Doing business in post-recession America is scary for many big organizations. Can you imagine the fear that’s cutting through small and mid-sized companies? Many companies are worrying about how they can drive new sales growth, while at the same time, make payroll each week. It’s a bit of the chicken and the egg. Without human capital, it’s tough to drive sales and without sales, it’s tough to pay employees. So what can companies do in order to move forward?

The answer: Start an internship program.

Internships can be a great way to bring on hungry individuals who are willing to work for the “experience”. You can structure your internship program in many different ways depending on your needs. It can be paid, unpaid, for school credit, etc. I’ll get into a step-by-step approach to building a great internship program in a later post. For now, I want to focus on the mutual benefits that a great internship program provides.

Internship program – Employer benefits:

• Motivated individuals willing to work on projects large & small
• Reasonably priced labor
• Full-time employees can focus on their primary responsibilities
• Ability to get more done each day
• Full-time potential post graduation – they already know your business

Internship program – Intern benefits:

• Great real-world experience
• Possibly paid or receiving school credit
• Resume builder
• Network builder
• Full-time potential post graduation

I graduated from Bentley University in 2005 with a Communications degree. With that said, in my opinion, the degree only played a small role in landing me my first job. I was a self-taught marketer. My definition of self-taught is reading articles, blogs, and books about marketing and working for marketing companies to gain experience. I had about 7 different internships by the time I graduated college. They ranged from local non-profits where I would be cold-calling all day, to an Advertising/PR firm located in Beverly Hills, California, and even all the way to Madison Avenue at Young & Rubicam. I was much more appealing to employers because I had a vast amount of work experience for my age. Combine that with a great education and I was able to land a great job out of school.

On the flip side, I was able to make an impact at each organization for which I interned. Each company greatly benefited from the time I put in working there. They got a motivated individual who was willing to take on tasks that were very important for the organization, but ones that many full-time employees didn’t have time for. And to top it off, I was willing to do it for free in some cases, for school credit in others, or for a low hourly rate. If you’re looking for creative ways to grow your business, starting an internship program should be at the top of your list.

Do you have a great internship story? Please share it with us via the comments section below.

What’s that you ask? How can your restaurant benefit from Twitter? Well, let me share a few ideas Catalyst Marketers has for you.

If you own or run a restaurant and are trying to figure out how you can use Twitter to reach prospects and current customers, check out the following 7 tips and let Catalyst Marketers know what you think. If you want to learn more, don’t hesitate to reach out to us.

Drive Traffic to your Website
Anytime you setup a social media marketing campaign, it must first be backed by a solid website. Driving people to your website is one of the primary objectives of social media marketing. Twitter is a great way to do that, especially for restaurants. Twitter is a great tool for extending your reach. If you’re a local restaurant with great food and loyal customers then use Twitter as a way reach out to potential customers who may not know about you.

First, get your current customers to follow you on Twitter and then allow them to pass along your information to their network. Occasionally tweet the link to your website. Another must have is your website URL in your Twitter profile. This way anyone who visits your profile, whether they are following you yet or not, is presented with a link to your website.

Daily Specials
Daily specials are a great way to give your customers something different than your normal great food. The only downfall is that nobody knows what your specials are until they come into the restaurant. What if you can use daily specials as a way to entice other people to check out your restaurant by tweeting them to your followers. Now customers know in advance what’s being added to the menu for the night. It may just be what they are craving…

Super Saver Discounts
Do you print coupons and run them in the local circular? How about a senior citizens discount? If you offer any sort of discount or promotion then you should be using Twitter to communicate that to your customers and prospects. Twitter is a tool that extends your reach to customers and prospects that you wouldn’t normally have access to. The key is figuring out how to use it effectively for your brand/restaurant. Tweeting your 10% off your total bill Monday – Friday is a great way to let people know about your super saver discounts.

Don’t forget the follow through…what I mean by this is that in your Tweets, let customers know that they have to mention the tweet in order to get the discount. Then let all servers know that anytime a customer mentions the Twitter discount, it’s an automatic 10% off the bill, BUT that’s not all…You must then create a special discount twitter code for the transaction. This way at the end of the month, you can extract that data and determine just how many folks you reached on Twitter and actually drove to the restaurant.

Behind any great campaign, there must be rich data to mine. That’s the only way you’ll know if your efforts are working. Anyone who comes up with a creative social media campaign but doesn’t mention ROI (Return on Investment) analysis is not someone you want to be working with.

Announce Events
Food tasting & Wine tasting events are fun activities that many people enjoy attending. Perhaps your restaurants hosts these events. If so, I’ll bet you use traditional advertising to lure people to them. Maybe you only use in-store promotions to let people know about the events…If so, you’re not reaching as many people as you could be if you were using Twitter. If you’re having an event at your restaurant, start tweeting about it a week or so before the event. Build up some momentum with your followers. I’ll bet the turnout is bigger than all of your previous events combined.

Run Contests
The latest craze is running contents through Twitter. A number of big companies are doing it. Cadbury is doing it. You can do it too.

Maybe there is a giveaway every Tuesday night at your restaurant. Anyone who comes in and has dinner is eligible. Perhaps it’s something that comes with your meal (a golden ticket so to speak). The only way you have a chance to win is if you come in and order a meal.

There could even be a free dinner giveaway to one person a day. To be eligible you must retweet the restaurant website. This now opens your website up to each followers’ network and if someone in their network is interested, they may retweet as well. Now you’re getting your website in front on another network. Welcome to Viral Marketing.

Announce Wait Times
A simple use of Twitter, but one that customers would certainly appreciate is announcing wait times at the restaurant (especially on busy nights like Friday and Saturday). People are on Twitter all day, either from the laptop, desktop OR cell phone. Instant information is expected from consumers. If they know that your wait time is 1 hour, then perhaps they’ll call ahead and make a reservation for later in the evening instead of driving down and being disappointed that they have to wait. If the wait time is 10 minutes, they may hop in the car immediately in order to beat the crowd. Either way, you’re providing information to customers that they appreciate. This will drive business to your restaurant because it shows people that you’re considerate of their time & are willing to go to the environments (Twitter) which they frequent in order to communicate with them.

Is your small business running the same old marketing campaign that’s been running for years now? Have you seen your ROI continually dropping? Are you even measuring ROI?

These are some of the questions you should be asking yourself a few times a year if you’re hoping to grow your business. If the answers to these questions is “yes”, it’s OK. There is still time to turn things around. I know that being a small business owner is not easy. There are countless things that come up in the course of a day, a week, etc. If you find that you don’t have time to handle your company’s marketing plan, simply find a company you can trust to do it for you.

If you’re finding that your traffic is slowing and those ads in the local flier are becoming more expensive, you’re not alone. Traditional media companies are raising rates because there are less and less advertisers buying space in their publications. When the economy gets back on its feet and people begin investing again in marketing/advertising, many experts expect those ad dollars to go to new media companies versus traditional media companies.

Their are a few reasons why all businesses, large and small, are shifting their marketing budgets to new media:

• Lower up front costs – many online tools are free
• Greater reach – small businesses can have a global presence
• Deeper impact with prospects, customers, & brand evangelists
• Ability for viral growth
• More tools available to measure return-on-investment

When it comes time for you to start spending again on marketing your product or service, definitely take some time to learn what’s changed since your last campaign. Find out where your prospects & customers are spending their time and then begin creating strategies around talking with them in those places. If you find that they are spending their time online, then new media marketing may be right for you. If you need any help getting started, feel free to reach out to Catalyst Marketers.

If you have found this post informative, please share it with others whom you think will benefit.