Day 134 – The Puzzle – What Would I Do Today If I Was Opening A Sandwich Shop

Today, I was on a podcast with a Restaurant influencer in Ireland. He asked me a simple question: “What would I do if I were opening a sandwich shop to compete with the big brands?”

This was easy

A

B

R

Attract, build, & retain. 

My advice is simple.

#1 – I’d do what I could to ATTRACT attention every day as far out from the opening as possible.  If I knew I was starting a restaurant in 8 months, I would begin creating content EVERY DAY.  I’d use every social media platform to start telling my story and post every day. 

#2 – I’d leverage that attention to BUILD a database and online following. I’d make sure that every piece of content I created helped me build an email and text list and followers on Facebook and Instagram. 

#3 – Then I’d do whatever it took to RETAIN their business, but more importantly, their ATTENTION!

Friends, marketing is not complicated or expensive in 2024.  Use the platforms we all have available to us every day and create conversations, stop SELLING!

CLICK HERE to watch the entire interview, which is around 15 minutes long.

Day 134 – The Puzzle – The Pie Is Shrinking, Go Get Your Fair Share

It is what it is.

Food costs are insane, and eating out at many restaurants is the most expensive I’ve ever seen.  This is forcing customers, as shown above, to eat out less.  

But I think this podcast sums it up best: YOU need to do more to get MORE of the pie that IS available.  

HAVE A LISTEN…CLICK HERE

Day 133 – The Puzzle – At Least I Grabbed My Shades

It’s funny how the universe speaks to us.

As I headed out for a walk yesterday afternoon I grabbed my sunglasses, which might sound like no big deal, but I regularly forget them on walks.  

I needed to clear my head, get away from my computer, and walk off dinner.

As I got half a mile into the walk, it started to sprinkle, and I could see heavier rain in the distance, so I turned around. I wasn’t too worried about getting wet but figured I’d avoid the brunt of the storm and head home.  As I walked back, I was hit by rain on my right and the sun on my left.  I thought it was a funny sign based on the week’s events, you win some, you lose some, is what went through my head. 

Then the sun went away, and the rain came down harder.  I didn’t care.  I kept walking at the same pace, whether it was raining or 90 and sunny.  

That’s when it hit me, “Matt, this is how you have to approach the ups and downs every week, with the same speed and direction.”

As I made the half-mile walk back home through the rain, I smiled, knowing the universe was looking out for me and showing me how to apply what happens in everyday life to my business life. The fact that it was raining, literally, didn’t affect my pace or demeanor. So why should I allow it to when it’s raining, figuratively?

Friends, every day isn’t going to be sunshine and rainbows.  There are going to be storms, and it’s up to us to keep our shit together and work through it the exact way we’d celebrate a victory.   

Day 132 – The Puzzle – The Edge

The Edge

Get close, but also know when you are TOO close.

This morning, as I opened the cubbard to grab a coffee cup, this mug was staring me right in the face. This is from an attraction in New York called The Edge.

The universe was speaking to me.

It was relevant because at the exact time I was getting ready to consume some coffee I was in the midst of finding a solution to a big problem we have, one that punched me in the face yesterday.

In business, you have to push the boundaries. You have to take the risks that most people would run from.

But more importantly, you also have to be able to recognize when you’ve gone too far.

When you need to alter your course.

You need to be able to get close enough to the EDGE to see the danger, but not fall off.

Day 131 – The Puzzle – He’s Doing This In His Restaurant, Why Aren’t Others?

289 times Dean and his staff did this.

As I tuned in Friday to watch Episode 4 of Heroes of Hospitality, I decided to open Dean’s dashboard to see how his program is doing and whether he’s continued the momentum he had in ONE VERY SPECIFIC AREA: his in-store marketing opt-ins.

For any marketing program to succeed, it must start inside your four walls. In May, when we traveled to film with Dean, I saw how it can be done at a high level. This part of the marketing equation really sticks out to me because it’s what I’ve seen most of our clients fail to do every day.  

As you know, the success or failure of your restaurant’s marketing starts and ends with your customer database.  And there are 4 main ways you can grow your database

– 1st – In-Store

– 2nd – Point Of Sale

– 3rd – Website & Online Ordering

– 4th – Social Media

75% of your best customers will come from #1, the customers YOU make an effort to gain from your in-store marketing.  To take that a step further, this is where you’re team SELLS your marketing program “I’m going to guess you’d love a free dessert your next visit, right?”

