B (4:01)

Thanks, buddy. I'm always excited to be here. We get to talk about spinning dreidels for Hanukkah.

A (4:06)

I every, every year play it with my son. Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel. And I need to use the little the Elmo Hanukkah book because, you know, I was raised Catholic, even though my wife's Jewish. And then by, you know, by virtue, my son is Jewish, so he likes to play dreidel. But I don't know what they're called, and I don't know what the sides mean. And so I opened the little Elmo Hanukkah book that we gave him when he was one. And so I'm still like, it's my cheat sheet for playing dreidel, dreidel, dreidel.

B (4:32)

You will laugh. A restaurateur that we both know that we are both working with. Came to me and said, hey, Rev, in my big Jewish deli, I want to come up with a really cool, awesome Hanukkah dreidel spinning thing to drive loyalty and sign ups. And like, I'm as Christian as it kind of gets. Like, like, I eat bacon every day. I, like, I am not a part of the tribe. But to your point, he was like, figure it out. And so we literally built this entire, like, how to be a mensch, how to like spin dreidels at the table. Like, we built a whole thing. So, like, you know, you figure it out, right? It was fun.

A (5:06)

You know, we talk about this all the time, right? Like, how do you do something that no one else is doing? And I just think, and it doesn't take much but like spinning the dreidel at a table during December. Like, I don't know about you, but that sounds like a really good idea. We talked about this just the other day I went to this place and over the weekend was having dinner with my parents and they said, no, no, it's legit Italian. You gotta go. And I was like, okay, it's legit Italian. They're like, it's legit Italian. So I went in there, I was like, I'm going to get the carbonara unless you tell me it's not legit. I was telling this to the, the server and she's like, no, no, no, it's the real thing. I was like, the real thing because. And my wife was like, if it's not the real thing, he's going to send it back. And she's like, I promise you, it's the real thing. So in any. It came, but it wasn't. Did I tell you this? It came in a mason jar.

B (5:51)

What?

A (5:52)

So the pasta and all the stuff. So all the eggs were like, like in there and, and it was hot. And what they did is she came, she put the bowl down and she picked up the mason jar with gloves because guess what? It's super hot. And then she like shook it like, like a bartender shaking a martini and everything. Then like mixes, like all the raw egg, like, all mixes in real time at like the 35 seconds. So like the hot pasta is then cooking everything else in there and they cook the pancetta with the pasta and then like it all swirls. And I was like. And then she unscrewed the mason jar cap and then just like poured it into my bowl. And I was like, oh, man. Like, that thing didn't even cook two minutes ago. That thing cooked Right here in front of me. And I was like. And then my mom was like, he's just so pissed that you didn't tell him to take out his camera because he loves taking pictures of stuff like that. Like carbonara in a mason jar. And she's like, oh, my God, I didn't even think of it. Do you want me to bring you another one that we can film? And I was like, oh, my God, yes. But no. Like, no, I don't. I don't need it. But like, carbonara in a jar. And then my son was like, basically, it's jar, jar. Which then was like, you know, it's like he's 10. Like, dad jokes are right in his wheelhouse. In any event, I love it. Spinning dreidels, putting carbonara in a jar. I've never seen it. But, like, so easy.

B (7:08)

I was going to say, if you had your phone out, you would have been like, welcome to my next presentation. Well, now you definitely. You and I have to go there. So now I need a photo of it.

A (7:18)

So we do have to go there. And it was legit Italian. Like, straight up. I was like, oh, this isn't fake. This is, like, in suburban Philadelphia. But it was like, it was legit. It was cool. Okay, for those of you who don't know, I have worked with Rev on and off for two and a half, maybe three years here. He gives a lot of talks, he's got tons of clients. Again, he is a restaurant marketer. We have co hosted the P3 Marketing Summit. And here's the news flash. I don't know if you guys know this, but we are actually sunsetting that event and turning it into or including it now in part of the Mastermind. So you guys know I run something I found it's something called the P3 mastermind. It's a group coaching program geared towards restaurant owners who want to increase profitability. Profit first, then growth. Marketing is definitely the growth engine for any restaurant. Right. How do you acquire new customers? How do you increase repeat visits? All of that. That content that we used to deliver. Over the course of two days, roughly 14 hours of content on stage is now being delivered bite size, one week at a time for everybody in the program. I have always loved the P3 mastermind. I think it makes an impact, a real impact in people's lives. I think now with Rev coming on board and helping me deliver this marketing content one hour every single week, I now think I am convinced this is the very best restaurant coaching program out there, hands down. Because you get a one hour marketing call every single week with me, with Rev, and then a separate two hour operations coaching call. And that is like an incredibly powerful one, two punch. This was something we were trying to, like, will into existence, what, a year and a half, two years ago. Rev, there's been a lot of talks and I'm so thrilled to make it happen.

