It was a fun, short interview about the issues that the restaurant faced when I jumped in as a partner to help my best friend. We discuss some of the specific actions that we took and how that helped lead us to becoming the #1 steakhouse in the Pioneer Valley.

If you can’t see the video, you can watch it over on PepsiCo’s YouTube channel.

If we managed to peak your interest and you wanted to read more about what we’ve down as a small business to build our community and increase sales at the restaurant using social media, you can find more here and here.

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In general, restaurants have a few main ways that they typically market their business: You can run ads in the local newspapers, buy radio spots, have television commercials produced, and grab prime billboard locations.  All of these marketing tools will help gain a restaurant visibility and exposure.  They’re part of most restaurants’ marketing toolboxes.  But, these marketing tools don’t help when an increasing number of eyeballs are turning to Google as their primary source of information.

When my best friend and now-partner, Joseph Gionfriddo, purchased Caminito Argentinean Steakhouse, the extent of the restaurant’s web presence consisted of, essentially, just a copy of the menu.  Joe was spending most of the marketing budget on local newspapers and radio spots.  The restaurant was struggling to survive even though the food that Joe prepared was some of the best I, and everyone else that came through Caminito’s doors, had ever tried.

Recognizing an opportunity to lower our marketing budget and use the web as the primary tool to drive more bodies through the front door, I approached Joe with the offer of a partnership.  My primary responsibility: create the strongest presence, both offline and online, for Caminito, in as short of time as possible.

We immediately sketched out a 12-month strategic marketing plan that included:

• A complete revamp of the website.
• Developing an online presence through social networks, a blog, and a video blog.
• Creating a listening station that allowed us to monitor for conversations across the web about us, our restaurant, our competition and our industry.

Since many of these tactics provide for solid SEO, as part of our goals, it helped us to gain several thousand links in Google and other major search engines.  As our online presence became stronger and we developed a more engaged community, we began to rank for prime keywords that we targeted as being important for our restaurant to drive business through search results.

Our take: if prospective customers ran searches for restaurants in the area while making a decision of where to dine and our restaurant dominated the front page of Google, they would be more likely to visit Caminito.  Though we had made the decision to decrease our traditional marketing spend by approximately 80% we still continued to run local newspaper and some radio spots.  Since not all of our customers use the Internet to do their research, it was important to us to continue to use these avenues to reach our customers.  We also contacted each of the newspapers, other print publications, radio and associations to negotiate for digital advertising options, linkbacks on their websites, logo, bio and/or menu publishing.

The first month of this strategy being in play we saw a sales increase of 20% as compared to the same month the previous year.  Over the past almost two years we have maintained an increase in sales every single month as compared to the same month the previous year.  Additionally, we have finished each year approximately 20-25% up in sales as compared to previous years.

As time has continued, we have tweaked our strategic marketing plan but still maintain the above tactics.  This has helped to continue to create conversations, both online and offline.  To measure the continued increase in online conversations we use a combination of Google Alerts and Twitter Search.  While this does create some duplication, it ensures that we never miss any conversations happening around us, our brand, our competition, or our industry.  We monitor offline conversations through anecdotal interactions we have with our community and inferred through the continued increase in new customers and increased sales.

To further guide decision-making we also measure everything from the number of comments we receive on a blog post, to the number of hits on a video, the total number of subscribers, where those subscribers come from, how and where our blog and video posts are shared, who shares them, the level of engagement we have, the number of conversations that are started and tons more.  The challenge is keeping up with all of this data flowing in and bringing it all together to analyze our overall online impact.

As a result of the measurement systems we have in place the impact of online and offline conversations is clear to us.  Online conversations help to further our online brand, increase conversations, improve search rank for evolving prime keywords, demonstrate and expertise in the food industry, create new opportunities, and increase sales.  The offline conversations translate to word of mouth marketing that helps to drive increase and repeat sales.

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a personal assistant to a politician or political candidate. A body man accompanies the politician or candidate virtually everywhere, often arranging lodging, transportation or meals, and providing companionship, snacks, a cellphone, and any other necessary assistance.

After learning about Reggie after watching a MSNBC special on an inside look at the working White House, I did some more research.  Reggie has become one of the most well-known body men in political history, due in part to his role as a basketball player with the championship Duke University team and his try-outs with two NFL teams.  There have been some very interesting articles on Reggie and surrounding him considering himself the “Chief of Stuff”.

When President Obama was on the campaign trail, ESPN caught up with, then, Senator Obama and Reggie to profile the Chief of Stuff.  It’s a fun video to watch, in my opinion, since it’s another look behind-the-scenes.

If you can’t view this video in your browser, you can also find it here…

Not only do I find motivation watching people like Reggie Love do whatever it takes, working 18-20 hours or more per day, when I first heard Reggie describe himself as the “Chief of Stuff” it resonated with me.  As General Manager at both New Marketing Labs and at my steakhouse, I tend to focus on operations, processes, and doing my best to ensure everything runs smoothly.  Along the way there are tons of “stuff” that needs to be dealt with on a daily basis.

