Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to another edition of Give and Ovation, the restaurant guest experience podcast, where I talk to industry experts to get their strategies and tactics you can use to create a five-star guest experience. This podcast is sponsored by Ovation, an operations and guest recovery platform for multi-unit restaurants that gives all the answers without annoying guests. With all the questions. Learn more at OvationUpcom.

Speaker 1: 0:24

And today I'm excited because we don't only have someone who is just sharp guy done a lot of cool things, but someone who is, at this point I consider him just to be a friend. I mean, he's like super cool guy, vp of marketing at Robex. He's got a great career in hospitality. This is actually his second round at Robex, but he's been in the marketing industry for years. He knows a ton of stuff. And, for those who can see, I'm actually wearing my watermelon shirt today because I went through my closet and I was like for Mitch, I want to wear something that has that healthy Robex vibe to it. And I looked at my closet. My closet is so unhealthy, mitch, I have hamburgers, pizza, hot dogs and one shirt with healthy food on it. So anyway, apologies that this is all I got, but welcome to the podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:15

It's okay. It's okay, thank you. Thank you, so good to see you. I know we usually see each other in person at the different conferences, but good to see you again virtually.

Speaker 1: 1:22

So now, Mitch, you've had such a great career in hospitality marketing and just kind of like from a high level, what's your philosophy when it comes to marketing Like? What are some of the guiding principles that you've taken with you from Hollywood Entertainment, Blockbuster, American Cancer Society, Walt Disney World to Robex?

Speaker 2: 1:41

I think overall you just have to be constantly evolving. You have to understand who your customer is, who your consumer is, and then be able to adapt your marketing message to that audience. That can be challenging. Sometimes you've got so many different types of audience members and breakdowns of different audiences, and how do you look at that?

Speaker 1: 2:01

When you're looking at your audience, how do you determine? Here's what they care about.

Speaker 2: 2:07

Well, I think, first and foremost, it's research right, it's utilizing the tools that you have at your disposal as your company, right? Understanding guest performance, understanding the guest data, looking at what they're ordering in our case, what they're not ordering, what they're adding, how frequently they're coming in, and a lot of those things come into play. We use a platform called BICCI to understand some of the customer insights and trends and then, through our mobile app, we've got hundreds and hundreds of thousands of users that we have their information. We could see what they're ordering, how they're ordering, what they like, what they don't like.

Speaker 2: 2:40

In fact, we're working on a new promotion to launch really at the end of March, focusing on our boosts and enrichments, which are hugely popular. That's adding immunity or adding whey protein, or adding energy to a smoothie or even to a bowl. But one of the things we're looking at is trying to understand what people specifically are ordering and putting a boost in is primarily our classics category that aren't pre-packaged with boosts, or is it our performance category where they're looking to add to it? So, again, the bottom line is it really comes down to the data that you have at hand to understand as much analytical information from the guests as possible.

Speaker 1: 3:17

And I think that using a platform like Vicky is so powerful because they do such a great job of aggregating data and helping you understand your guest more. What role does technology play for you in marketing?

Speaker 2: 3:30

It plays a huge part. I mean, we're really strong partners with our technology team because they're the ones sort of behind the curtains helping us get the information that we need. On my team, our senior digital marketing manager has access to our tools, whether it even be through third-party delivery platform, which we have a little bit of insight into what customers are ordering Our mobile app. You know, we have consumer data that we get from feedback, from surveys, things like that, that we're able to sort of all put together and extrapolate.

Speaker 1: 3:59

You know what a direction should be or could be, yeah, and I think that, as we look at it, you've done a great job at leveraging technology, but not removing the hospitality from it. So, coming from a marketer's perspective, how do you market something when, in restaurants, we are such an operations focused industry and it's not like you can ship the product to someone and it's going to be the same exact thing every time, because everything that happens inside of a Robax is going to go through the hands of an employee, and so there's such a huge operational aspect. How do you work with operations as opposed to getting mad if something doesn't go right?

Speaker 2: 4:40

Like you said, it's working with that team. Again, I've got a great relationship with our head of operations and his team as well, and listen, as anybody that's listening and or watching that's in the franchise system. They know that it's very difficult to enforce compliance, one of the things that, unfortunately, when we're sitting and putting together a program or an LCO or a promotion, we're putting together which elements are going to be in the store to promote it. We put together really detailed instructions for the team members, for the franchisees to review with their teams and their managers, and still you go to a store and it's completely the opposite.

Speaker 2: 5:18

We spent hours putting this together because there's a reason, as an example, window decal should go from the outside right Because you've got tinting, you've got you know any variety of things. So it is a challenge. It really is. And unfortunately, as I'm planning with my team what we're going to do next, I'm always thinking like, oh my gosh, like we're going to put out these decals, but I know they're going to keep the other ones. It's a constant battle, really it is, but that's where you know you've got to have a strong operations team that is in the field and saying, okay, here's your promotion. Here are the elements and here's where they should be, because we're giving you a planogram. This is what you need to correct it.

