Restaurant Month Wait Staff & Restaurant Rewards
Restaurant Month is presented by Heart of the City, along with headline sponsor American Express. This August marks the sixth year for this successful event.
Ensuring your restaurant’s success
A critical part of the success of the event is ensuring that front line restaurant staff are knowledgeable about what is on offer in their restaurant. To help encourage this, American Express and Heart of the City are offering a number of rewards for individuals and restaurants who are actively talking up their special menus and restaurant activity for the month.
Restaurant Visits
At the beginning of the month our Restaurant Month Ambassadors will be visiting each restaurant to deliver restaurant point of sale material and explain the wait staff reward scheme. Ongoing communication and updates will be emailed throughout the month to ensure that the message is getting to as many staff as possible.
The Golden Set Rewards
Once again we want to reward restaurants and staff who get behind Restaurant Month and promote it on their social media. This includes spot prizes for individual staff members as well as overall cash prizes and trophies for the restaurants that use social media in the most creative way to promote Restaurant Month.
How you will be rewarded
Wait staff rewards
10 x $50 cash spot prizes*
How to earn these
Use your personal social media channels to creatively promote Restaurant Month and the events or activity happening at your restaurant. The 10 individuals, who post the most creative content throughout the month, will win a $50 cash prize. You must use #restaurantmonthAKL AND #goldensetAKL on ALL of your posts so they can be found.
Restaurant Rewards
· 3 x $500 restaurant prize**
· 3 x trophies from the Golden Set**
How to earn these
Throughout the month, use either your restaurant or personal social media channels to creatively promote your participation in Restaurant Month (see our social media guide). The restaurants with the greatest overall social activity, the most creative content and the best behind-the-scenes posts (we’re looking for quality over quantity here) will receive a $500 team cash prize as well as one of the Golden Set trophies; the Golden Fork, the Golden Knife or the Golden Spoon.
*Winners of the spot prizes will be chosen based on the creativity of their Restaurant Month posts on their individual social media pages. The judge’s decision will be final. **Promotion commences 1 August 2016 and closes 31 August 2016. The winning restaurants will be selected on the 23rd September, 2016 and will be the restaurants that have created the most engaging, creative and compelling content on social media to promote their restaurant using the given campaign hashtags. The judge’s decision will be final.
How to win the Golden set trophies
The Golden Fork - will be awarded to the restaurant with the most mouth-watering food shots.
The Golden Knife - will be awarded to the restaurant with the ‘cutting edge’ content i.e. the most creative content overall.
The Golden Spoon - will be awarded to the restaurant with the ‘inside scoop’ or the best behind the scenes content.
We suggest sharing a selection of content from each category to increase your chances of winning. Take these categories into consideration when planning your posts.
HASHTAGS
The internet is a big place, so in order for us and the public to be able to find the amazing content you’re posting on social media, you MUST USE #restaurantmonthAKL AND #goldensetAKL on ALL of your posts.
TIPS
Here are a few pointers to give your restaurant a head start on winning those golden prizes!
· Add a photo to everything you post. People love visuals! Be spontaneous and creative.
· Get the right caption. People want to know the names and ingredients of dishes you’re showing them.
· Don’t forget to include the hashtags so we can find your posts! #restaurantmonthAKL #goldensetAKL.
· Don’t be shy. If people ask questions on your page/posts, be sure to reply to them as soon as you get the chance.
· Videos have a higher rate of interaction than photos on Facebook and Instagram. Keep them around 10-15 seconds long. Iphone videos are great!
· Add your location to your Facebook and Instagram posts so people know where to find you.
· People love a good tease. Use social media to reveal a Restaurant Month dish or drink every few days.
· Posts with questions have a higher engagement rate. Experiment with quizzes: ask people for their favourite dish out of two, ask for feedback and ask them to tag a friend they’d want to take to your restaurant during Restaurant Month.
The possibilities are endless.
PEOPLE LOVE TO SEE
· High quality photos of food, and more food!
· Behind the scenes photos of preparation in the kitchen.
· Shots of your exclusive Restaurant Month dishes.
· Short videos of chefs preparing dishes.
· Exclusive content that they won’t find anywhere else.
BOTTOM LINE
Using social media during Restaurant Month is a great way to get diners excited about the special menu and experiences your restaurant is creating to celebrate the month. The more creatively you show off your restaurant and menu on social media, the more people will be talking about you and will be more likely to come and in and try it for themselves. Happy socialising!
Who to Contact
For any questions regarding the wait staff reward schemes contact:
Louise Cargo or Stephanie Field, Eleven PR - phone 09 366 6266
For any questions regarding Restaurant Month contact:
Jane Stewart or Sonya Gandras - phone 09 379 8000
For any questions regarding American Express merchant enquiries:
Joshua Clarke phone 09 583 5426