Also, there a lot of things that I help Chris Brogan with throughout the course of the week.  Now, Chris never asked me to take on a role as his personal aide, though I am his right-hand man with a lot of things.  He does after all have a personal assistant in Kathryn Jennex.  However, I’m always concerned with ensuring that Chris is taken care of and that his other obligations outside of NML are taken care of.

So, why do I do this?  Because first, foremost and most importantly, Chris is a close friend of mine who I want to see continue to succeed.  He doesn’t like doing paperwork, organizing or worry about the detail stuff.  That’s not what he’s best at.  I, on the other hand, enjoy doing that and actually need to be organized to function properly.  So, as much as I can, I work with Chris to make sure he doesn’t have to worry about all that “stuff” that would slow him down.  I also work with our internal team to ensure that we’re aligned on processes, staying organized and always moving things like side projects along.  With how busy everything gets, it is very easy to let certain things go astray.  I try my best to ensure that doesn’t happen.

That role doesn’t stop with NML or Chris though.  I function in this role at the steakhouse and at home too.  Joe, my best friend and business partner at Caminito, is just like Chris in how he feels about “stuff”.  Joe is best at being our Executive Chef, not at organizing, planning, logistics (except as it relates directly to the functioning of service).  At home, I naturally fall into this role because of how much I do it by day.  I handle the bills, the scheduling of maintenance, logistics, and anything else that will help Laura and I out.  That’s not to say that Laura doesn’t do a ton of “stuff” that keeps us functioning.  Things like laundry, dirty dishes and tons more seem to always escape me.  She keeps me in line with that stuff.

I guess that makes me a “Chief of Stuff” kinda too, huh?  I’m okay with that and actually enjoy it.  So, my official title may be “General Manager” but I thing “Chief of Stuff” is a little more fun

What are you the Chief of?  How do you handle all of the “stuff” that needs to be taken care of on a daily, weekly or monthly basis?

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]]> http://justinrlevy.com/2009/07/being-the-chief-of-stuff/feed/ 11 http://justinrlevy.com/2009/03/using-social-media-to-drive-sales-for-small-business/ http://justinrlevy.com/2009/03/using-social-media-to-drive-sales-for-small-business/#comments Tue, 31 Mar 2009 12:37:35 +0000 Justin Levy http://justinrlevy.com/?p=996 Recently I had the opportunity to speak at Social Media Jungle: Boston hosted by Jeff Pulver.  The topic of my presentation was how brick and mortar businesses can use social media to drive sales.

Click here to view the embedded video.

If you run a small business, how do you use new media for your business?  Has it been successful?  What tools do you choose to use?

Today, Danny Brown takes over my blog with a guest post about eating and social media…two of my favorite things

I’m a man that likes his food. While I may not always be the healthiest of eaters, I do try and stay away from the junk and eat as much homemade food as possible. Not always easy to juggle with time constraints, but I try.Being a meat lover, I’ve already told Justin that if I’m ever in Northampton, MA then I’ll be stopping over at his Caminito Argentinean Steakhouse for a house special. I already have a huge amount of respect for Justin, and the fact that he can feed me meat just adds to his star!

It’s pretty apt that he has this steakhouse, as I’ve often said that using social media is a lot like eating at a good steakhouse.

Strategy Appetizers

You always have to start somewhere, and it can be confusing. Looking at the menu, not knowing what you want with so much on offer. Sure, your friends may have been there before, but who’s to say you’ll always like what they do?

Best approach? Take your time. Find out what looks good to you and your tastes. Don’t be afraid to experiment a little – after all, if you don’t like your first choice there’s always the next time. The main thing is go with what you feel would be best for you.

Recommended starters: flickr, Facebook, MySpace

Filling Up On The Main Course

Once you’ve overcome your curiosity and wetted your taste buds with the appetizer, you’re ready for the main course. This is where you can really go to town. You know what you like and what works for you, so now’s the time to start satisfying your hunger.

Don’t be afraid to experiment. The great thing with main courses is that you can really mix and match to get a meal that’s just right for you. Take traditional courses and add your own flavor. Treat it like a buffet, if you want – mix up side dishes that wouldn’t normally be recommended and add little nuggets here and there as you go along.

The trick to really enjoying a main course is knowing that it’s the reason you’re here. Don’t be left disappointed – sample the dishes that appeal to you the most.

Recommended main courses: twitter, blogging, technorati, friendfeed, LinkedIn, delicious, Viddler

Spoil Yourself With Dessert

The way to finish any good meal (apart from a great wine) is with dessert – it just adds the perfect touch to a (hopefully) perfect experience. Besides, who doesn’t like spoiling themselves?

What’s ideal about desserts is that there generally aren’t any bad ones. Unless you have an aversion to sweet things, then there are all sorts of decadent goodies waiting for you. Best approach to dessert? Just lick your lips and dive in!

Recommended desserts: Wordcamp, Podcamp, tweetups

Of course, everyone eats differently. How do you satisfy your hunger?

——

Danny Brown is the owner of Press Release PR, a boutique agency combining traditional PR and marketing with social media. He provides consultancy services to clients in both the consumer and commercial markets, from small start-ups to Fortune 500 businesses.

He is also founder of the 12for12k Challenge, a unique charity project using social media to change the lives of millions in 2009. You can read more from Danny at his social media PR and marketing blog or connect with Danny on twitter.