What's my story?

There is a specific reason you chose to start your restaurant. You carefully selected a style of cuisine and menu items to support it. You had reasons for choosing your location, hiring specific staff members, and operating under the name you chose. Try writing a story around those reasons, aiming for a narrative that's three-to-four paragraphs in length. This story will make you a character worth supporting and your business one to champion.

You might decide to include your story on your website. Some owners do, and they build a community of loyal patrons because of it. But even if you opt to keep the story behind your restaurant private, you can use it to select design elements on your website that match the heart of your message.

What does this mean? Here are some examples. For images, you might include photos of your team, your background, the region your menu is built around, or any other aspect of your story that feels important to emphasize. The colors of your site should tie back to your story, too. If there are colors that are important to the nationality of your menu, you may want to find ways to tie those in.

Let's talk more about content.

Whether or not you choose to tell your story, you should use space on your site to explain the concept of your restaurant and what diners can expect when they have a meal at your establishment.

Few people will pour over every word on your site, especially if you share paragraph after paragraph on the minute details of your restaurant. With this in mind, try to match your content to your audience's preferred styles of taking in information: Keep paragraphs short and to the point and use videos when possible.

Writing tone matters. In most instances, a polished, professional tone is best, especially if you want your restaurant to be taken seriously. However, if your place is casual and your people are lighthearted, you should show that through the words you choose. Be relaxed and casual, but continue to get the points that matter across.

One more tip: Don't underestimate the importance of good grammar. Run spell check and ask a well-read peer to proof your site for errors before you post your content.

What should I put on my site?

Beyond your story and messaging about your restaurant, there are a few elements that will help you win over your audience. Let's run through these briefly:

Your menus

So many people who seek out your site do so because they want to know what you serve. With this in mind, be sure to keep your restaurant's current menus on your site and make them very easy to find. Your menu can be a simple PDF file, a page on your site, or an interactive tool that allows site browsers to learn more about dishes, see photos, or place online orders.

Lots of diners today hope to see dietary information, such as calorie, sodium, or fat content, and allergen information. You can decide whether it's feasible for you to include those items.

Online ordering

Some restaurants develop their own capabilities for online ordering, but it's far easier to use a readymade tool, like the ones listed below. Check out the chart for a quick snapshot comparison, and click the logos for a video that shows you more about each option:

Online reservations

If you have a tool in place for taking online reservations, you can link it directly to your website. It's best to work with the organization that provides this service to your restaurant to learn how to integrate it. You may also find some easy-to-follow instructions on that organization's website (and examples of how others have integrated it, too).

If you don't already have an online reservation service in place, consider these options:

What about design?

As we said at the outset, design matters for every restaurant website. The style and visuals you choose will cause an emotional response in your audience.

There are countless resources that can help you with this step (including Templately), though if graphics aren’t your strong suit, we recommend working with an experienced web design professional (some even specialize in restaurant website design). Going it alone? These tips can help you develop your design strategy:

Be consistent.

Consistency is important for building brand recognition. Your website doesn’t need rigid uniformity, but you should ensure that your logo design, font selection, color story, and image elements have a similar look and feel and will appeal to a your ideal restaurant patrons.

Use color thoughtfully.

Every color can elicit emotions. For instance, green often exudes peace, earthiness, or prosperity; white conveys modernness and simplicity, and blue can hint at serenity, assurance, and tranquility. Study a color theory resource, such as this one, and select a dominant and secondary color for your site’s headings and imagery that will help you set a compelling tone and a clean and purposeful aesthetic.

Allow for white space.

Break up the visual elements on your site. By incorporating some white space, or visual emptiness, you can draw your viewers’ eyes to key elements of the page without making them feel overwhelmed by the content.

Prioritize simplicity.

It can be tempting to overdesign each part of your site, but doing so may overstimulate—and overwhelm—your audience. Try sticking to this design strategy: Choose a small selection of colors, fonts, and style choices for your website that will convey the image of your restaurant clearly and effortlessly.

Feature high-quality photos of your most popular menu items.

Food is at the heart of what you do. Show off what you serve. Hire a photographer who can help you take great photos at just the right angles.

You may also want to take photos of your site, tables, manager, or team. We said earlier that these photos can help site viewers connect with your story and visualize themselves within it.

Here are a few website design services with lots of experience helping restaurant owners design a winning website: