tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16937235228255945492024-02-02T06:03:13.247-08:00restaurantziteStories and information about RestaurantZite the new website builder for restaurants!bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-42285595329851163342010-11-30T08:58:00.000-08:002010-11-30T09:23:02.098-08:00New Toolbar!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ4bfHTJF8y3HhNYD8KFKZUtsupMUpV23RxsuWT2w82tqbGfV_1me84iYVJojGn54wwx9xAUdPlswt-91C8_lwDSq04qn5RdZ_NnfCwlCBWeh_EdOCqj3sdqSxlY_vFVPF_7GZQ-U287w/s1600/toolbar.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 79px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ4bfHTJF8y3HhNYD8KFKZUtsupMUpV23RxsuWT2w82tqbGfV_1me84iYVJojGn54wwx9xAUdPlswt-91C8_lwDSq04qn5RdZ_NnfCwlCBWeh_EdOCqj3sdqSxlY_vFVPF_7GZQ-U287w/s400/toolbar.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5545391080054732690" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Well you may have noticed the nice new toolbar when you last logged into the site. The new toolbar integrates experience from the shortcomings of the old toolbar.<br /><br />The old toolbar was a bit large. This made it hard on our customers who had smaller screens. It also limited the number of tools that could fit into the visible toolbar.<br /><br />When I first created the site my guiding mantra was 'make it simple to use'. The large tools made it obvious that you only had a few choices, which is comforting. However this was done at the expense of actual usability. I think the new toolbar fixes this.<br /><br />I also moved the Tools, My Tools, Photos, and Add Pages tabs to the top and moved the admin, logout and other controls to the upper right hand side. This made these controls available from every tab. Customers found it confusing that they could only get to the admin link from the tools tab.<br /><br />Thirdly, I hope you like the new design of the tools and the bar. I tried to bring them up to date while still making it obvious what they do.<br /><br />The last great thing about the new toolbar is the slider for the photo tray. The old slider was a brown rectangle. Yuck! I had really been wanting to sharpen it up and make it a more obvious slider. Well it is now!<br /><br />Well I hope you like it! Please let me know what you think. If you have any feedback at all please let me know.bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-18780934607186008262010-02-17T06:26:00.000-08:002010-02-17T06:32:44.672-08:00The main reason I started RestaurantZite.The main reason I started this service was to address a major disconnect between restaurant owners and their website visitors. I try to provide tools that guide restaurant owners to create sites that inform their visitors. Tools that make it easy for a restaurant to stay in a conversation with their customers via their website. <br /><br />This post explains the pain that many web users experience when they visit a restaurant website:<br /><a href="http://venomousporridge.com/post/389785000/a-conversation-i-have-every-month-or-so">http://venomousporridge.com/post/389785000/a-conversation-i-have-every-month-or-so</a>bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-3012054554281108202009-09-04T07:34:00.000-07:002009-09-04T07:44:46.591-07:00Dell's guides on how to use Social Media (Twitter, Facebook)Here are some great guides that again show you how to use social media (Facebook, Twitter etc) as a small business. These are not restaurant specific. But they are pertinent.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.facebook.com/dellsocialmedia?v=app_6009294086">http://www.facebook.com/dellsocialmedia?v=app_6009294086<br /></a><br />It may seem like an overwhelming amount of information. Remember just starting use and understand these technologies yourself is a huge win. Pretending that they have no influence on your business could be a big mistake.bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-68445000958479511592009-09-03T13:11:00.000-07:002009-09-03T13:16:47.715-07:00Using Yelp to increase your exposure online.This is a great video on how to use online services like Yelp to increase your business.<br /><br /><embed src="http://blip.tv/play/g8sRgZuMLgA%2Em4v" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="378" width="618"></embed><br /><br /><a href="http://www.building43.com/videos/2009/09/03/yelp-secrets-from-phat-philly/">http://www.building43.com/videos/2009/09/03/yelp-secrets-from-phat-philly/</a><br /><br />We will have a drag and drop Yelp tool very soon!!bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-29816919162912223582009-07-17T08:44:00.000-07:002009-07-17T08:46:57.554-07:00Another good article on using TwitterHere is an excellent article on how street vendors are using Twitter.