The Cock and Rabbit’s Graziemille restaurant has the advantage that it is set in beautiful surroundings and is a very photogenic business. Armed with my camera and a notepad, I visited the business to talk to the Proprietor Franco and to take a few pictures. The original site that I created (shown below), was a successful site but failed to promote the charm of the place. The newer site (left) makes much more use of large images, which had to be carefully optimised to reduce the slowing of download time by too much.
Every business is individual as is (are) the people that run them, so I wanted to get the ‘feel’ of the business, see who it would be likely to appeal to and find out what trade was like and where it came from.
From our preliminary discussions I drew up a shortlist of information:
- The Cock and Rabbit was a rural business with little passing trade
- The business was supported largely by locals travelling from nearby villages
- The age group most likely to frequent the pub was middle aged to mature
- Trade had been falling due to the economic climate and a general decline in the pub trade
- The Graziemille Restaurant catered for wedding parties, but business had fallen over recent years
- They advertised locally but with limited success
- The business had appeared in a number of television programs such as ‘Midsomer Murders’
- Franco himself was an accomplished chef with a long history in the culinary trade
- The building was able to be ‘hired out’ in parts
- There was a large garden with rural views over farmland
- The area was popular with walkers
From this information it was decided that:
- A strong web presence could promote the business widely at a cost that could not be bettered by any other form of advertising or promotion.
- It was imperative that a site be created rapidly to exploit the Christmas trade (it was September 2011)
- Towards the Spring it would be important to promote ‘Spring Bride’ receptions
- The ‘Midsomer’ connection could be an important publicity addition
- Franco’s experience in creating original dishes should be majored in recipe’s for download and perhaps later in videos on YouTube
- The connection with rambling and walking could reap rewards and that the business should approach local organisations
- Social Media Marketing through Facebook could encourage a new younger element to the business
- Local promotion through Google had to be initiated immediately as this takes up to 8 weeks to secure listing
- Search Engine Optimisation could aid Google and other engine results in the shorter term
