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> This is because restaurants often don't have tools to update the text on their sites That part struck me as well, because it's complete and utter bullshit. The tools exist, they've been implemented for years across a variety of industries and they come in all flavors. There should be no need for a restaurant operator to ever have to get on the phone with their technologist, and I use that term loosely, and request an item change and any developer with a couple of years experience should know that. The reason they're so shitty, imo, is that restauranteurs are ocd-minded workaholics who spend most of their time focusing on their own operation and very little time researching the technology aspects of their industry or comparing themselves outside of their business column. Just pick up any of their trade publications. They simply don't have the time or the inclination and more often than not the money to go out and hire a bonafide design or technology firm to implement a solution for them. They see what other restaurants are doing, calculate the costs of copying them and call it a day. As long as nobody else is innovating, why should they? Another aspect of the business that leads to poor internet marketing is the people that they have filling those positions. I'm willing to bet that upwards of 90% of the people who make the decisions on the restaurant's website have a) no business experience, b) no technology experience, c) no desire to be anything than someone who works at a restaurant, as long as they don't have to serve food or pour drinks. They are, and having worked in the industry for many years, mostly an underachieving lot who are most happy sucking down a cold beer that a friendly bartender comped them. Seriously, I build web-based, cross-platform financial applications and my restaurant friends still ask me to help them with the Yelp. They have absolute no clue what the internet has become in the past ten or twelve years. And if they can get their favorite cocktail waitress' friend to put together some crap website, then they're just as happy. More often than not, you'll have to print the pages out and send the paper site along with the invoice so they can look it over. |