Marketing is key toany business. Through marketing, the business communicates with its potential customers. The consumers getthe benefit of knowing the different products and services it provides. Marketing has a direct bearing on other aspects of a business like productivity and sales. It thus promotes product awareness and helps to distinguish a business and its products with those of its competitors. The marketing process employed by a restaurant involves tools, models, and processes.

Tools

The tools involve direct means a restaurant may reach out to a potential or existing client

• Web marketing- when guests are making plans to travel or eat out they visit and check what is on offer in the web. They conduct searches to get information, which may not be forthcoming from other people and travel agents. They seek to know about promotions, deals and amenities of the places they are going. Thus, a restaurant (hotel restaurant) should not only rely on third party sources for its customers but also have an online web presence. An updated website that is modern and is designed to attract more guests through controlled marketing. The restaurant’s website should have photos of it, its surroundings, some food and share more on the menu.(Andreasen, R. 2001 14-15)
• Mobile marketing- it is closely related with the web marketing. However, it provides the customer easy access for the customer to the restaurants website. The restaurant should ensure that their websites fully optimized for mobile devices. To achieve this, they ensure the mobile hotel marketing product is built to work dynamically with the different operating systems and screen resolutions of the mobiles.
• Social hotel marketing- social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are powerful tools that are used in marketing a restaurant. It is a norm for consumers to log into social media sites looking for information. Restaurant and dining services are part of the information that customers look for, particularly those in their locality. The restaurants can thus exploit the huge number of people using social media, post their menu and sponsor a review group where past customers get to share their experience. The social media is a good marketing tool because it has a huge number of people who are constantly in use.(Bloom, P. 2001, 42-44)

Models

Marketing models provide restaurants with the ability to communicate their purpose and reasons behind their strategies. It provides a framework for a restaurant to assess it operations compared to its competitors and plan for the future. Some of the models employed are:

• Marketing Mix-,it is made up with the physical element s and the service elements. The physical elements characterize the tangible aspects of a restaurant. They involve the product (food)-it should have exceptional food that will let people from everywhere sample it. Place (restaurant)-influenced by the location where the restaurant is located. Does it have enough seating space? Prices (cost) what is the average cost of the prices a restaurant is offering compared to its competitors offering the same meal.Is its customer willing to pay higher for the meals? Promotion (incentives) what incentives does the restaurant gives to its customers to retain existing and attract existing one? (Shaw, E. 2012, 30-45)

Service elements on the other hand represent an intangible position of the restaurant as a business. It involves the people (wait staff, chefs)who are involved with the serving and cooking of the meals- it can conduct training of the key staff especially the front of the house staff. They must have proper customer handling and service skills, whichenable them to handle complaints and any needs from the customers. They should also be able to function as part of the larger restaurant team. The kitchen staff of the restaurant should also be well conversant with the restaurant’s menu.(Baker, M. 2008, 27)

Process (methods employed in providing service) – involves the management of the restaurant, which directly affects the provision of services. Physical evidence (ambience) – the environment of the restaurant provides a good experience for the customers. The restaurant may choose to invest in the uniform for its staff, decoration of the table linen, use specific types of cutlery like silver spoons and knives. It can also paint and have an interesting decoration scheme. From this, a restaurant will be looking to maintain good reputation with its customers and benefit from word of mouth.

Processes

Involves those steps involve in analysis of the marketing opportunities and making a selection of the target markets.

• Customer generation- can be established through means of customer loyalty. Attracting new customers is expensive than retaining existing ones. By maintaining its customers, a customer can improve on its image, growth, and market position. It can introduce a customer loyalty program to reward its customers and make sure it offers an experience that would entice the customers to come back.(Shaw, E. 2001 54-55)