Empty Tables in your restaurant; don't you just love 'em? You have a full staff, and a restaurant full of empty tables.

If I could show you a way to leverage the emerging social technologies such as Twitter, eMail marketing, SMS messaging, FaceBook and real-time website pop ups on your website to fill a few of those empty tables with warm paying bodies at a moment?s notice, would you listen?

You know the restaurant business; we are Geeks developing a whole new concept in restaurant reservations, and project that is moving ahead rapidly.

In discussions about the vital email collection and management console, and while on our iPhones using Twitter, FaceBook and the various real-time social networking technologies, we realized that these technologies can be melded together into one tight, integrated, easy to use, real-time communications platform.

We wanted a silly website name to describe this unique new interface between you and your customers, and came up with TwoogleFace.com.

TwoogleFace allows you to instantly communicate special coupon type instant offers to your favorite customers when you notice that you have an empty house that is not likely to fill up organically.

It is 8:20 pm on a Tuesday evening, things are slow and you are paying an entire crew with no one to serve. Use the TwoogleFace console to immediately send out an offer for 15% off.

TwoogleFace quietly goes to work behind the scenes instantly presenting the coupon offer on your website, sends an email, SMS message or Twitter message including FaceBook to all of your customers who have signed up for your real-time marketing offers.

Sam is just finishing up after a long day at the office and wondering where to go for a late dinner - comes in to eat. Mary is on her way back into town from an out-of-town demo and really doesn't feel like cooking - when she notices your offer on her FaceBook page on her iPhone. You have another customer.

Everybody wins. Sam and Mary were not considering eating at your restaurant, but with the 15% off it seems a good solution. You have seated two people that would not have otherwise come in for zero cost (there are minor SMS fees to a gateway if you include SMS messages).

Get innovative with your TwoogleFace offers sending out real-time invitations as events end in your area. Encourage customers to dine with you at times that they would normally not consider it. Capture the vast mobility offered in today's world to increase your customer base.

Unlike the newspaper advertising of yesteryear (back when there were still real newspapers), there are either zero or nominal costs to sending out messages that are read by people who are already interested in what you are offering.

Because TwoogleFace is real-time and interactive you use it only when your experience tells you it will be helpful ? and you decide on the spur of the moment and transmit your message immediately to your growing list of 'preferred' customers.

Give us a call at 253-238-1246 when you are ready to talk about moving marketing for your restaurant to the next level. Let's toss it around and hook you up!

For now all we will say is that TwoogleFace'ing your restaurant customers is an exciting new way of communicating with them that uses the latest hot technologies, such as FaceBook, Twitter, Google, MySpace, iPhone.... well you see where we are going with that.

Special twitterThreads will be broadcast to the world [well, at least your customers that are TwoogleFace'ing with you] allowing you ensure world peace and that you will live to be 300 [OK increase your restaurant's recently elusive bottom line in this crappy depression].

A challenge for today's restaurant owner in today's 'new economy,' is in figuring out ways to become more lean while maintaining your business development goals. As revenues decline, savvy owners need to seek out new ways to leverage the impact of dwindling marketing dollars in ways that are more effective and controllable than ever. The days of one or two local newspapers being the primary information exchange medium about your restaurant are long gone.

One of the best initiatives that you can undertake is to begin to harness the exponential opportunity offered by intelligent use of email marketing. Using a well designed email marketing campaign, you will turn 'new customers' into repeat customers, if you go about it right.

A major component of the SimpleREZ restaurant reservation software system is our powerful email list management and marketing application.

• We recommend that you offer, in a prominent location on the home page of your website, a textbox control that allows customers to join your 'Can-Spam' compliant email list. Be sure to clearly tell them that you will not share their address and describe the types and frequency of the emails that they may expect (i.e. your monthly newsletter, coupons, special menus and events notices...)
• Based on your restaurant's culture, you should seek out other non-intrusive ways to solicit your customers' email addresses. Ideas include having a sign-up list or blank cards at the host station, or a small touch-screen computer kiosk allowing them to enter their email address safely, discretely and securely in a few seconds on their way out.
• Develop your email marketing culture. Come up with a simple, to the point, easy on the eyes newsletter design that showcases various types of content as needs arise; pictures, text, coupons and news. Establish a pattern of emailing. Monthly or weekly depending on the frequency of news you have to convey. Examples would be a restaurant with live bands that change often may easily email weekly; more staid restaurants are probably better off with a monthly newsletter supplemented with special editions for Christmas, New Years, Valentine's Day, Mothers Day, and so on.
• Follow through. Your email marketing campaign will become the 'bread and butter' power producer of your overall marketing strategy when you compare cost to results obtained.

Even if your restaurant is not ready to include a reservation system in your website, give us a call and let's explore how we can include a friendly email address gathering tool in your site.