Happy hours are excellent promotional strategies for bars, restaurants, hotels, and other hospitality businesses. They are great for bringing in customers and making them happy as they can get their favorite drinks at discounted prices.
Happy hours are unique experiences that can help you bring in business, especially during downtimes or slow sales. To make a happy hour work, you will need to make sure that a large number of your customer base knows about it. To do so, there are a number of strategies, tips, and tricks that you can use to promote happy hours at your bar and make them a success.
5 Ways to Advertise a Happy Hour at Your Bar
Happy Hour Timings
The time when you hold your happy hour is crucial. You want it to be at a time when it is convenient for the maximum number of people to attend. Simply put, you may want to avoid times when people are at work or close to opening and closing times.
However, you can use happy hours to boost small business during quiet hours. Most bars choose the 5 pm-7 pm slot on Tuesdays but you can also target the time after your dinner rush to bring business in during late hours.
Create A Special Menu
To capitalize on the happy hour, offer special menu items that aren’t otherwise available at your establishment. Creative cocktails, beer specials, and snacks offered during this time can create a demand for these items that are based on their availability.
This can also give you a chance to test out new drinks and food items before you add them to the regular menu. You can go one step further and hold themed nights where you offer an experience by putting up special decor, including drinks of the day, and offer signature cocktails.
Hype Up On Social Media
A social media presence is crucial for a business to survive in today’s market. As such, you should have an active social media presence where you would be advertising your bar and promoting your new drinks and any events that you may hold.
Create posters and graphics advertising your happy hour and some of the deals and drinks you will offer. Consider offering a customer rewards programme for Black Friday and Cyber Monday for example to gain attention during peak sales seasons. Graphical content is easier to understand and clicks with the audience who are likely to take your bar up on the offer.
The Advocate made good use of this by sharing a post on Instagram advertising their happy hour with a poster. The image informs their customers about the timings, which drinks would be on offer, and their prices along with additional details.
Use Creative Slideshows
A picture is worth a thousand words but a moving picture is even more so. Putting up a slideshow that cycles between different graphical posts or posters can up your promotional game. You should have this slideshow play on a TV at your bar and share it on all your social media accounts.
This will allow you to showcase all menu items on offer at happy hour individually and at the same place. You can share this short video slideshow at your bar, your socials or even run them as ads.
You don’t need the services of a dedicated photographer or a videographer to create such a slideshow for your bar. You can do it yourself using your phones and the various services being offered online. The PosterMyWall slideshow maker allows you to create a slideshow of your own choice in just a few minutes. Regardless of your design skills, you will be able to create a slideshow for yourself with the help of professionally designed templates and layouts.
Themed Happy Hours
To really offer your customers a one-of-a-kind experience, you can go one step further and hold themed events. 80s Hour, Pizza Day, or even a Game Night are some ideas that you can experiment with. Point is to offer your customers an experience where everything you do will contribute towards it.
For example, special themed drinks, decor, music, ambiance, and even some games can all be part of this themed happy hour experience. Experiment, see what feels best and how your customers react, and then go from there. The feedback you receive here will direct further events as well.
For a happy hour, value is key. You must give your customers greater value for the price they pay and they will be sure to return and bring their friends. Not only that, but happy guests will also provide free marketing with word-of-mouth reviews. In case you don’t know how to start, observe other bars around your area and see what they are doing.
This will give you some ideas on where to start and how to proceed further. Using that information, you can then create something of your own and hold a successful happy hour special at your bar. The rule of thumb is to stay consistent with what works.
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