<br /><br /><a href="http://mashable.com/2009/07/17/twitter-street-vendors/">http://mashable.com/2009/07/17/twitter-street-vendors/</a>bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-85798777156980091862009-03-11T10:06:00.000-07:002009-03-13T11:50:59.390-07:00Twitter as a tool to market your RestaurantWell, I didn't believe this day would come, but Twitter day is here. We have created a drag and drop Twitter tool that allows our subscribers to add a twitter "feed" to their website.<br /><br />When I first heard of Twitter I was skeptical but I was also skeptical of Facebook and lets face it - I was wrong. Twitter is getting popular very very quickly and offers many simple convenient ways for you to market your restaurant online.<br /><br />There are three main questions that I need to answer in order to help you take advantage of this potentially potent marketing opportunity.<br /><br /><h3>What is Twitter?</h3><br /><br />From the Twitter website:<br /><blockquote>Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: <strong>What are you doing?</strong></blockquote>Essentially Twitter is a constant stream of messages. You as a twitter user can <span style="font-style: italic;">follow</span> any number of people or businesses on twitter to keep up with what's going on for them. Your stream of messages will include messages from all these people.<br /><br />Conversely when you post a message, everyone who follows you will get that message.<br /><br />Now the kicker is that twitter is fully integrated with text messaging so you can post your messages from your cellphone. So you can blast out the twitter message <blockquote>"things are slow tonight: buy-one-get-one-free dinner tonight if you mention this tweet"</blockquote> at the last minute from your cellphone. That's just plain cool.<br /><br />You can and should join twitter in your restaurant's name right now at:<br /><br /><a href="http://twitter.com/">twitter.com<br /></a><br /><h3>How do I use Twitter to market my restaurant?</h3><br /><br />You can broadcast specials and events out to all your followers instantly on the night that they are occurring.<br /><br />You can also tweet strange things that happen: <blockquote>"OMG. I swear my last customer was Elvis himself. Looks good for a dead guy."<br /></blockquote>Other examples of messages that I feel fellow twitters will appreciate:<br /><blockquote>"Some lady thought we wouldn't mind if she brought her chimpanzee in to eat with her."</blockquote><blockquote>"It's been kinda a rough day. Have a round on me. The next 30 beers are free."<br /></blockquote><br />I highly recommend that you read the following article for pointers on how to market your business on twitter:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.startupnation.com/series/132/9334/twitter-marketing-7-steps.htm">http://www.startupnation.com/series/132/9334/twitter-marketing-7-steps.htm</a><br /><br />Mostly it's important not to alienate your potential customers by violating the social standards of Twitter.<br /><br /><h3>How do I integrate Twitter with my RestaurantZite website?<br /></h3><br />We created a new Twitter tool:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkA9bX7506oIK4iXKCPRgTOsviEhHH5vGCuZbGMssuSzpJ7wCDsGEv8Ai2ueSgr-YpKVIU5yPnDg1OCUGuemjpSVbV5VvrSA3XnqY9itua2wOBLYV7ZgmT4AYbY1NBdznl3C76QaLwvY4/s1600-h/twitter_button.gif"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 100px; height: 100px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkA9bX7506oIK4iXKCPRgTOsviEhHH5vGCuZbGMssuSzpJ7wCDsGEv8Ai2ueSgr-YpKVIU5yPnDg1OCUGuemjpSVbV5VvrSA3XnqY9itua2wOBLYV7ZgmT4AYbY1NBdznl3C76QaLwvY4/s320/twitter_button.gif" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5311993541744160578" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><br />Simply drag this onto your page from the toolbar.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Important</span>: if you do not see this tool please send us an email and we will add it to your website immediately. Please mention the page that you want to add it to.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcEXbMRy9n2RJZIigJPMH7OsEff2dEtFcZQLJoxynLMGudA4ufy5STY-V9UkPdJmVz8oU6GMhqM0x4U0ggI-gg7Tziz_OgytGwX7gOiYja_IDOqkdBkCbbk2s6uldoXQk_9VAsypRQeUE/s1600-h/Salsalicious.png"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 215px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcEXbMRy9n2RJZIigJPMH7OsEff2dEtFcZQLJoxynLMGudA4ufy5STY-V9UkPdJmVz8oU6GMhqM0x4U0ggI-gg7Tziz_OgytGwX7gOiYja_IDOqkdBkCbbk2s6uldoXQk_9VAsypRQeUE/s320/Salsalicious.