FOOD 8000: Menu Marketing Strategies in the Modern Restaurant

This essay delves into restaurant menu marketing strategies, examining the shift from pre-social media tactics to contemporary digital approaches. It compares strategies like leaflet distribution and website design with modern techniques such as social media marketing, online reservations, and customer feedback integration. The essay introduces a new restaurant concept, 'ABC,' outlining a comprehensive online presence strategy that includes website design, mobile compatibility, SEO, and social media engagement. Furthermore, the assignment provides an analysis of successful and unsuccessful real-world restaurant examples, like Giulietta and Uber Eats in Canada, highlighting the benefits and pitfalls of various marketing approaches. The paper concludes with a reflection on the importance of menu management for operational excellence and long-term sustainability in the restaurant industry.

FOOD MENU

Table of Contents
Introduction........................................................................................................................3
1.0 Comparison of strategies.............................................................................................3
2.0 New restaurant concept...............................................................................................5
3.0 Restaurant menu defaults...........................................................................................6
Conclusion.........................................................................................................................7
Reference..........................................................................................................................8
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Introduction
Menu management is considered to be one of the most success critical factors in the
study of hospitality management. Th food being one of the most lucrative things for
human being, the menu management in restaurant business is a critical factor for the
success of the business. The instant paper delves into the analysis of the different
facets of menu management in the context of given scenario. The paper is being
prepared in a report format and the researcher introduced the theme of the paper To
The reader at the very beginning. A comparison of different strategies has been
mentioned in the subsequent section and new restaurant concept has been provided.
Also, one of the finest restaurants in Canada has been chosen to provide an overview
of the restaurant menu for the company and finally the discussion is being closed
through concluding note.
1.0 Comparison of strategies
The time before the invention of social media, restaurants used several strategies to
promote their menus. These strategies are like distribute leaflets, event sponsors,
partners with other businesses, post advertisements on the roadside, design an official
website, etc. These strategies must have been more focused on the posters or details
and attraction of the websites to attract more people to the restaurant (Henderson,
2020). Moreover, after the introduction of social media, restaurants are getting more
customers interested in their menus. Many customers visit the restaurants by seeing the
post of the foods from their friends and relatives. Again, many customers search for
good restaurants according to the rating given in the social networking sites.
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The menu is the most important thing that attracts customers, branding the company
and rank the taste of the products (Chen, 2020). In this technological world, restaurants
are also changing their menu style from printed menus to the digitalized menu. They are
providing tablets to the customers that impress them and help them to make the
payments and provide feedback. Collecting payments and feedbacks are also becoming
easier for restaurants. Companies are also using social media by posting some of their
best menus and discount offers on social sites which lead more customers to the
restaurants (Nemeschansky, 2020). Many Canadian restaurants are designing social
media sites like Facebook or Twitter for marketing. They are posting special food
available according to the location which will lead them to the fastest delivery and
customer satisfaction. Drawbacks are also there such as many customers like to have
the food that is not available for that location. Also, online payments cannot be received
in time due to the network problems which cost fewer customers for the company
(Austin, 2020). Giulietta is one of the most successful restaurants in Canada that
attracts their customers by posting videos of their several dishes on their YouTube
channels and Facebook and Twitter pages. They also take reservations online and over
the phone and post their fresh menu of Italian dishes on their blogs and Instagram
page. Whereas, some of the companies are facing pitfalls while using social media in
their business. Social media increases the completion in the market. Many companies
are presenting the same type of dishes in their restaurants. Uber eats is one of the
famous food chains in Canada but they are facing many difficulties regarding taking
