Marketing Help ¢5

Yes, my title is a homage to Peanuts ;) Today I will write in regards to two simple marketing tips for the restaurant/bar industry. These marketing tips came to mind during a recent Sunday evening happy hour. 1. Give reasons for your patrons to spend additional time at your establishment. 2. Make it easy for potential customers to know what you offer. Here is how these came to mind. We were down on Rainey St in Austin. Nice pseudo residential/converted homes into bars neighborhood. We spent a few hours having a beer at 3 different house converted bars. Granted we only had one drink at each place so what I'm saying here doesn't ring true in this instance. However, if we weren't driving we would have spent the most time and most money at the bar that had the board/card games. This is no new concept but hey this is nickle advice. Give a reason for people to spend time/cash at your place. Playing those games and consuming a beverage was a great time. Many bars and cafe's take advantage of this offering. And its a great idea to do so. Unless you want churn, then this is bad marketing advice.

My next piece of advice. Austin is a food trailer town. It's awesome, many passionate people offer an enhanced selection of food. However, not all of them are marketers. Why I say this is there was one food trailer with an obscure name. No other details were given except one vague phrase. Now how are people passing by or at the bar across the street supposed to know what they offer. How are people supposed to refer to your trailer? My advice to all food trailers is simple. Have a fun, simple name that relates to your food. Post the menu or pictures of what you offer outside so people can easily see. Simple words of advice. Sure we were curious so we went up and asked. But how many others would do that? Especially when other food trucks/places on the block clearly state what they offer. Sure, obscurity/exclusivity has been a trend, but the tables in front were empty, so if that was their strategy, hmm.... Simple advice for simple good marketing. That's all for now.

March On

With no attention to patronize, March has two meanings. Both are quite obvious and well known, the month and movement/advancement. Both definitions are the reasoning for this post. March is here and where January and February went is beyond me. February was a fun month with Family visits. It was also a crazy month that involved snow and cold, which I am used to but in MN not Texas. I can and will cry a river because happily it never got so cold that rivers froze, however a few days were near the 32 mark but never fell to single digits, to my knowledge. Plus, negative and serve windchill's were not experienced and for that I am so happy. Back to present, here we are in March. The month of spring break; and with the weather getting warmer, its nice to look forward to a month of spring instead of just a week vacation. During this spring filled March month I'm going to see how often I can post without just exercising my fingers with worthless words. Here's a post that's been in the back of my mind...Ps- I know me cheering about warm weather can be annoying for those of you with cold toes but if you are reading this post you more than likely hold an open invitation to come visit Austin. 

SUNDAY FUNDAY
Sunday Fun Day is a phrase I have used for many years. Sundays have the cachet of being a relaxing day and they deserve that. I have always aimed for fun Sundays, hence the term Sunday Funday. In the fall and winter, Football is the entertainment. Now in the spring, adventure is the entertainment. Although not all adventure is relaxing per-say, it's all in your state of mind. If you not over thinking the activity and you are enjoying yourself, stress is absent and therefore you mind is in a meditative, relaxed zone. Probably didn't have to defend adventure being relaxing that far, but nonetheless. Sunday here was 86, gorgeous, I must say. So Summer and I went for a hike, stopped for some quick groceries and then got some Olive Garden take out. The hike and Olive Garden were delicious, but the best part was that the small niche grocery store had (has) Meyer Lemons. Which leads us to part two of this post.

WHEN LIFE HANDS YOU LEMONS; REQUEST MEYERS ;)

I could positively rant about these tasty little lemons for paragraphs. If you have never tasted one, do so, your next opportunity. If you're in Austin, head to Sun Harvest off Brody and Lamar. It's true these lemons are hard to find and quite more expensive then their big yellow cousin, but they are worth their weight in yellow gold. (an attempt at lame humor) These varieties are usually smaller and sweeter. Some believe they are a cross between a lemon and an orange. I have yet to meet Mr. Meyer to ask him (an actual man who created the variety) but I am a fan of his work. Regular lemons for me are too acidic, these are just right. I first tasted/discovered this variety at Summer's sisters house in California. When I discovered they grow great in pots, I have one on my shopping list for our balcony. I attached a picture below. The store bought ones are tasty but those ones I picked from the tree were simply amazing. They are perfect in a freshly brewed cup of green tea or in a pitcher of iced green tea for starters. Now I just need to find some recipes that require lemons as a main ingredient (so the flavor can be tasted not blended in)! And that's just what I am going to do.

Learning Facebook

Facebook Test

Hi Y'all, as you may know this blog serves the purpose to connect with family and friends while also documenting what Austin, Tx is all about to encourage tourism and visitation. A third and less advertised purpose is this blog serves as a learning tool for me. It seems this internet thing isn't going away *joke and everyday new things are arising on this www. So this blog serves as a way for me to learn more about the internet, social media and etc. Personally, I enjoy learning now. More so, then when I was in school, perhaps because it's on my terms and under my interests. None the less, I'll end the rambling because all this post serves is for me to try adding a Facebook like button to my page. =)

2011 - New Year, New Ideas - "T-sips"

It's a small world after all. I apologize if I burn that song into your mind, however that sentence rings so true, especially with the internet. I love how connected I can be with friends, family and future friends via Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Aside from the connectivity, every day people are coming up with interesting internet-exclusive ideas. Well, I'm not writing to say I will become the next million-dollar web entrepreneur or that I have a terrific idea, but this year I am going to play with some internet ideas. This first one isn't to make money but it's an interesting way to play around with Twitter and Flickr. I am by no means a professional taster, I have no "supertaster" abilities. However, what some "supertaster" says about a beverage may not hold true to how I percieve the taste so it doesn't really matter that I am just an average taster. Therefore what I am going to do in 2011 is tweet about many interesting beverage I come across using simple, concise, everyday language. T-Sips I call it. =) My catergory of interesting will include Brews (alcoholic and kombucha's), Caffeinated drinks, Wines, Tea's, basically anything that is liquid and not a common every day drink/brand. Sorry Bud light, water, milk, most juices. Why am I doing this? Mostly, so I can have a nice little documentation of drinks I like and don't like with a limited 140 character count blurb. However, other reasons are to share interesting beverages with my facebook and twitter followers and help spread the word about local, niche and specialty drinks. Don't worry, I won't over tweet, I'll keep the beverages I tweet about tasteful ;)

How it works: my tweets/posts will include searchable hash tags (#) regarding the beverage itself along with the #Tsips hash tag that will link all off these tweets. The tweets will also include a link to Flickr which will include a photo of the beverage and in some cases more details about the beverage. That's about it, just a simple little 2011 project. I hope I help you discover a new beverage to indulge in :)

As my grandpa would say: Na zdorovie