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5312024862021826866" border="0" /></a><br /><br />This will present you with a form like so:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFFDNN_EQErGt07JOKwaxhWEB8qUkeQGj38lUGM2Sgrj0JFE6y9d6eYJUgadNCLQy_xPrHoMGg1jOPnZPt_LYLDsJRDi92c_HykNivnctH_5vcCoue36V-y3M2kvQgXOmw6EIY_IvsF94/s1600-h/Salsalicious_twitter_form-1.png"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 157px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFFDNN_EQErGt07JOKwaxhWEB8qUkeQGj38lUGM2Sgrj0JFE6y9d6eYJUgadNCLQy_xPrHoMGg1jOPnZPt_LYLDsJRDi92c_HykNivnctH_5vcCoue36V-y3M2kvQgXOmw6EIY_IvsF94/s320/Salsalicious_twitter_form-1.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5312027416003189026" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Fill in the form with your twitter username. This is the username that identifies you on Twitter. For example my twitter username is <span style="font-style: italic;">bhauman</span> and you can find my twitter stream at <a href="http://twitter.com/bhauman">http://twitter.com/<span style="font-style: italic;">bhauman</span></a>.<br /><br />Also select the number of your messages/tweets that you want to show up.<br /><br />Then hit the <span style="font-weight: bold;">Save Twitter</span> button and you should be presented with a list of the latest messages that you have Tweeted. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Important</span>: if the list is blank you may have misspelled your Twitter username (or you haven't posted any twitter messages yet).<br /><br />Now you have a list of your latest Twitter messages on your website. The messages that show up are only messages that come from you. None of the messages from the people you follow are shown.<br /><br />This gives you the amazing ability to add important or not so important last minute messages to your website from your phone.<br /><br />Also, don't forget to add a heading above your Twitter feed with the Heading tool. Headings like "What's Happening Now" and "Twitter Updates" work great.<br /><br />Have fun and use your imagination!<br /><br />Also if you have time, please let us know what you think of this tool and if you have come up with any interesting ways to use it.bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-54837450010680511442009-02-06T10:56:00.000-08:002009-02-06T11:38:30.105-08:00A handful of new featuresWe added a handful of new features over the last couple of weeks, including:<br /><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Photo Deletion</span>: you can now delete images that you are no longer using to reduce the clutter in your photo tray. You can find this on your administration page (see the blue arrow on the image below).</li></ul><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Meta Tags</span>: you can now edit the meta keywords and meta description for your site. This is also available from the the administration page (see the red arrow).<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh57BWkkjoz8V7otcQ0ijeFXwRsC04u6h7S-_VZCNBBlaOmXpwFBG-xj3a_eTByCiV2w2JT2RfFwf4NvzSOzvVX_jeNojW8M_RNVfUPZ-s2v-EBjb6tO5GQ_ZqZ4SJcrWbEKv4-x32S0ATH/s1600-h/photos-3.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 381px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh57BWkkjoz8V7otcQ0ijeFXwRsC04u6h7S-_VZCNBBlaOmXpwFBG-xj3a_eTByCiV2w2JT2RfFwf4NvzSOzvVX_jeNojW8M_RNVfUPZ-s2v-EBjb6tO5GQ_ZqZ4SJcrWbEKv4-x32S0ATH/s400/photos-3.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5299763131034373986" border="0" /></a></li></ul><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Mailing List Download</span>: any collected email addresses can now be downloaded as a spreadsheet for use in other email systems (the mailing list feature is only available to <a href="http://restaurantzite.com/r_zite/signup">premium</a> sites).<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhodjhffAquzyfykIVVX2EIrljHET092gIGvNmHuP7t61ZhGy6qV3isf5oVmlRT1_q4PEG7H8OpMXWTsC4joRV-ipYoPHhMTz4fd5IjK2xS6ymeexa-JJnHTwxiGYndxd2ZFBNs6z61OpN6/s1600-h/dl-1.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 107px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhodjhffAquzyfykIVVX2EIrljHET092gIGvNmHuP7t61ZhGy6qV3isf5oVmlRT1_q4PEG7H8OpMXWTsC4joRV-ipYoPHhMTz4fd5IjK2xS6ymeexa-JJnHTwxiGYndxd2ZFBNs6z61OpN6/s400/dl-1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5299767577491553714" border="0" /></a> <br /></li></ul> <ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">More Slideshow Options</span>: A slideshow can now have one to eight images, allowing you to feature a single large image on the page.