BIGGEST TAKEAWAYS: Pizza Tomorrow Summit / Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show

The Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show and Pizza Tomorrow Summit just concluded in Orlando, FL. This was great! They combined two shows into one and had an even better attended event with more people and more diversity.

One of the reasons I really love this show -- the content has a focus on business education. While pizza is definitely an art form, the restaurant business is an ever changing landscape. Education is the only way.

--- KEY TAKEAWAYS ---

1. TECH TRAINING

I gotta give Bryan Meredith credit on this one because it’s one of the best things I’ve ever heard about restaurant tech: “train your staff on how to use the technology you select so well that they could leave your restaurant and go work for that company.”

2. BEST REASON TO REPLY

15% of local search ranking is based on if you respond to reviews. Just when I thought I knew everything there was to know about reputation management, the enigmatic Mark Sorenson teaches us all something incredible! Want to come up higher in "near me" search results? Reply to reviews.

3. QUALITY > EVERYTHING ELSE

It's funny, I go to these shows and think about marketing. Most restauranteurs go and think about food and operations. And you know what. the highest calling is the same for all of us. The best pizza wins, the best customer experience wins and when it comes to content, social, email, ads otherwise, good content wins over bad content, every time. If you are thinking about what kind of content create, just make it good.

4. 1-2 HOURS IS ALL YOU NEED

Marketing doesn't have to be hard, especially for independent restaurants. Here are 3 easy to execute moves that you can get done in less than 2 hours per week.

A. Listings management: Use a tool like Marqii to manage your business profile on sites like Google, Apple Maps, Yelp, Tripadvisor, Siri, Alexa, Facebook, Foursquare and more. Not only will all your menus and hours of operations be correct but you'll be optimized for "near me" searches.

B. Use Google search ads with a $3-5 budget per day to ensure you come up specifically for "near me" searches.

C. Send a weekly newsletter even if its just an amazing photo of food, a 2 sentence menu description and an "order now" button. This is what The Capital Grille and Red Robin do EVERY WEEK. They probably know something about how this works.

5. GET HELP!

If you know you "should do it” or “should be better” about it … but continue to move it to the bottom of the pile, please just hire out. Stop saying you’ll get to it and just pay someone else to do it. Especially marketing, which is an investment, not a cost.

Really need help with your marketing? That's what we do ... send me an email [email protected]

If you were at #FLRestaurantShow hashtag#ThePizzaTomorrowSummit, what did you take away?

#restaurantbusiness #restauranttech #restaurantowners #restaurantmarketing #restaurantindustry #restaurantowner #tradeshow