Marketing Restaurant Online

Every day we hear the buzz about Web 2.0 and how it can be helpful in marketing your restaurant virtually for free or very low price. So what is Web 2.0? There are many definitions for Web 2.0 but I will try to explain Web 2.0 with some examples to the best of my ability.

Wikipedia describes The term “Web 2.0” as the changing trends in the use of World Wide Web technology and web design that aim to enhance creativity, communications, secure information sharing, collaboration and functionality of the web.

Web 2.0 concepts have led to the development and evolution of web-culture communities and hosted services, such as social-networking sites like myspace.com, facebook.com, video sharing sites like youtube.com, wikis, and blogs. The interesting thing to note here is that Web 2.0 has changed the way we communicate, interact, work or do anything in this new information age.

I would compare the old version of Web to a walkie talkie. The communication was limited to only only 2 people and the communication channel was one way. There was no way the multiple people could talk at the same time. Web 2.0 changed the equation by allowing multiple channel of communication with unlimited number of people.
Old Web could also be compared to a boring lecture where the communication was one way towards the students without having an option for  the students to voice their opinions about the topics or the lecture. With the introduction of Web 2.0 the lecture becomes two ways interactive learning experience where lecturer could provide valuable lessons to the students and students can discuss their opinion about the topics, collaborate their collective research and come to the right answer or conclusion rather than just the lecturer deciding the answer.

Web 2.0 is a blessing to all the small businesses including restaurants if one can recognize its potential and use it to their advantage. As I have written in my previous post that Web 2.0 is  not a thing. It is a mindset. One has to change their belief or thought process if you want to achieve success that you have dreamed. Lets face it you started the restaurant business to have more freedom, more time with your family. To find out the real answers, I want to ask you couple of serious questions.

Do you get on time at night to give a goodnight kiss to your kids?
Do you have free time to attend your kid’s school programs?
Do you get to spend enough time with your spouse at home?
Do you get time off for vacations any time you want?

If you have answered yes to all the above question then good for you. However you can still keep your ears and eyes open to the possibilities of new emerging Web 2.0 technology. If you answered No to all or some of the questions then you need to ask seriously why you aren’t achieving the success you dreamt of when you started in the first place. This is a big question. Lot of small business owners struggle to succeed or don’t succeed is because of their being ness. They work and work but focus working on wrong things. Until an unless you change the belief or the thought process you will be doing the same thing that you have been doing for many years. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different result. If you keep on doing the same way you have been doing, you are not going to get there. First you have to change the mindset. Then that will guide you to focus on the right thing. Then only you will get the expected right results. Be - Do and Have. We have heard this but we haven’t learnt the lesson.

To put the lesson Be-Do and Have into perspective I would like to illustrate with two fine examples. We have heard the story about Tom Sawyer where he persuaded his friends to paint the fence. Tom Sawer’s being ness was different. His mindset was different. If his belief was that working hard by himself was the way to go then he would have been sitting the whole day painting the fence. Instead he surrounded himself with the friends who helped him and made his work easier.

Another recent example is the success story of our own president Barack Obama. When he didn’t have any money or resources at all, who he had to be in order to win the presidential election. He stood up and rose high with great leadership to say that they required change in Washington to make America a more economically stable country and well respected around the world. He ran with the unique selling proposition campaign “Change We Can Believe In”  and ultimately he won. But he had to change his belief that despite the odds he could do it.”Yes We Can”. He had to come up with new mindset leaving back the old outdated dogma of political leadership. He had to adopt the new emerging Web 2.0 technology to communicate with his supporters. Watch the interesting thing that happened as compared to Tom Sawyers story. It is just old time and fresh modern day story but the fundamentals remain the same. The only difference is that president got a chance to use Web 2.0 technology to influence more people than Tom Sawyers. He not only was able to influence the supporters to be an army of volunteers but also provide small amounts of donation which compounded to millions of dollars in campaign contribution which was record breaking in the history of American Politics.

Such is the power of Web 2.0 if you can recognize it and take advantage of it. But as I said earlier first thing first. Before you do anything with Web 2.0 you have to change your being ness. You have to change your mindset. Once have mental make up, then you need to act. This action will then result into having success in your restaurant business. It all starts with the change in your mindset. Web 2.0 is not a thing. But it is a mindset.