Opening a new restaurant is hard. Knowing how to market a new restaurant is even harder. In general, a good place to start once you’ve solidified your business plan and done your branding research, is to address your graphic design needs. Start with:
A LOGO
Every restaurant should have one – it lets customers recognize the business and lets them know that the business is reputable. A well defined logo is just as important as the restaurant’s food, décor, and ambiance. Colors, typefaces, and overall style of the logo help express the restaurant’s style. It gives the business an identity and helps determine how the rest of the branding should look and feel (menus, business cards, etc.).
A WEBSITE
A website is critical for any restaurant, especially those that are sit-down. Most customers look for a restaurant’s website to see what the interior and food look like, menus, hours of operation, specials, and reservation and contact information. A great looking website communicates to customers that you care about both the restaurant’s physical presence, as well as it’s digital presence. Even more importantly, having a website that is accessible on mobile devices lets customers check out the business when they’re on the go.
MENU DESIGN
Menus are usually influenced by the type of restaurant (whether fast food or sit-down), but the design and style should also consider the type of cuisine and overall restaurant theme. More importantly, menus should be organized, legible, grammatically correct, and clean. Cramped text and too many items on a page make it hard for a customer to read through dishes easily. Consider having separate pages for different times of the day if costs will allow for additional printing. Menu covers also keep pages from tearing, and can easily be cleaned of grease.
BUSINESS CARDS
Business cards make it easy for customers to get a restaurant’s information. The design should be consistent with the restaurant’s branding as well as overall theme. Consider having the designer include a QR code on it somewhere so users can find the website easily by scanning it with a smartphone QR code reader.
SOCIAL MEDIA PAGES
Social media makes it easy to stay connected with customers. Facebook is one of the largest social media platforms with 1 billion users and also allows businesses to promote posts for a nominal fee. Make sure that the business page includes the logo and an eye-catching header/timeline photo. Include all of the business’ information and remember to promote things like specials or photos of dishes!
Twitter is useful for promotion of the business as well. It can be linked up to a Facebook page so that posts will show up both on Twitter and Facebook. Be sure that the profile design is consistent with the overall look and feel of the restaurant and website. Have a custom background image made and be sure to customize link colors.
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Can you think of any other important graphic design items should a restaurant have? Let us know and contact us today.