When we visited Dean, it was apparent he and I were on the same page. He not only had graphics everywhere, but they were high-quality. And on top of that, he wasn’t relying on luck for customers to engage with them; his employees were ALL OVER THIS!  

Now, here is an even more important part: Dean’s had been a client of ours for four years leading up to this point, so one might think that every customer would be burnt out from hearing about a VIP or Loyalty / Rewards program for his restaurant, but they weren’t.  Even up to March when Dean was on our old program, his employees continued to gain new opt-ins at record paces compared to every client in our marketing programs.  When he launched his Repeat Returns program in late April his staff had something new to switch to, and it made sense that he’d have a lot of in-store signups.  But, it’s usually the 45-60 day mark when the “New” wears off.  

When I watched Dean’s episode of Heroes of Hospitality on Friday, August 16th, we were around 120 days into his program, so I figured the honeymoon was over with his staff. I figured his in-store efforts had fallen off.

When I logged into his dashboard, I was blown away! It had not fallen off; in fact, it had grown!  

One thing that’s HUGE in our business is seeing thousands of marketing campaigns at once.  The expertise we gain by seeing all of these restaurants in our software is why we can build successful marketing programs for restaurants daily.  We have the data, we have the insights.  It’s no different than you making 1,000 steaks per month and me grilling four; you’ll always be light years ahead of me with your knowledge and expertise.  It’s your craft, just like restaurant marketing is ours.  

So when I logged into his dashboard, I figured I’d be greeted with the disappointment I am most days as it relates to restaurants growing their database inside of their Repeat Returns marketing program (now DRYVER).  I figured I’d see new customers only from their POS integration or online ordering through their website.  But Deans was different; 289 of the past 500 customers who opted into his restaurant’s customer marketing program came from IN-STORE!!!!  Here we are four months later, and his staff is still KICKING ASS!! 

Somehow, Dean can get his employees to do what 99% of the restaurants in America can’t; TALK TO CUSTOMERS!

That’s all I’ve got for you today, but there’s much more to come.  

I highly encourage you to click below and watch what Dean has to say, and if you’ve not watched episodes 1-3, do that too. 

To watch Episode 4 of the Heroes Of Hospitality and the other three episodes, CLICK HERE!

Day 130 – The Puzzle – Weekly Vivid Vision Update – Our New HQ

The back page of our new Vivid Vision is our new HQ I want to build by May 17th, 2027.  

You can see the back page below; recently, someone asked me WHY.  Why 48,000 square feet?  Why a hot tub and basketball courts?  

WHY?

WHY?

WHY?

Well, why the hell not?!  My thoughts are simple: create something no one can ignore.  Create something that makes every employee of other companies question why they work where they do.   Create a space that fosters energy, excitement, and innovation.  

I want to build a campus that employees want to come on their free time, one that fosters a healthy life.  And I also want to build a place restaurant owners DREAM of coming to for a workshop.  

Do we need everything on there?  Probably not, but why shoot for a lame-ass office with drywall and a drop ceiling?

I can’t wait to start building this out and have 3D models created; it’s going to be awesome.  

My vision for the building is a container park inside a giant building with a giant glass entrance and water feature.  The inside will be built in an H pattern.  The layout will be like a mullet, with business in the front and a party in the back 🙂 The front of the building will be all operations, the middle the library, and rooms like that.  The back of the building will be all of the fun stuff.  I envision the second floor walking out to a rooftop patio that’s above the back part of the building.  I want to have the space inside and on the roof to host 100-person events.  

CLICK HERE to see our entire V V

Day 129 – The Puzzle – The One Page Restaurant Marketing Plan

I’m working on building the Ultimate Restaurant Marketing Guide.

Imagine a straightforward, one-page marketing plan that you can easily build on, followed by a weekly 1-page plan. That’s the essence of the Ultimate Restaurant Marketing Guide I’m developing.  

I’m doing this a little differently than you might expect, though.  Everything I’ve created that’s worked well was something I built for my own use.  As an example, back in 2015, I needed a tool to build a database for my client’s restaurant that showed trackable results.  I didn’t make it to sell; I built it to fix the problem we saw with the marketing plan.  Well, that tool, the ROI Engine, launched this company nationwide and worked exclusively with restaurants. 

When I started on this project, I was building a plan for you, restaurant owners.  Then I thought, “I’m not happy with our marketing plan; it sucks!”

With that in mind, I thought, what if I outline this plan and then relate it to what I need for DRYVER and America’s Best Restaurants?  

I’m not going to lay everything out in this one blog; this is simply my start.

First, I start with a mission, “Massive Attention & Excitement.”