</li></ul><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">The max photo size you can upload is now 8 Megabytes! </span></li></ul>Stay tuned, we have lots more good things in the works!Tobias Crawleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17760038582264098886noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-7570032577861799522008-03-31T11:13:00.000-07:002008-03-31T11:28:01.571-07:00New Feature: EmailWe rolled out a new feature over the weekend: email addresses for your restaurant. Now any user you create in your site's admin area will automatically be given an email address at the restaurant domain that forwards to whatever email address you enter for the user.<br /><br />Example: If your restaurant site is 'salsaliciousrestaurant.com', and you create a user with the login 'joe' and an email address of 'joe.smith@example.com', any email sent to 'joe@salsaliciousrestaurant.com' will automatically be forwarded to 'joe.smith@example.com'.<br /><br />This is now active for users you already have, you don't have to do anything.<br /><br />Note: email forwarding only works if your site has it's own domain name (salsaliciousrestaurant.com vs. salsalicious.dropzite.com), and you have not already made some other arrangement with us to handle email for your domain.Tobias Crawleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17760038582264098886noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-82794789136190431112008-03-18T19:48:00.000-07:002008-03-18T20:42:27.419-07:00Saying 'cancel', shouldn't get you a sales pitchIn late December I signed up for a business credit card with one of the large credit providers. I got it primarily for the 15 months of no payments and 0% interest it offered. Right after getting it, I bought some stuff - a nice monitor, some office equipment. I also signed up for their online service so I could keep track of my charges. After signing in, I went to check my charges. The total was there, and was what I expected. When I tried to get statement details, I got a helpful error message letting me know that statement information was not available, as the online account had just recently been created. Annoying, but I could wait a few days.<br /><br />Things got busy, and I did not log back in for a while. Quite a while actually - six weeks go by. By now I've had the card over seven weeks, and have received no statements. I log in to the online account to see when I should be receiving a statement, and notice a missed payment fee has been added to my account. I drill down to look at statements, and am given the same error message they showed me six weeks ago. I called customer service, and they were kind enough to remove the missed payment fee. They explained that they were having issues with some online accounts, and mine would be fixed shortly. They also assured me that my statements have been going out, and must be getting lost in the mail. I suggested that perhaps there was some connection between my inability to access details of my account online and my inability to receive paper statements, and was told that was not possible.<br /><br />Three weeks go by, during which I should have received another paper statement. I log back in, and still cannot see my statements online. I call customer service, and they assure me they are working on the problem, and ask me to check with the post office to see if my mail is being held. I assure them it is not, since I am getting all of my other mail. After 45 minutes of getting transfered to various departments, I get disconnected. At this point, I scheduled a transfer to pay off the balance, and decide to cancel as soon as that has cleared.<br /><br />This evening, I call to cancel the account. I have to speak to four different customer service representatives, and have to authenticate myself to each of them with my account number, address, last four digits of ssn, name, business name, and phone number. The first three tell me they will have to transfer me to someone else to handle the cancellation after I have explained to each my reasons for canceling. The last CSR was clearly a customer loss prevention specialist - when I told her I wanted to cancel, she asked the obligatory authentication questions, and then asked why. I started my story, and she cut me off half way through to tell me I was not getting statements because I had no balance, and that the card came with great benefits that I would be giving up if I canceled. I continued to explain to her why I wanted to cancel, and all I had been through to try to resolve the issue, finishing with "I've wasted enough time on this, and I want to cancel now." She asked why I was giving up the great 0% interest for the next year, and wanted to know why I had not called customer service before today to resolve my issues. This went on until I finally said "I want to cancel NOW, and am not interested in any your reasons why I should keep this account". She said she would process the cancel order, then proceeded to list all of the great benefits that would no longer be available to me after cancellation.