbors. These are
folks who know and frequent your restaurant; they took the
time to fill out a VIP card and have shared personal
information with you," says Davis.
"VIP Clubs are a great way to build customer loyalty. Always
give a thank you reward bonus for joining the club. We
recommend that the offers go out by email or regular mail
within 72 hours after signing up. The offer should be
without any strings attached. I like to suggest that the offer
be for a dollar amount. A flat $15.00 or $10.00 amount
could be enough depending on your guest check average.
You could give a FREE, dinner with a $10 or $15 limit. Give
them an offer they can use on anything they want. The
offer is now valuable and they feel compelled to use it,"
says Teresa Horn, RMG Marketing Program Development
Specialist.
To enjoy the greatest return on your VIP Club enrollment
campaign, you should train your employees so that they
understand everything about the VIP Club. Have a contest
and give prizes to the employees who sign up the most
customers. Place VIP Club displays and sign-up cards in very
high-traffic, highly visible areas. Use pre-printed "Post-It"
pad messages and put them on your menus so that your
customers and employees will be reminded to fill them out.
Always emphasize the benefits of VIP Club membership.
Enter the names and additional information into the
computer software program on a daily basis, using a part
time employee.
Horn suggests that your VIP Club sign-up cards include the
following information:
Name:
Address:
Birthdates of each family member, so that they can receive a
birthday surprise.
Anniversary:
Email::
Phone: (Optional)
"Carefully select your expiration date. I usually suggest using
a three-week expiration date. If it's not used by then, it is
usually lost. You want to create a sense of urgency," says
Horn.
Processing the data:
Don't wait until you have built a large database. Start
marketing to each VIP Club member the minute you get
their data. You will find that this information is your most
valuable marketing asset.
Creating a database of your customers and immediately
communicating to them on a regular basis will increase the
frequency of visits to your restaurant. For almost any
reason, or sometimes for no reason at all you should send
the customer a postcard or an email with an incentive to
bring them into the restaurant again. Remember, the goal is
to bring the customers in at least one EXTRA time per year.
By sending them a reminder postcard or email around a
holiday or during a local community event will remind them
to visit your restaurant. And if they make several EXTRA
visits you have exceeded your goal and dramatically
increased the sales and profit of your restaurant.
Create a Birthday Club:
What is the most popular holiday for eating out?
According to the National Restaurant Association, it's on
your birthday. In fact, 55 percent of all Americans eat out
on their birthdays. The best news of all is that people have
birthdays 365 days a year, spread out over 12 months.
Birthdays are the perfect time to encourage additional
business.
"Use the information gathered in your database to send out
birthday cards for each VIP customer as you recognize one
of the most important days in their lives. Their celebrations
might as well happen at your restaurant. Always include a
FREE offer such as a FREE dinner for the birthday guest.
Remember that birthday guests rarely party alone; the
average size of a birthday group is five individuals," says
Davis.
Go out of your way to make the birthday party a special
event when a customer redeems his/her certificate. Your
restaurant needs to become the "Party Place." Develop
definite policies to ensure that it happensกชthat the parties
are fun and your birthday guest is treated like royalty for
their day. You must create a special party atmosphere.
One Northwest seafood chain has a crazy fish hat that the
birthday person wears while they take a Polaroid or digital
photo of the birthday guest and his/her friends. The photo
is then slipped into a cardboard photo holder and becomes a
nice takeaway remembrance of the evening. Of course, the
restaurant's name and address is on the card. If you include
a "year" sticker, it can become a collectable item.
Celebrate Anniversaries:
Another great marketing campaign can be centered on your
VIP customers' anniversaries. Forty-three percent of
American couples say they go out to eat to celebrate their
wedding anniversaries. If you own a fine dining restaurant,
try to make your guests dining experience special and
romantic. Doing "little extras" is what will set your restaurant
apart from the competition. Value-added incentives are
more important than discounts on anniversaries. You must
make it a "special occasion."
Quick Service Restaurants and Pizza Shops can effectively
wish mom and dad a happy anniversary by giving them a
great offer for their children's meals that way, Mom doesn't
have to cook for the children before she goes out to dine.
This let's the children celebrate the anniversary too.
Advertise Specials or New Menus:
"With a marketing database, you are prepared to
communicate with your regular customers. It's a great way
to introduce a new menu or a new menu item. Always
include some special offer just for VIP members," says Horn.
Many companies have developed a newsletter for VIP
members. Others are sending out e-newsletters. This is a
great way to say thank you to your frequent customers. It's
also a great medium to tell them about new menu items,
new employees, and new recipes. All this helps to make our
customers take an interest in your restaurant and keep your
restaurant's name in front of your VIP members. Be sure to
make the newsletter newsy and fun to read. Always include
some sort of incentive for those members to stop by for a
meal. Change your incentive in each newsletter and track
the results.
Sponsor Contests:
One restaurateur saw a substantial increase in VIP member
visits when she started having a weekly drawing. She sent
out a postcard to the VIP members and asked them to bring
in the postcards for a FREE offer. When redeemed, the
postcards were entered into a weekly drawing for a free
lunch or "Dinner For Two". Monthly drawings were also held
with prizes such as a digital camera, CD player, clock radio,
etc. Grand Prize Drawings held twice a year gave away a
grandfather's clock or a cruise. With every mailer, she
reminded her customers of the grand prize drawings.
Additional Celebrations:
Create theme nights to attract your VIP members back to
your restaurant. Tie your theme occasions with holidays. For
instance, February is National Chocolate Lover's Month. Offer
your VIP members a special chocolate dessert promotion for
the month of February. One creative Italian restaurant
owner did a VIP promotion for its St. Patrick's Day
elebration. He sent out an email invitation saying, "Come
party with real Italians on St. Patrick's Day. We'll show you
how to celebrate St. Patrick's Day in style." Any holiday will
do. One restaurant celebrated Agatha Christie's Birthday by
offering a surprise entree special.
Remember that the number of dollars that a
customer is going to spend is limited. To get more
than your share, you are frankly going to have to
take them away from your competition Effective
marketing will help you get a larger share of your
customer's dollars and includes the tools to track
each and every promotion to determine your
customer response and return on investment.
With good marketing and tracking you will be able to
keep your restaurant in Top OF Mind awareness with
your customers.
"It's not your customer's job to remember you. It's
your obligation and your responsibility to make sure
the customer doesn't forget you! An effective VIP
Club will do just that," says Davis.
Brenda Carlos has been publisher & managing editor for Hospitality News & the International Education Guide. She has authored articles focusing on all aspects of foodservice. She is the co-author of "Event Management for Tourism, Cultural, Business & Sporting Events," (Prentice Hall). She is a regular contributor to the National Culinary Review and Sizzle magazines. Ms. Carlos is an enthusiastic speaker. She is a graduate of Brigham Young Univ.