Love the restaurant industry... Worked in many restaurants in operations, management, consulting, and marketing, here are my thoughts...

My advice after been there and done that is to try everything... (I know it sounds crazy but hear me out)

1) Word of mouth - The Good ol' tried and true method... someone had a great experience on food or service, tells their friend, guarantee to have people visit you... (so how do you get them in or back more frequently?)

2) Social Media - It's a mess out there in the social media world, the more noise you can make the better... not only develop friendships but also invite prominent local bloggers and yelpers to visit your restaurant... giving away food and a great experience is also a form of marketing... (no matter what, marketing cost money regardless...)

3) Create events, favorable deals and coupons for your business, and keep it lively! - Not all coupons, deals, events, freebies is bad for business... it's how you work it and how creative you are! The most important thing here is to cover your cost and have them become repeat customers.. maybe it won't pay off in the beginning, but in the end it will be all worth it.. (You know your bottom line in cost to run your business)

4) Don't be stingy - If you raise prices don't decrease the size of serving... if necessary, give a little more without telling your customers.. If there was a complaint on service, take care of your customers instead of fighting them... yes there are bad customers but you will eventually weed them out, but in the end, it's your graciousness that will shine thru and win over more business! Remember, these costs will build to more business in the future, You may not think it this way but it's also a form of marketing...

5) Beware of Marketing Services but DEFINITELY hear all of them out! (Listening is FREE, just take a couple minutes of your time) - Not all marketing companies out there is trying to make a quick buck off you... (In our case, our MOSE app) Here are some popular ones that I had experience with...

1) Groupon - Community coupon service, favorable for hit-n-run customers, high investment with a low return rate, good for exposure. (I personally thinks that Groupons works extremely well for products and services, but not restaurants... Restaurants simply has too high of a operational cost which will work against the owners (I know a couple restaurants almost shut down because of using Groupon... but if you offer gym memberships, toys, products, etc.. Groupon is a wonderful way to sell your offerings!)

2) Yelp - A Review site, no need to pay for the service... people go to your restaurant because of the reviews but not the marketing services that yelp provides... Ad is way too expensive per click rate.. (Varies from $1.10 - $5.00 from what I've heard) But great company providing lots of searchable results!

3) Five Star Loyalty - Expensive! They provide a fancy tablet for people to enter their phone numbers to get rewarded. Yes.. all reward programs are great, but the cost for Five Star may be the falling point for using them.. (not to mention that they have raised pricing without prior disclosure) But neat idea of using a tablet for loyalty. (which you have to also pay for)

4) FB/Twitter/Instagram/Snapchat, etc... It's the new Word of Mouth!!! Be sure to get on it and have an account for your business on all platforms! However, their marketing service such as ads are just like the billboards across town! Think about it... how many times have you seen a billboard on the freeway, knowing what the message is, but yet you have never spend any money on that advertised goods/services? It's about exposure which is very important, but there are cheaper ways out there to get exposure across to the people... Exposure is a must and cannot be ignored, but just don't expect them to generate lots of ROI just because you have signed up for an ad. Don't forget to keep the noise coming!

5) Paper coupons/ads - One of the proven methods, but high cost in terms of printing and distribution via mail... Paper coupons can also be lost or tossed resulting in a waste of money for the advertisers... Yes.. coupon works well, but there are better ways nowadays to get your coupons thru to your targeted audiences.

6) Delivery services - Eat24/Grubhub/ChowNow/UberEats. These services are great and I think that as a restaurant it's important to offer this service to your customers. However, do remember that there is a pretty high cost associated with each order but to me, it's still worth it because you are not paying a delivery driver + insurance... understand that the % goes to the deliver service and you are simply making a cut off your menu items.. (I recommend to sign up with all the services but talk to them and see if you can work a deal with them), but the more service you are listed on the better! (not everyone use only one delivery service)

Whew... I'm sure that was a lot to take in...but.....

In the end, it's all about trying everything and keep yourself open and available on all platforms, service, methods, etc... (While making sure that the cost to the service is fair to you!) Just remember, marketing cost money one way or another... You will never be able to ignore that!

If anyone is interested in learning what MOSE app is all about and how it can help your business, contact me and let me know (www.moseapp.com)... I guarantee you will be quite delighted and surprised! Hope to talk to some of you owners soon!

Good Luck!