Lazy Prawn and Piglet Biscuit: Why most restaurants need help

I was going through some photos on my computer today and I came across some pictures I took a few weeks ago. My wife and I were in a town nearby where there's a Chinese restaurant with photos of the menu items in the window. Once we stopped laughing, I took some photos of the dishes:

Mmmm ... who's up for some more Piglet Biscuit? Sounds yummy, right?! Nah I think I'm going to stick with my Melted Pork, it melts before it gets to your mouth.

This is an extreme example of what I touched on in our last blog entry about the importance of good copywriting. These pictures take that to a whole new level. The owners of this business think that they can rely on Google translator to write their menu for them. At least get a human being to translate the original dishes into English! How many piglet biscuits do you think they sold this week?

Like I said, this is an extreme example of basic marketing gone wrong, but lots of other food businesses are making the same mistakes on a smaller scale. Every day I go into cafes and restaurants and in almost all of them see things that could be improved. Spend some money, get a photographer to take photos of the food (at least the above dishes actually look appetizing enough, even if they don't sound it), write your specials on the blackboard instead of a quote of the day. Your customers want to read what you can give them to eat, not what Ghandi said about flowers.

Get someone who speaks the same language as your target market to write your menu. And yes (here comes our sales pitch), get a professional looking website and some marketing advice. Your website will be the first point of contact for many of your customers. If you don't have a website (egad!) they will be left looking at Eatability or UrbanSpoon when they look for your address, phone number or opening hours. Do you really want these third-party businesses to be the first impression you give your customers?

It's a cliche, but sometimes you do have to spend money to make money. In the scheme of things a few hundred bucks for a professional looking menu, sign, or website is not much when you look at the potential returns. So don't be a lazy prawn!