The problem is restaurant owners falling left and right like flies. It\’s no laughing matter. According to a recent study in Ohio State and Cornell universities, more than 50% of new restaurants are forced to shut down within the first three years of operation. It doesn\’t stop there. In five years, the number rises to 75%. Don\’t tell that to any of your friends who are looking to open their own small restaurant business.

Amateur restaurant owners simply make too many mistakes. It\’s understandable, everyone has to start somewhere, but when your business and start up capital is at stake, it\’s best if you try and minimize the damages so you don\’t end up being among that 75%. Menu being too big, the dining room is too large, non-budget friendly dishes, over decorating, etc. All these have no place in your restaurant business especially if you\’re just starting out.

Here\’s a list basic tips for new restaurant owners:

1. Identity through colors
Are you familiar with the 90s video game hit Street Fighter? Don\’t you find it peculiar how easy it is to associate characters to certain color combinations?

For example, red and white is Ryu. Red and yellow is Ken. Blue and brown is Chun Li, Brown and yellow is Dhalsim, green and orange is Blanka. In terms of restaurants, when you think of red and yellow, you think McDonald\’s and almost immediately you\’re hungering for a Big Mac.

Use two colors, preferably contrasting colors, to make your restaurant more memorable in the eyes of customers. Use the same two colors for everything else: marketing pamphlets, logo, business cards, etc.

2. A smaller menu is better
A bigger menu looks grand, sure, but a smaller menu is much better for a number of reasons, especially for amateur restaurant owners. For starters, a small menu means you\’re working with less ingredients so it\’s easier to maintain costs. A smaller menu is also easier to prepare, so you\’ll be able to maintain the high quality of your menu items and provide consistency with every dish.

In short, don\’t design a menu that you can\’t handle.

3. Cater to a market niche
Too many new restaurant owners disregard the importance of marketing. They seem to think running a restaurant business is all about food, food, and food. But it isn\’t. No matter how good the food on the table is, it won\’t sell like pancakes unless people start knowing about it. There\’s word-of-mouth marketing, yes, but why depend on that alone?

The trick is to target a market niche. Identify the age demographic and social status of your ideal customer, and then focus all your marketing efforts into getting that customer to sit on one of your tables and place an order. If you try to market to everyone at one, you\’ll end up getting no one.

Remember these pointers when starting your own restaurant business. Hopefully you\’ll be among the 25% of restaurant operators that breaks past the five-year curse.

Author Bio: Jon Orana is an Internet Marketing Consultant in Calgary Alberta Canada. He\’s teaching Internet marketing for small businesses and independent professionals to generate targeted leads and customers using the Internet. Click here for more restaurant marketing strategies.

Category: Marketing
Keywords: restaurant marketing, restaurant marketing zone, restaurant market niche