A Celebrity Chef's Marketing Wisdom

Celebrity Chef Gordon Ramsey, the wildly successful restaurateur and star of a compelling show, Kitchen Nightmares, on FOX is one scary dude. I always avoided his shows, finding the commercial clips alone entirely too mean-spirited for my taste.

That all changed on one cold, winter evening when I had a hankering for television, but with no Netflixs to watch. I found myself inexplicably drawn into Chef Gordon’s world. And now I’m hooked!

Kitchen Nightmares is about struggling restaurants who apply to have Chef Gordon come in and transform the establishment into a hot spot. The chefs of these failing, debt-ridden, customer-losing restaurants voluntarily ask for Chef Gordon’s help usually as their last resort. Yet interestingly enough, when Chef Gordon shares what’s wrong and what needs to change to start making a profit, the chefs move into denial, refusing to believe that anything they’re doing is at the root of the restaurant’s struggle. This never fails to fascinate me.

There are so many gems of advice for any self-employed professional in each episode. Being a foodie, I’m drawn to the food fun of it all. Chefs of failing restaurants never fail to say, “What do you mean my food is terrible?” “How is serving frozen food not real cooking?” “What do you mean there’s mold and mice droppings in my walk-in?” Being a business owner, I’m attracted to Chef Gordon’s nuggets of wisdom for self-employment success. Here are a few tips that I found particularly ring true for wellness professionals:

Don’t Try to Be Clever

A chef with nary a customer in sight and with a wife and kid at home stressed out because they have no money to pay their mortgage believes that he shouldn’t change his confusing, overly complex menu. He believes no one else is doing it and therefore it’s brilliant and that any day he will be the next Wolfgang Puck. Never mind his wait staff can’t understand the menu and has to spend 20 minutes with each customer to help them order, only to result in a customer who is grossed out with their meal.

“But it’s a great idea!” sputters the indignant chef.

“Get a grip,” says Gordon. “Keep it simple, tight and on point. Stop trying to be clever!”

How to apply this to your business: Keep your website design and content super crisp, clear and clean. This keeps the focus on what you can do for your clients versus enamoring them with your pretty—yet ineffective—website.

Be Known for One Thing

A struggling chef who offers a mish-mosh of menu items, which lacks any clear distinction as to the restaurant’s specialty results in fare where everything is average at best and customers leave feeling unimpressed, unsatisfied and ultimately vows never to return.

Another chef of the only Irish pub in town serves a terrible Shepard’s Pie that sends Gordon to the restroom to vomit after one bite.

Another chef, who can’t really cook, refuses Gordon’s advice to start using his brick oven for easy-to-make homemade pizza, stating, “It’s not clever enough.” Meanwhile, creditors are calling and his would be the only place in town to get pizza. Maybe this person needs to look up the word “clever” for his choices to date clearly are not.

How to apply this to your business: When you focus on one thing, and become really great at it, it’s so much easier to create both a buzz and raving clients.

Presentation Counts

Take pride in your work. That’s right, chewing gum is not normal for food servers. No, patrons shouldn’t hear your wait staff goofing off in the kitchen while they wait around for their food. No, it’s not normal to have mold all over your fridge. Avoid sloppiness, inconsistencies and careless staff attitudes that show up at the front of the house. When in doubt, keep your presentation simple, clean and crisp vs. fancy complicated.

How to apply this to your business: Send your newsletters consistently, don’t go over time in your sessions, be clean and clear about how you charge, take your self seriously and start treating yourself and your business like the success you want to attract.

Passion Is Not Enough

Gordon runs into a variety of food lovers who have set up shop as restaurant owners. Having passion for food and entertaining is not enough to become successful. “A lack of self-discipline will kill your business,” says Gordon. Gulp. It’s time to grow up and run your business like a business.

How to apply this to your business: I, too, run into a lot of people who are passionate about wellness, health and changing people’s lives for the better. This never impresses me. What impresses me is self discipline to do the unsexy work of newsletters, websites, and marketing that brings them closer and closer to the vision they hold for their business.

Sure Chef Gordon drops the F-bomb more than I could care for and his get-over-yourself style is abrasive, but it comes from surviving and flourishing decades in the restaurant business. Does he come off as arrogant in those “made for TV” editorial clips? Sure. But if you look closely, those clips are heavily edited and you’ll find that he just knows what he’s talking about and the people who ask for his help don’t.

Time to get in the kitchen and start cooking.

Here’s to expanding your passion into a profitable and meaningful business in 2008,

Karin

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