payment online and delivering the food in time (Sung et al. 2020). In some remote areas
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in Canada, because of a bad network, payment cannot be reached in time which loses
a customer for Uber eats.
2.0 New restaurant concept
ABC is a new restaurant trying to settle in the Canadian market. The social media
platform is one of the quickest ways to create a position in this competitive world. The
values of ABC are to provide fresh food and collect customer’s feedback and
continuously improvise their menus. Their targeted customers are the Italian market.
ABC is planning to introduce a set of technologies that include an online reservation,
detailing menus in websites, mobile phone compatibility, feedback collection (through
offline and online) and social media involvement. Online reservations will be taken
through blogs, email and mobile phone apps (Li et al. 2020). Customers can go through
all of the menus in the blog and also in the phone apps. Some of the special offers and
discounts of Italian foods will be posted on Facebook and Instagram sites where
customers can also provide their feedback and rating and can book a table. ABC is
willing to set a team for feedback collection some of which will gather all the feedback
from the social media sites and others will take feedback in a feedback sheet. All these
services are linked to one another. There will need to be facing difficulties if the food
cannot be presented at the time of reservation, the feedback and rating provided by the
customers can be low in the social media. In order to integrate all these promotional and
marketing initiatives online, technology exerts such as Search Engine Optimization
(SEO) specialists may also be hired. SEO experts may be found in Canada from
secondary research in the webpages. Generally, SEO services include social media
promotion, website maintenance and review management as well. For order collection
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and revenue management, various software’s are available in the market that may
integrate booking with the collection and thereby the financial health check up from the
stand point of revenue and bottom-line of the restaurants. However, restaurants
generally refrain from incurring such costs thinking them to be no-productive.
3.0 Restaurant menu defaults
BANNOCK, Canadian comfort food is one of the finest restaurants in Canada. Some
menus may be looked better if an alteration can be done (Bannock). One of these is as
below:
 Mushroom Bannock Melt V - Mushroom Bannock Melt V has been more
delicious if it can be a little spicier. The screenshot and link are shown herein and
references list as well.
Figure 1: Screenshot of Specific Menu Item of the Restaurant
(Source: "Canadian Comfort Food - Downtown Toronto | Bannock", 2020)
The other food items that are fetching positive outcome like: Fried Chicken Sandwich Roasted Salmon Sweet Potato Fries.
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These can be re-written as Fried Chicken Sandwich with cheese Roasted Salmon with onion Sweet Potato Fries with poppy seeds.
Conclusion
A successful menu management provides management the overview of the operational
excellence and the therefore it may finally be concluded that a well-designed menu
supported by efficient monitoring may help the management of a restaurant business to
identify and achieve long-term sustainability in the industry in most time and cost-
efficient manner (Buisman, Haijema, Akkerman & Bloemhof, 2019).
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Reference
Austin, K., 2020. 10 Examples Of Awesome Restaurant Social Media Marketing.
[online] Toast. Retrieved 11 April 2020, from
https://pos.toasttab.com/blog/examples-of-awesome-restaurant-social-media-
marketing
Buisman, M. E., Haijema, R., Akkerman, R., & Bloemhof, J. M. (2019). Donation
management for menu planning at soup kitchens. European Journal of
Operational Research, 272(1), 324-338.
Canadian Comfort Food - Downtown Toronto | Bannock. Bannock. (2020). Retrieved 14
April 2020, from https://www.bannockrestaurant.com
Chen, J. (2020). The Complete Guide to Social Media for Restaurants & Bars. Sprout
Social. Retrieved 11 April 2020, from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/bars-restaurants-
social-media-guide.
Henderson, J., 2020. 10 Social Media Marketing Tips For Restaurants. [online] Modern
Restaurant Management. Retrieved 11 April 2020, from
https://modernrestaurantmanagement.com/10-social-media-marketing-tips-for-
restaurants
Li, H., Xie, K. L., & Zhang, Z. (2020). The effects of consumer experience and
disconfirmation on the timing of online review: Field evidence from the restaurant
business. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 84, 102344.
Nemeschansky, B. (2020). Listen to your customer-how to manage your restaurant
more effectively. Journal of Foodservice Business Research, 23(1), 17-45.
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Sung, K. K., Tao, C. W. W., & Slevitch, L. (2020). Restaurant chain’s corporate social
responsibility messages on social networking sites: The role of social distance.
International Journal of Hospitality Management, 85, 102429.
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