Attention is what every one of us needs.  If our ideal customers saw our brands 100x times more than they do now, they’d spend more money with us.  And on top of that, if they were excited about what we were doing or what we could do for them, they’d spend more money with us.

And let’s face it, our customers spending more money with us is ALL WE ARE AFTER!

Second, WHERE can I get that attention & create excitement?

From here, I list these opportunities in order of importance and ease because EASY makes things more repeatable. 

#1 In-Store – By a mile, this is your #1 opportunity to grow your sales.  These people have made the most significant commitment to you, yet you all ignore them.  Research shows that 95% of consumers are never engaged verbally with an “ASK” to get their information.  And to make that even worse, 95% will give you whatever you want when propositioned correctly.  Why is this data so important?  Well, you know they’ve at least visited once, and it’s the only way you can guarantee a future conversation through email, text, and messenger.  

#2  Website—I’ve been preaching website optimization since 2010, which is how I got into the marketing consulting and agency world. In 1999, I created a website for an online-only boat and RV dealership that my brother, dad, and I started. We took that website and built a three-location $15 million per year dealership. That was over twenty years ago. The importance of the web today is one million times more important. 

#3 Email List – I was told in 2010 that email was going away.  During this time, I was doing seminars monthly on the power of email marketing and this thing called “Facebook.”  We all know that email did not go away, but it is alive and doing well.  Email is your lowest-hanging fruit with regard to reaching your customers; you have to use it carefully.  

#4 Text List—We all live on our phones, and text alerts are. the easiest notifications to see daily. The textthrough rates are insanely high. The only issue with texting is that you must use it with caution. Consumers don’t want texts as often as emails, and you should limit texting to high-value CTAs (calls to action).

#5 Messenger List—Messenger is the same as texting. The issue is that most of you don’t have software hooked up to your Facebook and Instagram accounts that will help you take advantage of it. I’d say Messenger is a cross between email and text because you can get away with more than text, but not as much as email. 

#6 Organic Social Media – It’s free, easy, and a MUST!  But you can’t post your damn food every day. I’m creating an easy-to-implement plan that offers you the variety you need to build a social media following that’s paying attention. 

#7 Paid Social Media Ads – Facebook and Instagram ads are the BIGGEST innovation in marketing EVER!  You can target anyone, anywhere for any reason.  The cost per engagement and lack of waste make this a GOLD MINE!  Plus, no one uses it, so you’ll dominate it quickly for a few hundred dollars monthly. 

#8 Community Marketing—My friends, this is as important as #2, but it’s not easy and duplicatable. And for many of us, it’s not something we can do every day. So that’s the only reason it is way down here. 

The second column below is for my company.  I don’t have “in-store,” but I do have a sales team, so that’s the closest thing I have.  After that, we are both the same.  The third column will become YOU!

Stay tuned,

MP

Day 128 – The Puzzle – Why You Don’t Need Google Ads For A Restaurant

Google just proved me right!

Recently, I did a podcast on why restaurants should not waste money on paid Google ads.  CLICK HERE to listen to episode 695.  

This topic arose recently because a large restaurant marketing firm was touting this as a better option than Social Media.

Let’s start with a simple question: when was the last time you Googled to find a restaurant nearby? Chances are, it’s not a common practice. Even as someone who dines out 10-15 times a week, I can recall only a couple of instances over the past decade when I’ve used a search engine to find a restaurant. We tend to know what’s around us.   Our dining decisions are often influenced by what’s on our mind, which is where social media comes in-a powerful tool to capture attention more frequently.

As I was writing this blog post, I thought, “I’m going to Google restaurants near me and see what ads come up.” 

Surprisingly, no ads were displayed in the search results.

Think about that. Google ONLY makes money on ads. I posted that Google search above. The first piece of evidence is that Google showed me the FREE listings of restaurants near me. So, if you were buying ads, you would not be first, which is the goal. The second piece of evidence is the image below. This is what was listed after those listings—NO ADS!  So the fact that NONE OF YOU are buying these ads is even more evidence that it’s not a good idea.  

A much better place to spend your hard-earned dollars is on paid Facebook and Instagram ads.

See you tomorrow.

Day 127 – The Puzzle – My 5 Day Fast & Why

My blog title is “The Puzzle.”

The motivation for The Puzzle came from studying how businesses are built. But also from a childhood memory of a puzzle my mom and I made.  A puzzle that, like many businesses, we never finished.  

WHY?  Because we could not find one piece.  We ended up taking a similar colored clay and making the last piece. 

