For coffee shops and cafes ยท Marketing planning
A marketing plan for a coffee shop.
The morning rush mostly takes care of itself. The plan is about the hours that do not: the afternoon lull, the slow season, and the catering orders you could be taking.
Or text (508) 546-9942
Slide it
You vs. Cup of Joe Schmo.
Left is your website today. Right is the one Cup of Joe Schmo has. Drag the line, then hit the button.
Crickets on the left. That is the problem.
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Illustration. Joe is made up. Your competitor is not.
The coffee shop version
Why it matters.
A coffee shop's revenue is shaped by the clock. Mornings fill with commuters and regulars. Mid-afternoon goes quiet. Some shops have an evening crowd, most do not. Marketing that pushes the morning is pushing a door that is already open. A plan looks at where the empty seats and slow hours are and picks the offer that fills them: a lunch menu, an afternoon study crowd, office catering, retail beans, an event night.
Picking channels is the other half. Plenty of cafes post daily on several platforms and never check whether any of it brings people in. The plan picks two channels, sets a rhythm the staff can keep on a short-handed week, and names the measure worth watching, like catering inquiries or afternoon sales, with a date to review it honestly.
What I would build
For a coffee shop.
What you serve, who it is for and why they choose you over the drive-through. Written down plainly, so the menu, the room and the marketing all point in the same direction.
Defined tightly enough to price: an afternoon pastry and drink pairing, a work-from-here day with refills, a catering box for offices. Something specific to promote, not a vague invitation to stop by.
Usually the Google profile plus one social platform, with email for regulars if you have a list. A weekly rhythm short enough to survive the week when two baristas call out.
Afternoon sales, catering inquiries, event signups. Each gets a threshold that triggers a decision, so you know when a promotion is working and when to drop it without second-guessing.
The mistake I see
Running a punch card and calling it a plan
Punch cards and points apps reward people who were coming anyway. They are fine, but they are not a marketing strategy. The harder questions are why first-time visitors do not come back, why the afternoon is empty and whether catering is worth chasing. A plan answers those before spending on perks for regulars you already have.
What you get
Marketing planning.
Before anybody designs anything, I figure out what you are selling, to whom, and what has to happen every week.
- A written position: what you sell, to whom, and why you over the alternative
- The offer, defined tightly enough to put a price on
- Which channels get effort and which get ignored
- A weekly rhythm somebody can actually keep
- What gets measured, and the threshold that triggers a decision
How it goes
For a coffee shop, step by step.
→ Keep scrolling. It moves sideways.
One long conversation
Your numbers, your best customers, the jobs you wish you had more of.
Narrow it
Most plans fail from doing six things badly. I pick two.
Write it down
One page. If it needs ten, it will not survive a busy month.
Set the review
A date to look at it honestly and change it.
Step five is you.
The free Receipt shows what your coffee shop should fix first. About half a minute, no card.
Print my Receipt →
Questions
What coffee shops and cafes ask.
Is catering worth pushing for a small cafe?
Often, if you have the capacity. Office coffee boxes and pastry trays use the quieter hours after the rush and come in at a bigger ticket than a single latte. The plan checks whether your staffing and equipment can handle it without wrecking the counter, then decides how hard to market it.
Should I add a lunch menu to get more traffic?
That is an operations decision first, and marketing cannot rescue it if the kitchen cannot handle it. If lunch makes sense for your space, the plan treats it as a launch with a defined offer and a few weeks of focused promotion, not a quiet addition that nobody notices.
How do I know if my social media is doing anything?
Pick one thing it is supposed to cause and watch that. New faces mentioning a post, event signups, catering inquiries, or traffic on a slow afternoon after a promotion. Likes are not the measure. If nothing moves after an honest trial, the effort goes somewhere else.
Everything else
Other services for coffee shops and cafes.
Same service
Marketing planning for other businesses.
Where I work
Southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
Start here
See what your customers see.
The Receipt looks your coffee shop up the way a customer would and itemizes what is costing you calls. It is free. Or skip it and book fifteen minutes with me.
Or text (508) 546-9942