B (9:00)

A lot of talks. Now I'm excited. I'm excited. In fact, I think there's a lot of. Come on, Chip, when can we do this? Come on, Chip, when can we do this? Come on, Chip, when can we do this?

A (9:08)

So for what it's worth, that was just about every, every conversation we'd have. And we'd be sitting over like wings or a burger and beer and he's like, yo, yo, when can we make this happen? And it's just anybody who runs a company, anybody who sort of like is building anything, knows that like, when you're small, you can go fast, but you can't go so fast. You still have to be very, at least I think about having to be very methodical and strategic with like, what I do, how I grow and all of this. This was very much the right time to do it. And I'm super pumped. So here's my shameless plug for the P3 mastermind. As a P3 member, you get a one hour marketing call every week and a two hour operations call every week. So how do you actually run your financials? How do you forecast? How do you budget? How do you give your team everything they need to succeed? And how do you actually, actually market your restaurant in the year 20, 26 and beyond? We're basically presenting those 14 weeks of content over a 22 week boot camp that will just repeat. We do 22 weeks with all this space in for Q and A and then on the back half of the year, we do it again. And that's what we're going to do until people tell us not to do it. We're going to present this boot camp twice a year, every single year, until somebody tells us to stop. I'm super, super pumped. I mean, that's actually not what we're here to talk about though, today. Rev.

B (10:23)

There's one last thing on that, by the way. I'm excited. I get asked this all the time, like, hey, Rev, can you help us out? And I don't want this to come across as braggadocious, but like, I'm not cheap and I'm not always available, but. Right, but like, I want to help everybody and so this is a way that I feel like I can give a lot of help to a lot of people. And it's all the things that I'm learning working with like larger enterprise brands, like what are they doing that I can help independent restaurants figure out on like a budget, fast friendly type of thing. So like all the people that pay the rest of my day are going to make it much easier for you to go faster. So I'm excited about this.

A (10:57)

I love that. And it very much is paint by number. And I mean that in the most respectful way. It's like what do I actually need to do? What buttons do I press, where do I click, how do I set up my website, what should my emails look like, what's the cadence, how do I run a Google Ad? Do meta ads work? You know, how do we do influencer marketing, how do we do reputation, all of that in bite size, like one hour a week. So it's like you learn something and then you go put it into practice and then you come back, we learn something new the second week and then you go put it into practice and so you like, you're ready to receive the next part. Best part, this is the last thing I'll say on it. And the reason why we turned it from a live in person summit to this virtual thing is that now it's really easy for you to get like you the restaurant owner, to get anybody you want on the damn call. I literally don't care. You give them the zoom link and and they show up. So your social media girl, your email marketing guy, the whoever does the stuff. Cause I'm assuming for most of you you don't actively do the stuff. You got other people to like do the stuff. So just get them on the call. And we heard over and over from the last time we did it in Salt Lake City in January, people said, this is so great. I just wish Fill in the blank could have been here. I wish I could have brought Fill in the blank because hotels aren't cheap and airfare isn't cheap and you know, a weekend at one of these events isn't cheap, not to mention the tickets. So I was like. And this is what Rev rev. And I said we were doing our postmortem, which we always do. And I said, you know what, I just think there's a better way we could administer the content, a way that will get people the impact that they're looking for and all of that. So that's where we transitioned it from what it was to what it's now becoming stoked. I'm pumped. Okay, all of that aside, today we're going to talk about AI search. So one of the things that came up in a Mastermind session was one of my members who Rev now knows, got to know him down in Dallas at our last event, the Profitability Summit. But he said, you know, he ays, nobody under 30 is using Google. So we keep talking about search, right? We talk about how do you, you know, optimize for SEO and how do you make sure you're found by the people who are Googling you? And he said, guess What? Nobody under 30 is Googling anymore. They're all just going straight to ChatGPT or Claude or whatever they're using to figure out where they should go. And he said, I think it's a totally different machine. And so Rev and I were talking and I said, rev, what do you know about this? And at the time, you said, I know very little about it. I don't know that it's a big deal. I said, I didn't think so either. And I've learned it is a very big deal. And then Rev went and did a super deep dive and. And came back with all this information for me, and I was like, stop talking. Stop talking. We're going to have this conversation on the podcast. So now there's SEO and what is it called now? Geo, right? Which is that generative AI. Like, when people are going somewhere else other than Google, it's a whole different way. We have to think about this. So now I'm going to pretty much stop talking and pass it off to Revolution. Rev, what did you learn when it comes to search via, you know, browsers, you know, Google, things like that versus ChatGPT. And I like, what's the difference? What did you learn? Teach us.

