In today's "rough and tumble" world of advertising among businesses, the business of pizzeria advertising is definitely in the fray.
Getting noticed by would be customers and staying on the minds of current customers, is challenging to say the least. The success or failure of rising to this challenge (no pun intended) has made the difference in a business remaining on the scene or not.
The pizza industry and in particular, the brick and mortar pizzeria has a tough fight on their hands when it comes to winning new and repeat local customers. This is true for the small pizzeria to the corporate pizzeria who by the way, have a continuous need to advertise, even though they've been branded on the minds of customers for years. Having notoriety and a great recipe is unfortunately not the only winning difference in the equation.
Therefore, here are some tips for any pizzeria owner/manager who's realized the real and constant need for advertising. Before we continue to those "Tips", allow yours truly to qualify how it is that, what you are going to read is true and effective for you, the pizzeria owner/manager.
Related Qualifications
When it comes to business, it all started with the good 'ol fashioned, paper route. This is a great way that many in business have laid as a foundation for dealing with the public and, gaining insights into what it is that customers want and, especially what makes those customers keep wanting your product.
Advancing from there was experience in the business world, from business ownership to media marketing and advertising. Included in that line of work was sales, writing, voice over, on camera acting in television and radio commercials as well as producing media creatives. Over the years, much of that experience has repeatedly served well, for ongoing and related endeavors.
From there, culinary pursuit took root. Among those delicious recipes within that pursuit were, you guessed it, pizza! Ummm ummm good, lip smacking pizza! Favorite kind being pepperoni.
The past two decades of being an amateur pizza maker have enabled this pizza man to eventually advance to the level of a genuine Pizzaiolo (man who makes pizza) with all kinds of experiences with homemade dough making and proofing, with nice flours like, the award winning Tipo 00 to the good old bread flour from off of the shelves of your neighborhood supermarket.
Additionally, learning to make sauces of various kinds was indeed a must ingredient added to any deliciously satisfying pizza. The sauces included red sauces made from various types of tomatoes like, beef steak to the award winning San Marzano, which comes from the region of Mt. Vesuvius, a volcano located on the Gulf of Naples in Campania, Italy, about 9 km east of Naples and a short distance from the shore.
It is boasted that the tomato grown there is planted in soil that has a traceable content of volcanic ash from that very Mountain volcano, Vesuvius. This gives it it's distinctively, awesomely delicious flavor.
Also on the pizza went creamy white sauces, from prepackaged to homemade and whisked with love. The rest of the ingredients were of the standard cheese to the line cook variety of toppings.
Well, this could go on for a very long time. You get the point. The qualifications have been met. Therefore, here are the tips that you've ordered and served with much respect for you, the pizza owner/manager.
Tips
For decades, pizzerias have used television and radio to gain local customers. Additionally, paper advertising in magazines and newspapers have been a mainstay. Now and since the advent of the internet, pizza owners/managers have been utilizing blogs and podcasts in order to get noticed by the local pizza hungry consumers. Lastly mentioned here will be the video. Yes, the all important video.
Without going into much detail about each, let it be said that, no matter which form of aforementioned advertising you use, the return on investment is an all important factor, to include cost per customer. That is to say, how much you spend on a advertisement divided by how many trackable customers you've gained from it. This will give you the "Cost Per Customer". That of course, is only the beginning of the equation of cost per customer. Other factors include the resources that it takes to serve that customer from ad to table.
Here are seven tips that when implemented, will serve you and your potential and current customers, well.
1. Try to start wisely by considering the cost per customer and the resources equation. Choose advertising and or methods that track how your new and or repeat customers became aware of you and or your current special offers. This will help you to make wise decisions in your choice of advertising to begin with.
2. Stay within your service area with your choice of advertising. While an advertising medium may have a broad reach, it's only to your advantage in a limited capacity. So, to maximize your exposure to hungry pizza lovers near you and have them quickly ordering from you, you must go to where they go. One way to do this is to consider who your audience is, what age, gender, income bracket and what their activities and spending habits are, etc. It is not smart to say, "I want everyone as a customer". Reason being is, the paying customer is attracted to more than just food. They want convenience, variety, atmosphere and consistency, to name a few things. So, how does your pizzeria meet those challenges? The answer... by knowing who you are and which customer type of person will be most attracted to you and your establishment. Starting by focusing there is another basis in spending your ad money wisely. While this sounds simple enough, you'd be surprised at how woefully misunderstood and under utilized these insights are and, no doubt will continue to be. The exception being you, the reader of this article. Right?
3. Factor into your planning the cost of advertising and how much it will cost to implement the strategies in point number 2. above.
4. Image matters. The impression you give to your audience can make or break you and, in perpetuity when it comes to video advertising on the internet as, these videos can remain on the internet for years and years. Therefore, you may want to consider the appearance of your employees and even yourself, the pizzeria owner/manager. Even the words you choose make a difference up or down, to the potential customer.
As for appearance, while it's not important for one to look like a movie actor or model, do you have unkempt hair, noticeable cuts, scabs or bruises on you? This is a major turn off to your viewer. Would you be hungry after viewing such things? Are you wearing clothing that relates to your target customer, IE., ball cap, jewelry, business attire? This matters as, "Birds of a feather flock together". Are you describing your product, service and so on in a way that your potential customer can relate to? While you want to be yourself, the words you use and how you say them matter. Slang? Maybe, yet, speak their language, so to speak, and don't cajole your audience.
5. Treat your advertising as a ongoing series of campaigns. Trying to let the potential customer know everything about your business in a thirty second t.v. commercial, for example, is like oversell. You said a lot and yet, what can they remember? Usually, the word pizza. Save more content for a video ad on the internet, for example, and try to use an economy of words within the ad. Be descriptive but not too descriptive.
You will benefit if you start with ads that describe your business and who you are, the specific uniqueness of your menu items and where to find you. Your next ad would focus on the atmosphere that you've prepared for yourguest(s) to include again, who you are and where to find you. In the next, you may want to mention who you are in terms of your experience in the business and from there, the next ad could include, who loves your pizza and other things about you and your business. This can be in the form of written or video customer testimonials from customers within your main customer demographic. Staying focused on your main type of customer demographic will help you to subtly leverage consistency in the mind of the customer. A Customer demographic includes age, gender, income level etc.
6. Ask questions of whatever sales rep walks through your door, based on the aforementioned considerations and how they can help you meet your advertising goals based on them.
7. Lastly, although you, as a business owner/manager, have precious little extra time on your hands, make these things a mandatory part of your business duties. Include in these things, knowing a bit more about the inside scene of advertising mediums, the equipment used, techniques, rationale, personnel expertise, etc. used in the ad business.
In conclusion;
By implementing the tips within this article in your pizzeria/restaurant business advertising pursuits, you will gain positive traction over failure, your competition and even the shady ad sales person who'll promise you the moon, while you watch their fellow sales people eat at your table, too often and for free. If you don't know what this means now, you will in time. Hint hint... radio trade-outs.
While there is so much more that can be added to the list of information in this article, you've got more work to do. So, pace yourself by implementing small slices (pun intended) into your time schedule and, before you know it, you'll be far and away more equipped to benefit from your advertising than you may have been before you've read this article. Oh, and if you've gained from this information, please share it with your fellow pizzeria friends, those of whom are not in your service area, of course.
All the best to you in your wholesome pizza advertising pursuits!
John Williams - Webmaster/Owner of Media Creative Companies
Feel free to Google, Bing, Yahoo etc. us!