This is a great time to look back and see how this year has evolved and the things I’ve accomplished. Here is the break down of things that happened this year.

January;
Signed up with WIFS and got a chance to be part of the mastermind group that was hosted by a business coach Michael Winters the owner of Chris Vin Coaching. This program was based on a book ” You Were Born Rich” by Bob Proctor. It was great to be in the group of so many inspirational women who have been in the business for quite some time and to develop a positive mind set when it comes to running a business. Michael was so helpful and really tried to help us all understand our purposes and walked us all through if we were confused on any topics.

February:
Started working with Madison Wealth Managers who I was keeping in touch since last year and was really excited to work with them.

March:
HIred a professional speech expert Dale Klein from Profitable Speech to work on my presentation who by the way did wonders and is always there to help you. Her knowledge and professionalism are just top standard.

April:
Completed a logo for LivingFiction Photography. First client to hire me without knowing me.

May:
First public presentation on How to Avoid Four Brand Identity Mistakes that could damage your business in front of Albany-Colonie Chamber of Commerce. – That got me 3 clients. Yahoooo!!

June:
Attended AIGA event in Utica and met some great fellow designers.

July:
Filed LLC with New York State with help of the greatest attorney in the world Robert Serenka.

August:
Won 2010 America Graphic Design Award. Thank you Graphic Design USA.

September:
Was a host on Talk1300 AM Radio Station.

October:
Got appointed to be on a board of directors for WIFS.

November:
Recorded my first video and posted on facebook.

December:
Appointed  to be a Program Chair for Business Referral Group at Albany-Colonie Chamber of Commerce.

I wanted to create something that my clients could use all year long and decided to create a card on one side and calendar on the other. For my best clients who have been with me all year and supporting business, I’ve also included a Panera Bread Gift Card.

I’ve also created the wrap around labels, cut them and glued them all individually on the envelope. This way the envelope, card, and panera gift card all had similar colors and looked.

I have received few e-mails already from clients thanking for the gift and how much they love Panera Bread. Happy Holidays to You!

Your Restaurant brand is one of the most important ingredients in your business. Your brand isn’t just your restaurant logo, color scheme or tagline.  Your brand is what your customers think it is, so you have to make sure that they are always thinking the right thing. Your branding can help you with the reinforcement of good reputation in the community.

However to achieve a good branding for your restaurant these are the steps you need to take:

Step 1: Brand Definition -This is the most important step that many business owners skip. Just as you can’t build a house without a foundation; you can’t build a brand without it’s definition. This can be achieved by answering specific questions such as: What is my restaurant concept? Who is my competition? What food am I going to be serving? If you want to know more on this you can sign up for my monthly e-zine TheScoop and you’ll receive a FREE report that will help you more in depth with this topic.

Step #2: Brand Positioning – Once you create a Brand Definition you are ready to move to brand positioning. This is where you choose one thing that makes you different then your competition or one thing you want your restaurant to be known in the minds of your customer. This can be excellent food, excellent location, excellent customer service, what ever you think makes you the leader of your industry and then promote it to the world.

Step #3: Design – Once you have Step 1 and 2 completed you are ready to design your marketing materials. Your logo, tagline, menu, advertising should all communicate your restaurant brand definition (story) and reflect your restaurants personality. This will set you apart and get you noticed by your audience.

Step #4: Consistency – It is extremely important to keep consistency between your restaurant marketing message and restaurant appearance.  This will help you with brand recognition. Once your customer comes in contact with your materials and dines at your restaurant they will notice that you invested a great deal in developing your restaurant brand.  This image and entire customer experience they had at your restaurant will stay with them. Next time they see your logo or someone mentions your restaurant name they will have that image of your brand and the customer experience they had at your restaurant.

If you follow these four easy steps you are going to be on a great way to building a great restaurant brand.

The fast-food marketing to children as young as 2 was so effective in 2009 that two-fifths of U.S. children younger than 11 ask their parents to go to McDonald’s at least once a week, says the study — and 84% of parents admit to obliging. Being a big opponent of fast food, I am very sad to see this post on Wallet Pop. The fast food industry is targeting kids and is brain washing them because they know that adults are aware of what effects we’ll have after eating the fast food. I just wish that  parents would not take their children to fast food restaurants and rather educate them on how important it is to eat healthy.

There is no doubt that cupcakes were and still are a huge trend of 2010. The Restaurant News has published an article that it says that there is a prediction that many more bakeries will be opening that specialize in pie baking. What I like about this is that these pies will not be your traditional pies, but rather a bite size pies that you can also blend into milkshake varieties. What are your thought on this do you think it could work?

Do you think if advertising is worth it? Advertising most certainly helps you maintain your brand position. Let’s say you have been receiving great reviews and publicity and all of a sudden those things stop. How are you going to keep yourself in front of your target audience? If you stop being mentioned your competition might just take over.  I am not saying that you should throw your budget all out on advertising, but you need to make sure that your ad is bringing you profit otherwise it is not money well spent.