I can still picture that puzzle.  We bought a frame for it and put it up on the wall.  I can still see that spot we filled in with blue clay.

I’m just like all of our restaurant clients, trying to build my puzzle every day, and I can’t say that we’ll ever have every piece in place on one given day.  

One of the puzzle pieces is you and I.  As business owners and visionaries, we are a key piece of the puzzle.  

Every day, I think about improving myself.  I think about what I can do to make my mind, body, and spirit unbreakable.  Becoming unbreakable is impossible, but you might as well aim right, right?

Now, to why I’m fasting.  We’ll get into my current five-day fast, but first, let’s talk about why I’m not doing my planned seven-day fast.

Last Thursday, I decided to do a seven-day fast. Then, around 5 p.m. on Friday, around 23 hours into the fast, I thought, “That means I won’t be able to grill with the family tomorrow or eat with the family when we move my daughter back to college that Sunday.”  So, just like that, I canceled the planned seven-day fast and said, “I’ll start a five-day fast on Sunday.”

You see, while I can create some goals and stick to them, I can also “reason” with myself.  I’m all for getting healthy and creating a better me, but being happy is also a part of that.  And I wasn’t willing to give up those weekend moments (and meals) for that.

So, on Sunday, the five-day fast started around 12:30 pm.  

This year, I told myself I’d do a five-day fast every quarter, along with my daily intermittent fasting.  This is my third one.  There are many benefits to fasting like this, the biggest one being your body getting a reset.  That reset has been proven to kill cancer cells.  On top of that, your body goes into a state where it burns off your stored body fast as energy since there’s no new energy coming into your body in the form of food. 

Funny fact: They say your body has around 100,000 stored calories. So, if you need around 2,000 daily, you have 30-50 days of stored calories. Crazy, right?  

Of course, besides the reasons above, there is also weight loss. I lost 8 pounds the first time and five in the second. I’ll lose 3-5 pounds this time.  

Last but not least for me is brain health.  Research also indicates that a part of your brain gets bigger, a good part, when you do things you don’t want to do, and let’s face it, none of us want to go five days without eating.  

For me, a person who’s done many one-day fasts is better than it may be for someone who has never fasted.  But it’s honestly not bad.  The most challenging part is thinking about eating.  As I type this, I’m halfway through and not hungry.  All I’ve had the past 2 1/2 days is water, water with electrolytes, salt water, and coffee.  I’ve also chewed four pieces of sugar-free gum, which is fine.  

Tomorrow evening through Thursday morning is usually the most challenging time for me. I did have a rough spot around 5 pm today while working out. My energy was low, and my mindset needed to be corrected.  I tend to notice I let negative daily items impact me more during this, basically slight mood swings.  I also think I had too much coffee today, which might be to blame for my rough afternoon.

But I know what you’re thinking. You’re working out while not eating!  Yes, it’s proven that HIT workouts are an excellent combo for fasting.  In fact, on day four of my first five-day fast, I had the best workout I can recall in years.  At that point, your body is tapping into immense stored energy, and you can do much more than you’d ever thought.  

Friends, especially restaurant owners and parents.  It’s your job to lead your tribe, and if they see you being unhealthy, overweight, and not caring for yourself, ask yourself, “What kind of example am I setting.”

Talk to you tomorrow,

MP

Day 126 – The Puzzle – New Sleeping Routine That’s Working

This is the easiest hack of all; it’s like going back to 2006 before our smartphones ruled our lives.

One rule we’ve stuck to as adults we’ve never had a TV in our room.  

WHY?  Research shows that when you train your body to lay in bed and ONLY go to sleep, versus watching TV, you properly train your brain about WHY you’re in your bed.  

Well, that worked great for me until the past few years.  While we never added a TV to our bedroom, I did add one to my hand, my iPhone.  Up until a week ago, my nighttime ritual became to lay in bed and find every reason possible to play on my phone and obsess about the next day.  

So I came up with an idea.  I would no longer take my phone to bed and work towards being off it and a laptop for an hour before bed.  The only problem was I love my iPhone alarm. 

I’ve found the ring I love and a volume that doesn’t wake my wife when I get up a few hours before her daily.  

Then it hit me.  I had two extra iPhones on my desk that I’ve collected through the years.  I took one and deleted everything possible from it and did not hook it up to wifi.  And I left it in airplane mode.  As you can see in the picture above, there’s only one icon on it: the alarm clock. 

Well, I’m six nights into this idea, I’ve had zero issues falling asleep, and I’m waking up more refreshed.  

So there you go, my simple sleep hack.  Back to the basics: no TV and no smartphone.