Speaker 1: 5:55

And I think that that works so well, that idea of working closely with marketing and operations. And I know that one of our partners, Doghouse, they actually have a group, it's called Markerations and they meet three times a week because you can't run a marketing program without the operations on board and you got to know what you're marketing and operations needs to know what to put out there and how to implement it, and so I think, that there's just too many brands right now where there is an unhealthy tension, from what I can see, between marketing operations in the restaurant industry, more so than marketing other industries I've been involved in.

Speaker 2: 6:34

You're probably right. I mean, I've actually talked to CJ about this same thing he's brought up that term before and we discussed how the two are integrated and you're right. Without a doubt, marketing operations are the two that've got to be hand in hand. I really feel that we are. I think we're well aligned. I think they come to the rescue when we need it and we come to the rescue when they need it. I think, at the end of the day, we're on the same page, certainly to ensure our franchisees are successful and are doing the things that are going to help drive their business.

Speaker 2: 7:03

But, like you said, we could put programs out there, but if they're not implemented the way that we're recommending, I mean you got to rely on your operations team to follow up. And again, it's not because we want, as an example, a cling this way on this window. There's a reason, as I said, for it. And if you look at marketing the business from sort of an omni-channel approach, you've got outside stuff driving people in, whether it's an e-blast or social media or rewards messaging website, you name it, search and when they go in the store, we want that messaging to continue and to make sense. So, ultimately, when they go in the store. We want that messaging to continue and it makes sense. So, ultimately, when they go up to the kiosk to place the order or they go to the team member at the cashier's station to place the order, sort of you got, oh yeah, you guys are promoting superfoods.

Speaker 2: 7:47

I want that one yeah, yeah exactly because now we're able to follow through on that promise, to our franchisees, of course, but to our customers. Hey, here's what we're promoting. You're going to love it. You're seeing it here. You're seeing it here. You're seeing it here.

Speaker 1: 8:01

I love that idea of just that omni-channel messaging and carrying that same message from hey, I saw an ad, I saw a Instagram post, I got a push notification. I go in the store and I see the sign. It's like, yes, this all makes sense, it looks professional and it feels unified, I think, which is really critical, because, at the end of the day, all of this, what we're talking about here, mitch, is the guest experience, right? And so what do you think the most important aspect of guest experience is nowadays? I mean.

Speaker 2: 8:30

We know service in the eyes of many consumers is really important Service accuracy, that you're fulfilling your promise of your brand. The great thing about our brand, our mission statement, is we make delicious food that makes people happy. It's the easiest no-brainer, low-hanging fruit whatever you want to call it a statement to be able to execute on for our franchisees and for us as well. All we're doing is like okay, great, here's this great looking product, it's colorful, it tastes good. I mean, who doesn't feel good and happy when they drink a smoothie? You may have a little bit of odd taste if you you know straight kale and spinach and just add a little wheatgrass shot in there or something like that. But for the most part, you know, and for us flavor is number one. It's the number one thing that we launched our business on years ago 1996. And we maintain that to this day.

Speaker 2: 9:21

Even if it's something in our functional category, first and foremost it's got to taste great and there's some great competitors in the category. They all do a good job. But it's just amazing to me how their product is great, it's functional, but just some of the tastes are like, oh my God. And the great thing for us is, you know, once our customers taste that product, that's what sort of pulls them in. I mean, it's really, again, it's. I think it's executing on your brand promise. You know, if you are going to tell somebody, you're going to have a great experience all around. I think you should back that up every step of the way with the consumer experience in the store, the cashier, how you're using the app In your case, how does someone get a survey that they could engage with quickly and easily? Everything across the board, our socials. How can they engage with us on social? Is there a consistency there as well?

Speaker 1: 10:16

really interesting is we did a bunch of data, we did a bunch of research to figure out what are the most likely reasons for restaurants to get negative reviews, and they were the two things that you just mentioned service and accuracy. And I found it really interesting it wasn't about the food, because if a restaurant is still in business, the reviews aren't going to be all complaining about the food. It's the service and the accuracy, because if you aren't treated well, you want to feel vindicated and so you will be out for blood. And these consumers they go to Google, they go to Yelp to really get their pound of flesh If the order is inaccurate.

Speaker 1: 10:48

I drove 10 minutes. I picked up my order, I drove 10 minutes home, I opened it up to give it to my family and I ordered five things and four of them are there. I'm so frustrated, right, and those two things, I think, are so critical because it creates a very viscerally emotional experience. I could handle hey, I wanted to order here and the food wasn't that good, so we'll go someplace else next time. But if you make me feel like I'm not important, that is going to get a negative review more often than any other mistake that you could make in the restaurant industry.