B (14:13)

Sure. So thank you for not embarrassing me, but I will tell the real story of what happened and embarrass myself. Chip and I were planning for the P3 Marketing Online Summit and stuff, and he said, rev, where's your head with AI? And I was like, man, whatever. Then he's like, no, no, you're wrong. I was like, I'm not wrong. I was like, I'm friends with the Google people. They told me this. The other thing, he's fine. He's like, I'm telling you, you're wrong. I was like, fine, I'll go look it up. And I looked it up, and yes, I was wrong. So I was a naysayer. I was definitely like, all you gotta do is this Other thing. And then I was wrong. I was wrong, however, to I guess maybe my credit is it was actually really easier to learn than I thought it was. So here's the story, okay? And this part is what I believe before and is still the truth and was confirmed to me by some of our mutual friends at Google. There is nothing more important in local search than listings management. Nothing. And listings management are. Is Google being Yahoo, Yelp, Foursquare, Facebook, MapQuest, you know, Siri, Apple, Maps, whatever, anywhere that like your black and white facts about your businesses already lives online, still number one, still number, still the most important part of search because they are black and white facts. Right. And even though most AI answers are contextual, it's based on a backbone of hardcore black and white data. What's your address? What subway are you near? What's your hours of operation? What's on your menu? Do you have gluten free options? Do you have parking? Like it's all black and white facts. Right? The entire Internet is structured on top of data, Right. And there's a number of ways to speak it, but that language is known as schema. Right. And so listings, Google, Bing, Yahoo, Yelp, Foursquare are basically structured data known as schema. That makes it easy for the search engines, the discovery sites, the apps, the maps, all that. It makes it easy for them to read. Okay? So you and I have been talking about using tools like Marquee and some of the others out there that like in terms of becoming search for local optimization, still crucial. Okay? Still crucial. And it doesn't matter what you do outside of that. If you don't do that, you don't have the foundation. Right. And it's the same reason. And look, and again, it's the first module in the P3 marketing. When we get into it, we literally talk about local search because it's that damn important. You know what I mean? Yep. And in terms of AI, it is still also that damn important. Makes sense.

A (16:35)

Yes.

B (16:35)

So that, that if you're not doing that, if you're not properly doing listings management, that you gotta start that and that is AI or not Super. That's like the most important part of search. I've done the research, I've asked the Google folks, 67% of guests to your restaurant, whether they're driving or online ordering, have air quotes, search in their journey. Okay? So search could be even if they've been there before they go to look at your hours of operation, or they might want to make a phone call, or they might go look at your menu or they want to see, you know, do you have catering or whatever. But they go to the Internet for that information. And that is quote, unquote, a search function, right? So if two out of three guests returning or new have search in their journey, that tells you how important it is. Makes sense.

A (17:21)

It's huge. It's huge.

B (17:23)

It's super important. So step one, manage your listings. There's nothing more important than that. And my understanding prior to our conversation three weeks ago or two weeks ago was not good enough. I was so wrong. I was so wrong. And you are right. And I think what you said to me is rev. No, you only believe that because we're both over 40.

A (17:44)

Well, that was the, that was, you know, and for what it's worth, is that the member who came to me, he was like, yeah, yeah, like we're the exact same age. And he says, yeah, yeah, it's different for people who are 20 years younger. And I was like, I guess. And he's like, no, no, no, that's like, like, no, it's totally different. So tell me what you found as you did the deep dive. Because you did a deep dive and wrote a really, really incredible newsletter on LinkedIn which in the show notes we're going to link to that because I think it's worth reading it. I think it's going to condense a lot of this stuff. But what did you like, give me a high level like, like what did you find when you did the deep dive?

