Why Your Restaurant Needs A Blog

A blog is a journal published on the World Wide Web consisting of posts typically displayed in reverse chronological order so the most recent post appears first. Blogs are usually the work of a single individual, occasionally of a small group, and often are themed on a single subject.

A blog by no means is a short term marketing solution.  It is however a long term marketing asset that will bring you traffic “or eyeballs” to your restaurant website. 

Now I know how busy restaurant time can be and there is very little time for sitting down and writing about things to post online.

However here is a cool fact:  Companies that have blogs have 55% more website visitors.  Can you restaurant afford to not use this indispensable marketing tool?

At the end of this video and in the text below Illgive you some inexpensive tools to use to make blogging a little easier.

So you might be wondering what do blogs do and why do I need them for my restaurant?

Well, Blogs are used to earn peoples trust that your restaurant is the place they want to dine. 

Now it is up to you how many times you blog.  The more the better but in this busy world; who has time to continually be writing while running a restaurant?

You need to add some sort of value for the reader. Entice them with a coupon.  Show them why your restaurant is the place then need to be.  Post pictures, Build a relationship with them.

Now when setting up your blog for you restaurant I suggest you set up 5 or more blogs. Let me explain.  The more written original content there is online about your restaurant the more Google will think you are an authority.  Meaning they will put you higher up on Google when people search for you.

Now, you may be wondering how Google picks your restaurant to show on Google. It is done by keywords and similarities to what the user is looking for.

So the 1^stthing you need to do is figure out what are the best keywords to use for your restaurant.   What would a person enter into Google to search for your restaurant?

Maybe

• Wing night
• Restaurant on YOUR Street
• Restaurant at YOUR Mall
• Live music in YOUR city
• Your restaurant feature like Martini Mondays

So now that you have a keyword list you can start to build your blog.

I suggest having 5 blogs that you use for advertising purposes and setting these up in Blogger.com. Now I suggest using Blogger.com as it is owned by Google and … Do you get how using their tools may help your efforts?

Now the key to remember is to use one of the keywords in the title of each blog you set up.  So for instance here is a blog that I have set up as “Kanata Irish Pub” because Kanata is the city the restaurant is in and Irish Pub is one of the keywords that a person might use to search

Now, in blogger you can pick nice background images and change the appearance of the blog to suit your tastes. 

So once you have this done you can set up your 1^st blog posting.

So go ahead and write about what you think will be of value to your restaurant audience.  In this example we talk about the restaurant and the deal of dinner and a movie.

Make sure you add compelling images that catch the reader’s attention and draw them into your story.  This also helps by breaking up the text and making it easier to read.  You can even embed your YouTube videos.  This makes for a very compelling story.  Imagine a restaurant without a blog and a future customer is searching for where to eat and one of the websites they come across is your blog and it contains fabulous stories and videos of your restaurant. Then there is your competitors page that just has one plain Jane website with very little content and imagery.  Where do you think they will dine?

Now do not forget somewhere in the blog to put a link to your website. 

Also you will see labels listed at bottom, these are important as well.  Insert your keywords here and always put more than one.

Also one image per post and rename your image one of your keywords before you upload it.

Your good blog should be on your domain like www.restaurantname.com/blog

To do this you will need to get your website administrator to install Wordpress on your domain and use this for your professionally written blogs. The ones you add to your advertising and links form your website.  The reason you use Wordpress and attach it to you restaurant domain is that it will build up the reputation of your domain name but it needs to be hosted on your website address

Now make sure you do not always just talk about your restaurant. Readers do not always want to read about your restaurant.  

Here are some great things your can blog about for your restaurant

• Your neighbourhood and other businesses in and around yours.
• Your city that you do business in.
• A team you sponsor.
• A regular customer.
• A staff member that went above and beyond to please a guest.
• Your family story
• Blog with images about past entertainment like bands in your bar, even maybe a video
• Special events like St. Patty’s day
• Charitable events that your restaurant participates in.

Now don’t for get the title of a blog post is very important.  It needs to capture the reader’s attention.  It also needs to contain one of your restaurant keywords like your restaurant name, where your restaurant is etc.

Here are some resources

Blogger link up http://www.bloggerlinkup.com/

Here is a cool blog I have learned tons from http://www.ppchero.com/

Blog writers http://www.iwriter.com/

Use the Google keyword tool to assist with your research http://www.googlekeywordtool.com/