Speaker 2: 11:22

Yeah, you're right, we see it If you look at it. We review our input, our customer data, customer feedback regularly. But if you just look at even across the board reviews for brands in general, just generalized, that's the majority of complaints, especially for restaurants. And now introduced a couple of years ago, obviously because of COVID it sort of took off but third-party delivery that we really have no control over, our us in the restaurant space have no control over right the order gets placed I mean many of us using a preferred provider to deliver that product into the homes. And then of course there's the individual. If somebody orders from Uber Eats, it's going to come from Uber Eats, but there's minimal control on that. We make sure that when it goes to the driver, when it's ready to go, it's packaged, it's accurate, it's verified, everything else. But if there's something that happens you end up with an outraged customer. Sure, you can give them a refund, but it just puts a bad taste in their mouth and so with that, what are some tactics that you've used to improve the guest experience?

Speaker 2: 12:24

Again, a lot of this, I think, falls onto the operations side. It's just verifying. Funny one of the complaints that we would get from our mobile app is that people would place an order and they would hit the wrong location, oh yeah, what happens is an order is ready somewhere else or it doesn't get delivered, so really focusing on that.

Speaker 2: 12:43

So what we did is we recently updated our app and we have an extra step there to verify hey, you're ordering from this store on La Cienega Boulevard in Los Angeles versus another store. That's one of the ways again, but operations really is the one that that falls on, because again, we're sending people in, we're promoting products. It's got to be executed by our operations partners, with all the things they're training to our franchisees and to their team members.

Speaker 1: 13:10

Yeah, I love that. I think it's so important and I think the message about this unification of messaging to the guest and making sure that you have a unified face, like you know, if my wife and I disagree on how to parent our kid through a situation like maybe I shouldn't talk about this on the podcast, but my kid was getting like he was getting pushed around by this other kid and so he popped him in the nose and gave him a bloody nose, right, and so my wife's reaction was like hey, wait, like stand up for yourself. My reaction was let's use our words, right. So her and I had to get on the same page on how do we handle that. But same thing with operations and marketing you have to provide that unified face and I think that messaging throughout I think is so critical and I love that you really touched on that, because that's something that often gets overlooked and it's not sent out as a campaign. It's sent out as like a one-off and it's so much more powerful when it is a campaign.

Speaker 2: 14:09

Yeah, there's a balance between our operations folks not being police officers and being coaches, as an example, we have a monthly all franchisee webinar. We have a biannual conference and we drive these things home and we take feedback from franchisees, of course as well, but again, just trying toes, of course as well, but again just trying to, yes, be uniform, be consistent, but trying to explain to a franchisee here's why we're doing something and here's the importance of it, besides the fact that you're obligated, through your franchise room, to follow this.

Speaker 1: 14:41

But I mean just this is going to help you, and I think that that's really the what's in it for me, right?

Speaker 2: 14:46

And when you've got a brand that's been around for as long as we have 25 years. We've tried a lot of different things over the years. What we did years ago, when I was at Robex in the mid to late 2000s, is different than we're doing now as far as tactics and training our franchisees to get out and market their stores.

Speaker 1: 15:03

So, mitch, you know a lot of people in the industry who's someone that we should be following, who's someone that deserves an ovation.

Speaker 2: 15:08

This is going to sound somewhat silly but as a consumer I look at, everybody says Starbucks right, which they do a great. Starbucks, apple, nike, they all do a great job, although Nike sort of lost a little bit of its flair lately. But one thing I continually see is McDonald's. They're always reinventing themselves, whether the look and the feel, either the marketing messaging they use, whether it be broadcast media or even in the store. They're always evolving to not only what the customer wants but, I think, to attract a different customer, a broader customer. And I see just in their messaging it seems to be very, very clean. They don't take a lot of chances, because how many variations can you do on an Egg McMuffin or the McRib?

Speaker 2: 15:52

But that's one of the brands that stands out in just being diverse and being unique and keeping a real high level of quality. You know, of course, apple because it's simplistic. They definitely, you know, have for years, you know, focused, focused on the brand and it's all about the brand. At the end of the day, you could have a phone over here, a phone over there, a computer. Pretty much it's going to work the same way. So it's just about the whole essence of being part of the brand, making you feel like you're part of that movement, so to say.

Speaker 1: 16:23

Yeah, Love that Mitch. Well, how do people find and follow you and Robex Gosh on social media.

Speaker 2: 16:30

Obviously, robex Fresh Juices and Smoothies. Robexcom is the website. I'm on LinkedIn, mitch Baker for those franchise folks that are viewing and listening I'll be at the International Franchise Association annual conference starting on Sunday. I'm actually part of the Marketing and Innovation Committee, which is headed up by just some great folks here. Sherry Fishman, who is a longtime veteran in the franchise industry, is our chair, so we're doing some great things to help franchisees and franchisors be able to market their stores and use best practices. So anyway, long story short, I'll be there and, as I mentioned, of course, linkedin.

Speaker 1: 17:09

Awesome. Well, Mitch, for giving us a Mitch Baker's dozen worth of insights. Today's ovation goes to you. Thank you so much for joining us on Give an Ovation. Thanks, Zach. Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We're all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by Ovation, a two-question, SMS-based actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you'd like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at OvationUpcom.