See press release here :

http://www.jamesbeard.org/files/2012_JBF_Awards_Lifetime_Award_FINAL.pdf

1. place your most frequent visitors into a circle and send them special loyalty deals
2. send special deals to patrons who haven’t visited in a while to draw them back in
3. place strong influencers who have visited your restaurant, such as local political figures, celebrities, etc. into a circle and give them free meals for sharing your content
4. share a special menu with your most culinarily refined customers
5. add people who attended an event or party to a circle and send them photos of the party or invites to the next

How is your restaurant using Google+ Circles?

Let us know on our Google+ page or comment below.

  Sole proprietor/ Chef owned restaurants have so many challenges to overcome. Getting capital,compliance to so many local and Federal regulations buying in quantities that are cost effective while maintaining quality and freshness and so much more.
  Perhaps the most challenging is to Brand and promote the restaurant
while the behemoth Chain stores seem to dominate every medium of advertising with huge Image Campaigns and Bottomless Restaurant Marketing Budgets.
  This is where we believe we can help. I know how hard it is to take that ever shrinking profit margin and move the revenue back out into the marketing channels.Let’s talk a little about leveraging your dollars spent.
 1. Once upon a time getting a video commercial done and shown on tv in your local market was considered the most effective marketing strategy
yet also the most expensive.Nowadays still a multi $$ thousands dollar investment for a relatively short term schedule of distribution. Well of course nowadays video is still said to be the most effective yet leveraging it’s production and distribution is now the question. Many who have spent that money on professional tv production now have a valuable property on their hands.
But what to do with it?
 Common answer is youtube and Facebook and yes they are free so why not? However are they as effective as you thought they would be? Not so many folks actually do their searching in youtube and in web search youtube is still not that effective because Google would become redundant.There are distribution services that are mainly looking to leverage your content to get advertisers overlays on to your videos. This is obviously not the business you are in and while all distribution is helpful.We recommend a service that is working to benefit your organic results and market your business.

 2. I’m pretty sure that spending money for a company Such as any “Daily Deal” Co. to give your goods and services away @ %50 discounts is not a good strategy no matter how popular for the moment.But coupon campaigns do have a track record of effectiveness however at a rather high cost typically starting at at least $500 a month. Those customers that come in w/ coupons need to be captured somehow to become repeat customers to make such expensive techniques profitable. So what to do?
  3. Try to get their email address so they can be on your list?
Yes this is good and often considered the holy grail of your marketing strategy. A good email service that is easy to use and gets your mail delivered is the best way to use this list. Cost of a service with a list of 500-2000 is on average run $30 a month.This is definitely thought to be Very cost effective.

 4.How about getting a mobile number and get them to opt in to your short code mobile text marketing campaign? Also a Very effective strategy and perhaps the NEW Holy Grail as %99 of text messages are said to be read as opposed to not as effective of a rate of emails actually read.Now these services vary greatly but seem to start at at least $100 a month for a reasonable amount of texts sent and more typically average $300 a month. True ROI obviously depends on where your cost ends up.

 5.What about a frequent buyer/Loyalty type program? This is also an effective strategy and has a few ways to approach it. Some of the new social Gps based programs have the potential to be effective but with the selection available how do you pick which one your potential clients like or choose? or how can you manage them all if you wade in to this medium? Another route is some sort of card either manually monitored with a punch or stamp that just costs the price of printing and customer/employee integrity…(who knows that true cost). Also there is a transaction fee based program that works through your merchant service credit card machine. The more effective the greater the cost.

6.Social pages Tweets>Likes>Fans>etc. Great and free (If your time has ZERO value) Do you know when the best time to tweet or update is? So that your info doesn’t just go past un-noticed in a  news feed? This phenomenon is effective to a degree but just how much is debatable.If you can manage it without taking up your extremely valuable time why not. But should you pay someone or hire a Social Marketing management service? There are services that do this for $200-$300 month..

7.Search engine Marketing (such as Google Ad words) ? Whats a good budget to put in place for this? $250 a month minimum is recommended.

8.Online Menu site membership? This is also an option that through our research typically costs At least $250 a year or $90 a month including any sort of promotion which is normally a banner on the site your paying…Hmmm effectiveness is variable.

9.Banner ads on local “yourcity” type sites and others At least $75 a month for the minimum option…OK.

10. Well hopefully you have a site already.It has become debatable now if the Site itself is necessary anymore. We stll believe in you having your own piece of Internet real estate to Brand as your own and to triangulate in your online strategy. Costs whatever you spent plus whatever you need to spend to re-do it so it can now be Mobile friendly… $2000 is a good average.

11. The newest component! And we believe the true Holy Grail!
Your Very own Custom Branded iphone/ipad/ipod/ Android Mobile App!
We like to describe it like this…How many business cards have you distributed for your business over the years?
 What if you could know that they were actually still in that persons pocket AND you could communicate with it at will? Update the info you need them to know with an easy to use dashboard of your own?
  What if it could manage and help optimize every type of marketing we spoke of so far?
This is the reality of today! Take advantage of what is offered to you Today! And be The little Restaurant that COULD!!!

Don’t fall prey to the bevy of competing Daily Deal Programs that seem to be falling short on customer satisfaction and merchant viability. Truth be told the new digital junk mail craze is devaluing the reputation of merchants and wearing thin with the consumer as their inboxes are now inundated with digital copycats. Business Insider has been following the financials and the bloom has definitely begun to fade.

We at Flip4food.tv recommend owning and distributing your own campaigns so that you can reap the full reward of slim profits as the loss leader brings cash flow through the doors.Our custom Mobile Apps are the perfect courier and system to develop QR campaigns and GPS reward type incentives. The easy manageability and simple dashboard access make management and updating a breeze. The inexpensive app is the digital business card that continues to market and communicate for pennies per app holder (or less) per day! That makes the profits compound with the savings of conventional ad dollars spent.

 Once again Flip4food.tv is ahead of the curve of the most effective marketing channels available to small business’ today!

Put your business in your best customers pockets and keep rewarding them to encourage their friends to become your customer too!

Contact us for info on a Demo of an App of your own.