B (18:22)

So it's really just a natural progression of search. Like search has been contextual for a while, right? Search for restaurants 10 years ago was best hot wings near me, right now it's best hot wings near me with parking, gluten free menu open Sunday 2pm and, and has high chairs, right? Like people's search, People's search habit has developed and now that like chat, GBT and even some of the social media networks have deeper, like more contextual search, people are just searching with more context and because they're doing it with an agent that knows who they are. Like If I use ChatGPT all the time, it knows rev. So it's also using the context of what it knows about me, not just my search history. So we were headed this direction anyway. Okay. So what I found out is something is way more important than it's been in a long time. And that's your website. Okay. And for a long time my belief and my understanding based on actual data and facts is that if you basically had like your Hours of operation and your address and an HTML based menu of what's available. Like you're kind of good. It's not the case anymore and it's going to continue to not be the case. Right, so really sort of the next version of this here, right? Other than like, look, you got to do listings management. You want your guests talking about you and ratings and reviews. You want them like all the stuff you were going to do anyway.

A (19:48)

Yes.

B (19:49)

There is one move that you can do right now and it's so easy. It took me 10 minutes from my restaurant 10 minutes to become optimized for gensearch. And it is an FAQ page on your website and, and a simple FAQ page in HTML. I mean, look, they want you to do it in JSON and this other stuff, but let's not get into that in the show. But if you have a simple FAQ page answering the most common questions that people are gonna have about a restaurant or your restaurant and put it on your page, it will be indexed by the, by the AI agents and help you immensely. So rather than the AI agents having to gather that data on their own or pulling it in from different sources or seeing if somebody talked about it on Reddit, which by the way, you know that 20, 21% of chat GPT comes from Reddit, did you know that?

A (20:38)

No.

B (20:39)

That's crazy. That's crazy.

A (20:41)

That's alarming.

B (20:42)

Yes, the trolls of the, the honesty of the universe is my chat GPT. Anyway, there, if you basically put a, a relatively robust 10 question FAQ page on your website in addition to doing listings management, it's kind of it chip. It's like actually way easier than I thought it was. And that, that was the best part for me is after I did the research to find out how important it was like, I was like, okay, well what do I got to do? It was like, oh, answer these 10 questions. I was like, you're kidding me. It's that easy? It actually is.

A (21:13)

You know, really funny is that over the course of me learning more about this as well, and you've just confirmed the things that I had learned, which is that I would. I was sort of against about pages for a long time and I was.

B (21:27)

Like, oh, super important now.

A (21:29)

And it is super important. What I didn't like about about pages is that there was so much important information there that really should be sprinkled out throughout the website. Like if there are founders or owners or if there's like an ethos or philosophy that should be on the homepage that should be woven through, you know, all different areas of the menu. Not just condensed onto one page, but now the about page. You know, I would say, like, make it a history page or a legacy or the, you know, there's like, ways of doing it. It just, just felt like there's a more elegant way of doing it because I just felt like there was. Anytime we take somebody somewhere where they can't buy from us or reserve with us, it's moving them in the wrong direction because we know that the data still holds. Now, 25 years into the modern Internet, every time they have to click, you lose 15% of traffic. And there's all this stuff. That's why, you know, the, the buy now, the one click ordering, you know, really got, you know, really stemmed from that data. But, like, the more places we send people, eventually they're just going to stop exploring. They'll be like, all right, let me see something else. Let me go check out another restaurant. Rather than, you know, building them, you know, driving them towards the finish line.

B (22:41)

Now, though, I'm like, I'll tell you, this is a, this is a different conversation. Okay? But the about page is super important in establishing what makes you different and it's subcontextual. So again, there's another conversation you and I have, but in terms of, like, if your about page just says, oh, we have hamburgers and tacos and they're the freshest ever, like, nope, nope, yep. It's not going to do anything for the long term of your brand. But again, that's a different conversation.

A (23:11)

Yeah, for sure. So the FAQ page on the about, you know, either an FAQ page or putting the FAQs on the about page. What do you. Is there a discrepancy?

