Dear Restaurant Owner or Manager,
Do you ever have days when you feel overwhelmed by information, data, messages, advice, requests, complaints, email, and social media? Not to mention the endless parade of minor business and employee emergencies. If you’re a restaurant owner or manager, I bet you do.
My two brothers are long-time restaurant owners (Portofino Italian Grill, Italian Grill Pizza and Market, and The Italian Grill) and I’ve been a small business owner for many years.
So we know first-hand how easy it is to lose focus, especially when we’re working on marketing ideas. They get pushed to the back burner and it’s tough to get back on track.
It’s called a mindmap. You can download it for free, and I’ll explain why in a minute.
In the past, I always worked with conventional outlines when I needed to organize a lot of information. I know I’m dating myself, but that’s what we were taught in grade school. So it stuck.
Recently I had to compile a restaurant marketing outline as part of a bigger project. Even though it’s a simple outline, it has 10 categories and 93 sub-topics.
Now, writing that down in conventional “outline” form is easy enough to do—headings, sub-headings, bullet points, notes, etc. But it’s awkward to digest, scrolling from top to bottom, page after page. And when I came back to it after an interruption, it took me 10-15 minutes to re-focus.
Turn the outline into a mind map.
Forbes columnist Dan Woods writes in The Power of Mind Mapping,
“For just a single project, mind maps may seem optional. The power of mind maps is best revealed when you have not five but 50 projects or complex tasks.”
As a Chief Technology Officer, he and colleagues repeatedly became overwhelmed by the sheer mass of information upon which they were collaborating. Mind maps solved the problem.
• A mind map is a cheat sheet that shows everything on a single page.
• It reduces an overwhelming number of items to a manageable, visual overview.
• It makes distant connections visible at a glance.
Visual cues and imagery help you store and remember important marketing ideas. A study by Farrand, Hussain and Hennessey (2002) found mind-mapping improved long-term memory of med students by 10%. It encouraged a different level of processing than conventional text-based studying.
Essentially, mind maps give your intuition (i.e., your brain’s sub-conscious processing power) more material to work with and to do so more effectively.
So now, with our restaurant marketing mind map, we have the same 10 categories and 93 sub-topics all presented on one page. The brain processes this instant visual glance at a different level that it does the written, linear word.
There are many more studies I could quote, but I don’t need to.
Download the pdf and take a look for yourself. I think that once you see it, you’ll be convinced. It’s an easier way to think and absorb knowledge.
Not only is the mind map a great tool for getting re-focused, it also has very practical benefits for your restaurant.
If you have lots of events to keep track of, this mind map will remind you of all aspects of your operation that need to be addressed for the event.
Mind maps are great for keeping meetings on track and for remembering details.
Use a mind map to organize and prioritize all your own daily tasks. It will also help you with delegating.
As you set up your marketing calendar, a mind map helps you to see all the related items that will affect every campaign, ad, or event. It also inspires connections that help you to create new marketing tactics.
Mind maps often allow you to see new relationships between elements of your business. In turn, this leads to better problem solving.
Give one to each of your key employees, or to all your employees. Not only does it instill respect for the enormous task of managing a restaurant, it helps them to see how everything and everyone is connected. Every employee has a unique perspective and a mind map will tap their creativity.
Boost your personal creative insight when you use a mind map. They are great for seeing new connections. It frees you from thinking linearly and puts your intuition to work for you.
You could also use this mindmap as inspiration for your own customized mind map. We’ve done most of the hard work for you. It makes it a snap to get started.
Most restaurant consultants use mind maps like this to guide their restaurant clients. Get the inside scoop and download your free copy today.
Simply enter your name and email in the form top right. (We respect your privacy and will never sell or share your information.)
The “catch” is that we’ll send you our weekly Small Business Rainmaker email newsletter, from Success Publishing and Marketing. It's totally free and there is never an obligation to buy anything else.
Once a week (well, most weeks) you’ll get an informative email with tips by small business owners, for small business owners, including restaurants. You can automatically opt-out at any time. That's it!
Once you enter your details, you'll get an email with a link to download the PDF file.
Dedicated to your small business success,
Andre Palko
Founder and Editor
The Small Business Rainmaker
(Allow a few minutes for the system to do its thing. Sometimes it's instant, other times it takes a few minutes.)