<br /><br />At this point, I believe the card is actually canceled.<br /><br />This is no way to treat customers, which is obvious to anyone reading this. So why isn't it obvious to the credit card company? Why do they have staff that are paid to try to convince dissatisfied customers into staying, not by helping resolve issues, but by pointing out all of the "great benefits"?<br /><br />I intended to start this article out with a small example of bad customer service, and then mainly discuss our customer service philosophy. What it has become is a long rant, followed by some short and sweet:<br /><br />At RestaurantZite, if you contact us with an issue, we will work on it until it is resolved, and keep you posted of our progress.<br /><br />If you decide to cancel your service, we'll ask you why. And when you answer, we'll <span style="font-style: italic;">listen</span>. We'll listen to see if your reason for leaving is an issue we can resolve for you, or an issue we can resolve to make other customers happier. And if you still want to cancel, we'll wish you luck, and thank you for your business.Tobias Crawleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17760038582264098886noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1693723522825594549.post-46574030930071520662008-03-12T13:43:00.000-07:002008-03-15T12:57:13.057-07:00We Launched!Well, it has been almost a year and a half in the making. But here we are. RestaurantZite has launched!<br /><br />It all started while I was eating brunch at <a href="http://tableasheville.com/">Table</a>, here in Asheville, NC. I started thinking about how difficult it is for the average restaurant owner to obtain and update their own website.<br /><br />The cost, the pain of getting a web-designer and the inconvenience of going through a web-designer to update the website. With all these barriers its not surprising that most restaurants do not have websites at all. The restaurants that do have websites seem to struggle with keeping their websites current.<br /><br />I started thinking about the features a busy restaurant owner would need in order to be empowered to keep a website up to date. The requirements would be:<br /><br /><ol><li>The system would have to be very intuitive.</li><li>It would have to be as easy as email.</li><li>The website should be able to be edited by restaurant staff.<br /></li><li>It would have to allow for lots of little changes fast.</li><li>It would have to take care of all the formatting details so that the owner isn't bogged down with making things bold here and underlined there and so on.</li></ol><br /><br />Well, I worked on these ideas in my spare time. I developed 2 systems that were just awful. They relied on little links here and there to insert headings and text and eventually the interface was just so ugly I had to say, "No way".<br /><br />Then it occurred to me that drag and drop may be the answer. With drag and drop I could leave the web page intact and the user could send signals to the web page by dropping things on it. I spent some time, fleshed the ideas out and got the basics working. Then I bought an IPhone.<br /><br />The iPhone really influenced the interface a great deal. The iPhone does not do everything. You can't take videos. However, the iPhone does things that most people want to do, and it does them very well. The principles that drove the design of the iPhone started to drive me. RestaurantZite doesn't have to do everything. It simply has to do what it does intuitively and well. In other words: <blockquote><span style="font-weight: bold;">Don't compromise on ease of use, compromise on features!</span><br /></blockquote><br />So, here we are at ground zero of a new venture. If you have the time, please check out our interface. Then send us an email to tell us what you think!bruce.haumanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03135037740796449953noreply@blogger.com2