B (23:21)

The jury's out on which is which. But what I'm understanding that, like, if you're just going to go do it just its own page, like literally the is, you know, your restaurant, URL.com faqs. Because the Internet then's like, oh, these are FAQs. And then if you put that they are frequently asked questions in FAQs, then the Internet's like, oh, these are FAQs. So the Internet, the Internet is kind of obvious in that way. If you label it what it is and you tell it what it is, it's much easier for it to figure out what it is.

A (23:49)

Love it. Anything else? I mean, I think even just this, the whole point of these conversations is to make something super actionable. And I don't want to drag out the conversation. If somebody can just take that away from this conversation and just say, there's significant data that says people under 30 are using ChatGPT in, you know, in the way that anybody over 40 uses Google, right? Like, best restaurant near me, best tacos near me. And people are going in, say, hey, I'm spending a weekend in Nashville and I want to be here and here, and we've got theater tickets to there, and we really don't want, like, they'll just say and tell chat cbt, like, put together three potential itineraries and, you know, tell me why you recommended that. And so you got to be on that list, like, hey, I'm going to go out for a bachelor party. Hey, I'm going to get whatever it is, like, you want to be on that list of, you know, when people say, this is what I'm looking for.

B (24:37)

I'll tell you, we don't. We don't have to go over the whole list on the show here because you're going to link it. But. But it's actually, it's ev. I. In that blog post, I'm literally like, answer exactly these 10 questions. Like, if you. It's. I gave you paint by numbers, but it's like, you know, what are your hours of operation? You know, how do people get there? Do you have online ordering, delivery pickup? Do you have catering? Like, it's literally all the things people are going to ask anyway. But I put the questions in a structured way that you can literally just cut and paste my guide, answer the questions and put them in FAQ page again. It took me 10 minutes to do this at Handcraft Burgers and Brew. 10. 10 minutes.

A (25:10)

Love it. Yeah. For those of you who don't know. So the. The. One of the coolest parts about Rev is that he's not just a marketer, but he's an operator and an owner himself. He's got Handcraft Burgers and Brew, which is in the heart of midtown Manhattan, wedged in between Times Square and Bryant Park. So, yes, a lot of foot traffic, but also a lot of competition. So as a marketer, he has to think very deeply about how he gets people down a very narrow, otherwise strange block in midtown Manhattan that's just a couple blocks away from this massive, you know, 42nd street, but it's not there. So how do you get people down there? So he thinks, really, he has to think about this in the same ways that you guys do as well.

B (25:49)

I also have to think about how to justify $2 for a house Made sauce. But that's another. Again, another conversation.

A (25:55)

It was super good, man.

B (25:56)

Anybody that's listening to this, check the link that Chip will put in the blog and literally just answer the questions.

A (26:03)

Yeah, I love it. And if you're in New York City, go check out Rev's restaurant, Handcraft Burgers and Brew. I'll put the link in there too, because it is super good. It's got great food, great hospitality. Rev, any final words before I kick you out of here?

B (26:14)

The next time you talk about my restaurant, can you please also say that we have great marketing?

A (26:18)

You do. You have to. That's my point is that you have to have great marketing. If you guys don't follow him, it's worth following. Even if you don't even live in New York City and have no plans to ever come to New York City. But just to see what a master marketer does with a very small space in a very saturated neighborhood, you'll learn so much about. Like what? About what to do? Yeah, I mean, 100%. It goes without saying.

B (26:43)

Thank you. But yeah, if you're listening to the show, what's the last thing I want to say? Please do what we just told you to do. Read the blog. Go do it. It's worth the time. This is important now. It's going to continue to get more important every day. And search on the Internet is a long tail game. You don't just turn it on. It's working. Like you have to build the trust. So the time is now.

A (27:04)

Love it. Rev, as always, I love having you out here. Appreciate you sharing all your wisdom. I love having you as part of the P3 mastermind. Now again, final plug, guys. Shameless Plug now members get two calls every week. A one hour marketing call and a two hour operations call. It is now, I think, the very best coaching program out there to help restaurant owners make more work less, bring more efficiency to what they're doing. How do you dial in profits and then grow your business? That's the P3 mastermind. And you get to hang out with me every week. You get to hang out with Rev every week. You guys know Chris Hughes has been on the show. Sour Tolo has been on the show. Those guys are rocking it as well. Appreciate you guys making time for this show and I will see you next time.