Marketing a restaurant takes careful planning. Location, concept and menu are the primary functions of your restaurant’s unique character and they should be exploited. Even on a shoestring, restaurants have to market themselves. Every restaurant has competition, whether it's the Italian restaurant around the corner, the McDonald's a half-mile away, or even Mom's Thanksgiving leftovers in the home freezer.

There are many ways to market your restaurant, including local newspapers, TV and websites. These are standard paid media methods for advertising. They can be very expensive. There are other marketing tactics that seem small, but can have big results. They can be hit-and-run, sometimes you can have fun with them, but they are definitely serious restaurant marketing tactics.

Guerilla Marketing is using a number of smaller tactics locally, rather than utilizing larger, more expensive tactics, like the TV ads that franchises use. Guerilla tactics are cheap, if not free.

Web Rating — If your service area favors a particular website for restaurant reviews, then actively encourage your clients to go online and rate you there.

Signage — Make sure you have the largest sign that local ordinances will allow and give it the clearest reading, most clever message possible. If you don’t know what your limits are, find out!

Flyers — Make sure people know you are open. Produce fliers periodically and pass as many around as possible. In it, give your patrons 15% off an entree in the following week.

Loyalty Programs — Give patrons a reason to come back often. Offer them something for free after they've bought 10 meals at your restaurant.

Public Relations Stunts — Grab some media attention! Have your staff dress up as chickens and walk around your neighborhood, if you serve the best roast chicken in town. Invite a news staff to dinner or lunch. Be creative. Hand out menus and cards. Do whatever it takes to get noticed.

Great Customer Service and Warmth — Treating people graciously and making them feel special will create buzz. People will tell their friends about a great experience they had. Be sure to periodically review/retrain staff on how customers are treated.

Promotions — Offer special themed dinners, guided wine and cheese tastings and other fun events to give people a reason to come to the restaurant on a usually slow night.

Contests — Just having a fishbowl and collecting business cards allows you to collect valuable information about your customers. Make sure that data gets into a spreadsheet, database, or other information tool. Now you can build an email and snail mail direct marketing campaign.

Customer Comment Cards — Invite criticism from your customers. You’ll learn from those who spend their money to dine in your house. Collect their names, email addresses and birthdates and reward them. Maybe you can e-mail them a special coupon 3 weeks before their birthday.

The Web — Have a website that shows people your menu, your restaurant concept, what kind of payment you accept, your operating hours and your location shown on Google Maps. The Internet is a great marketing tool that is gaining ground on traditional advertising every day.

Word-of-Mouth — Word-of-Mouth is often the best (and cheapest) marketing for a restaurant. If you produce a good product and provide good personal service and people will talk about your restaurant in a positive way.

Manage in the open — Every time there is an opportunity to interact with a customer, it is a valuable “touch” point. It’s your opportunity to win over a new customer, one who will tell their friends and spread invaluable positive word of mouth.

Sampling — Have your most personable server with the best appearance hand out samples. It’ll go a long way towards building relationships with your new customers. This is where your foodservice supplier, Windsor Foods comes in. You provide the waiter and we’ll handle the samples.

Windsor Foods can provide a variety of delicious appetizers. Or, select from our menu of foods that can be scaled into bite size samples from José Olé, Golden Tiger, Bernardi, Fred’s for Starters and The Original Chili Bowl. Let us help you spread the word about your restaurant while they're stopping to grab a sample.

Whichever tactics you employ, you must be active in your marketing. There is no slowing down because your competition is hungry for the business you miss by not marketing. Hopefully, you can use all of the examples shown here and think of a few on your own. It’s a war out there and guerilla tactics in your marketing works!