How to Write Menu Descriptions that People Want to Read
Did you know that the average diner will spend less than 2 minutes reading your restaurant menu? Some people will only peruse the entrees, and some will beeline straight for their favorite protein. And some cheapos will just skim prices, looking for the lowest number they can find. (I feel you, fellow cheapos.) So you don’t have a lot of time to sell your best dishes. With limited real estate and even more limited attention spans, you need to make your menu descriptions helpful and enticing. So here are some menu writing tips that will put the winner in your dinner. Draw an accurate picture Word choice is important, and space…
57+ Creative Topics for Your Wedding Venue Blog
Coming up with content ideas is one of the toughest part of blogging, no matter the industry. Fortunately for wedding venue managers, there is a wealth of ideas to write about weddings! From bridal style to centerpiece ideas to etiquette to the newest trends, you have a vast range of topics to write about. I’ve pulled together nearly 60 topic ideas that you can refer to any time you’re stuck and need a bite from the blogging muse. Real Weddings You have a steady stream of content ideas flowing through your venue every weekend during wedding season. I’m talking about the real weddings that you’ve already booked. These are your calling card. They’re…
5 Reasons Copywriting is the Special Sauce You Need
Listen, I understand that it seems a little self-serving for a copywriter to explain why copywriting is so important. That would be like a turkey explaining why ham is a superior Thanksgiving protein. But the value of copywriting is an established fact, just like ham’s dominance over turkey. Since there is often some confusion about what exactly this type of writing entails, I thought I’d share an overview of copywriting — what it is, and why it’s important for businesses of all sizes. What is copywriting? The simplest definition? Copywriting is the words on the page (aka the “copy”) that get the audience to take an action. This includes the…
The Magic of Transition Words for Better Writing
Today, we’re going to unlearn one of the silly rules that was forced upon us in high school English class, and instead do something that makes sense. We’re going to add informal transition words to our writing. Now, the powers-that-be never banned transition words on their own. But there were certain words that we were absolutely forbidden to use at the beginning of a sentence, like “and” or “but.” I am here to give you carte blanche to throw that rule out the window and go bananas with transitions. Why use transition words? Transition words display the logical relationship between two thoughts. They help the reader follow your ideas from…
The Easy Guide to Search Intent
Just yesterday, a client asked me to write a blog post around a certain keyword. For the sake of example, let’s say it was wedding caterer Austin*. The client currently appears on page three of Google search results for that keyword, and they want to get up to page one. Now, this company is a Central Texas wedding caterer, and they have a strong website. So a well-optimized piece of content that focuses on that keyword should be able to get to page one. But when I got started, I ran into a snag regarding that keyword’s search intent. And it was a good reminder that not every keyword is…
The Quickest Way to Lose Customers
After a sleepless night of tossing and turning, jarred awake every few minutes by the A/C roaring to life, I finally began to drift off around 7:00 AM. Then… BANG! Thunder that sounded like Zeus himself was chucking lightning bolts at the foot of the bed, and a torrential downpour like marbles pelting the metal roof. I groaned and rolled over, trying to find a comfortable position on my lumpy pillow. But then the wind picked up, adding to the ferocity of the storm and whistling through chinks in the window facing the lake. “Our firewood is getting soaked,” I told Kirby, who also could not sleep. I got up…
How to Share User Generated Content — And Stay Out of Trouble
Around my house, I’m known as “The Disposal.” This is because I go hunting for any bits and bobs in the refrigerator or pantry, and combine them into some kind of Frankenstein’s monster-type lunch — aka, I eat like the garbage disposal. A bit of leftover rice, ground beef, and some veggies? That’s about to be a stir-fry. Some mushrooms and scallions? Hello, omelet-city. I’m all about using what I have and turning it into something to fill the hole in my tummy — to sometimes questionable effect. User Generated Content (aka UGC) is the leftover ground beef in the fridge. You can (and should) repurpose it into part of…
Designing A Restaurant Website: Tips From A Pro
I am a millennial. And as such, I am slavishly devoted to a food item called the Avocado Toast. On their own, both toast and avocados are bit bland. But when you mush that fatty avocado goodness onto a piece of crispy toast and add a sprinkle of salt and pepper on top, some kind of food alchemy turns it into a gift from the gods. A great restaurant website is the Avocado Toast of your marketing. Your site design is the crispy toast. Excellent, SEO-focused copy is the avocado. And when it comes together, magic happens. While I know a lot about the copy side of the restaurant website,…
Restaurant Website Content Ideas to Boost Your Search Engine Ranking
In a perfect world, when your customers search for “Best Thai food in town”, your wonderful Thai restaurant would pop up as the first Google result. But you and I live in the real world. And we know that’s probably not going to happen. That’s because of sites like Yelp, Foursquare, and TripAdvisor. These sites are so huge, so regularly updated, and get so many visitors that your little Thai restaurant can’t compete with them in SEO (search engine optimization). So when people search for “best Thai food in town”, they’re going to get a bunch of results like this: The top results are all review sites. But you…
Get Started with Google Analytics for Restaurants
When I worked for a big local restaurant a few years ago, we did weekly meetings where we would talk about “the numbers.” We discussed F&B sales, labor costs, cost of goods, rental fees, employee turnover, and more. But one number we never dove into was our web traffic. This was entirely due to the ignorance of the executive team, including myself. At the time, I didn’t even know how to monitor web traffic, let alone what to do with the information if I had it. To put it simply, I didn’t know what I didn’t know. Since then, I’ve learned a lot about online marketing, and I’ve gotten better…
