Goals for bar strategic marketing

Bar services face all the normal marketing challenges of restaurants. However, they present some unique problems, related to the risks of promoting excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages and service to intoxicated people. In addition, bars also have to sell food in often crowded, turbulent environments disconnected from the kitchen.

You must be very careful when selling alcohol not to go against local laws on selling wines, beers and other alcoholic beverages. Many laws limit your ability to advertise or offer incentives and “happy hour” prices. However, there are many responsible shortcuts, such as offering discounts on “top shelf” beverages, home beverages that employ molecular mixing techniques, and food discounts to supplement beverage purchases.

Define Your Marketing Goals

At the end of the day, your goals are to increase sales and profits, but the generic and vague goals are difficult to monitor and achieve. Your goals in marketing your bar may be to increase alcohol sales, create a social environment for your business, attract important demographic segments – such as millennia – or lead people to stay longer and spend more money.

Regardless of your goals and strategies, you should research local alcohol-related regulations to avoid legal problems. Remember that not all promotional ideas are appropriate for each type of bar. For example, organizing a vintage wine tasting event may be inappropriate for a neighborhood bar and steakhouse.

You should always customize any promotion in your bar, direct it to your customers, evaluating the available space and price profile. The following suggestions should trigger some creative marketing ideas:

Embrace Social Networks

Today’s social networking platforms connect people with similar interests in an incomparable way. Millennia-old people often build an active social life through social networks, connecting with people living nearby. Social networking ideas for bar services include the following possibilities:

• Incentives for Members. Only Special advertisements for specific social groups can broaden your social profile and reach.
• Incorporate Customer Ideas. You can open a competition on various social networks, asking your customers for ideas for new foods, snacks, drinks and themes.
• Cultivate Community Groups. Social networks are the ideal platform to promote your bar space for community events, fundraising and casino nights to raise funds for charity and other events.
• Captivating Local Celebrities and Influencers. You can use social networks to get in touch with local celebrities and influence and persuade them to promote an idea, cause or product in your bar.
• Make Relevant Publications. Publish photos, articles, tweets and videos that show the concept of your bar and your clientele.
• Organize Improvised Events. You can encourage your clients to invite their friends for impromptu meetings by holding an informal contest to see who can take as many co-workers, team members or friends as possible.
• Encourage Sharing. Encourage your customers to share photos of food, snacks and colorful drinks. You can share these publications on a digital device or a large screen monitor.
• Incorporate Customer Created Content into Your Marketing. Sharing photos taken by clients, ratings, karaoke performances and other content can attract favorable publicity, encourage referrals and strengthen client loyalty.
• Engage Your Team. The members of your bar staff depend on tips, so every employee of yours also wishes you success.

Use Creative Culinary Trends to Attract Customers

Both bars and restaurants advertise and attract customers, adopting ideas of molecular gastronomy and mixology. The molecular gastronomy movement was named and developed a spherification technique, which transformed liquids into solid and colored spheres. These spheres could add an artistic touch to cocktails and often provide a powerful improved taste.

Design Problems Affecting Bars

There are a number of interior design problems affecting bars, which experienced owners address to make their facilities more comfortable and attractive to customers. Decorations for special occasions are important, and bars often choose to install refrigerators and quick preparation areas to speed up food preparation for bar customers.

Mobile Marketing

The key to success is to offer a personalized message at the right time to the people nearby. People gladly share their location data through their mobile devices.

Tasting Events

These tasting events can have a theme – a certain brandy, a country of origin, festive drinks or other creative concepts. Menu-driven meal tasting events can also attract a conviviality where customers can try different foods, snacks and drinks. Consider sending invitations to the smartphones of people passing by your bar to try a tapas cocktail.

Sponsorship of Local Sports Teams

Most bars depend a lot on regular customers, and people can be very specific about the atmosphere of their bar and their customer group. One of the easiest ways to attract regular customers who share the same tastes is to sponsor a local sports team.

Advertising through Events and Tricks

Successful bar promotion events include bar tours, treasure hunts, contests, vacation events and entertainment. Guerrilla marketing – which can include spreading messages in abandoned buildings, cleaning graffiti in the city and disguising staff members for Halloween or for a famous movie or sports championship – can generate a lot of publicity on the Internet and in traditional media.

Living Large with Immediate Orders

The bar’s profit is often concentrated in the few hours before and at midnight. This means that it is essential to accelerate the service, receive orders quickly and still have time to involve customers and assess the feeling of each client.

In today’s connected world, bars face extreme competition to attract high income, sophisticated singles and business people who want to be entertained. Bar operations face competition from hotel lounges, raves, privately hosted events and pop-up clubs.

However, developing creative ideas that resonate with your target audience can ensure a constant clientele, increase profits and establish your bar as a popular location for your target audience.