Put Your Customers Back in Charge

Guest blogger, Richard Peck, is with Table 301 in Greenville, South Carolina. Table 301 is a mega fine dining resource in the upstate area of South Carolina, providing fine dining restaurant experiences, catering services, events planning and publishing.

While his chief responsibility is business development, Richard carries many other responsibilities, too many to list at the top of his posting. Please follow us to the end for more information.
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What? Put restaurant guests in charge . . . of what they pay? That sounds crazy, doesn’t it! But think about it: the guest already is in charge. If they aren’t satisfied, they just don’t return.

How about your business? Your customers behave precisely the same way: if they aren’t satisfied, they just don’t return.

Ongoing loyalty and support is the only sustainable basis for success. So, why shouldn’t a restaurant put its guests in charge of pricing, to give them a chance to say what they think their meal was really worth? If the restaurant gets “rave reviews” (i.e., guests pay the equivalent of menu price or more—and yes, that has happened!), the chef and staff know they are doing a great job. If the guest thinks the meal was worth less than menu price, the chef and staff missed an opportunity to satisfy guest needs, and they need to find out why. Here's the biz buzzz.

In The Support Economy: Why Corporations are Failing Individuals and the Next Episode of Capitalism, Harvard Business School professor Shoshana Zuboff puts her finger on an uneasiness most of us have felt. She calls it “the transaction crisis.” We fear the transaction crisis when our flight is cancelled: will the airline rebook us promptly and courteously? We fear the transaction crisis when we arrive late at a hotel: will they have given someone else our room, despite our guaranteed reservation? We fear the transaction crisis when a piece of expensive electronic gear fails after purchase: will the retailer or manufacturer replace it instantly, or somehow try to blame us for its failure?

In the same way, we fear the transaction crisis when a dish we ordered in a restaurant doesn’t arrive at the proper temperature, or is simply unsatisfactory. Will our server make excuses or object “That’s the way it is supposed to be”? Or will the restaurant’s response be, “I’m so sorry! We’ll replace it immediately or take it off your check. And may I bring you a complimentary glass of wine, as a small apology?”

The immense gap between the power of businesses, and the relative powerlessness of the customers, is already being narrowed. American Express cardholders can protest any transaction. Upon receiving adequate documentation demonstrating the business’ failure to deliver, AMEX reverses the charge. Transaction crisis averted!

Table 301’s “pay what you think your meal was worth” raises this concept to the next level: transaction crisis eliminated. As a consumer, how much more comfortable would you be if you knew your had the final word on the price/value equation? As a business, valuable would the benefits be from this type of real time customer feedback?

Pay what you think it’s worth. Crazy? Yeah, crazy like a fox! And it will be the wise old business foxes who survive in the tough times, those who understand and esteem their priceless loyal customers.

Read more about Table 301's "Pay What You Think Your Meal Is Worth" marketing plan in this Nation's Restaurant News article.

Richard Peck is, among other things, a Certified Sommelier (Court of Master Sommeliers),a Certified Specialist of Wine (Society of Wine Educators). He has written four books, two on the music industry, along with Crossing America, a motorcycling narrative. He also is a co-author of Soby's New South Cuisine cookbook, published by Table 301. You can see Richard's bio, in detail, here. What a powerhouse!

You can also find Richard on twitter, LinkedIn and on MeetUp.com...or in the air, flying a plane,...or on a bicycle...or a hiking trail...or...

Three No-Cost PR Strategies for Small Businesses

Guest blogger, Stephanie Richards, M.A., is founder and Chief Newsmaker of The Write Way, LLC, an Atlanta-based P.R. firm.
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Small business owners are often short on time and money. But if you find yourself shorter on money than time, consider the following three no-cost public relations tactics that can boost your business. Here's the biz buzzz from Stephanie.

1) Speak
Just like small businesses across the country, many networking organizations, trade associations and chambers of commerce are also short on cash. Event budgets have taken a hit, which means that many of these organizations are looking for high-quality speakers who don’t charge speaking fees. Consider proposing a topic and offering yourself as a potential speaker. You may not get paid for your time, but speaking is often one of the best ways to establish your credibility and meet potential clients.

2) Write
If you possess solid writing skills, consider writing a by-lined article for a trade or business publication and submitting it to an editor. Many publications have laid-off a large percentage of their staff, leaving fewer journalists to develop content and generate ideas. This means that many editors are looking for ready-made, high quality by-lined articles by industry experts. Be sure to follow the publication’s writers’ guidelines, and remember to write like an objective journalist. This is not the time to write a biased, glowing review of your company. Instead, the content should provide readers with a resource or fill a need.

3) Pitch
It doesn’t cost anything but time to pick up the phone and call an editor and pitch a story idea. Many businesses don’t get coverage simply because they never reach out to the media.

However, there is a right way and a wrong way to contact the media. Imagine that you are an editor. You are at your desk, working tirelessly to meet a tight deadline and the phone rings. It is another PR professional or business owner, who didn’t do their homework, hasn’t read your publication and is pitching you a story that you covered last week. How likely are you going to be to write about them? Not likely.


Keep in mind that editors, executive producers and journalists are looking for objective stories that bring value to their readers and/or viewers. They are not interested in doing you a favor. Their goal is not to help your company gain exposure. That is the job of the advertising department. Instead, editors and journalists want to provide useful, valuable content that will help their audience solve a problem, make an improvement or fill a need, and you can help them do this by providing them with newsworthy content. This means no fluff and no marketing!

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The Write Way is an Atlanta-based public relations firm built around the concept that you have to be willing to go the extra mile to do things The Write Way, even when no one else does.

The Write way is also on twitter at http://twitter.com/thewriteway



Visit Stephanie's PR blog at Operation Media Exposure or look for her on LinkedIn.

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