An email calendar for a venue with no marketer

An email calendar is a simple plan of what a venue will send to its guests, and when, across the year. For a venue with no marketer, it is the difference between email marketing that happens and email marketing that is always about to happen. Without a calendar, every email is a fresh decision, made in a spare moment that never quite arrives. With one, the year's messages are decided in a single afternoon, and each month someone only has to write the email that is already planned.

Most independent restaurants send email irregularly: a burst around opening, a message at Christmas, an announcement when the menu changes, then silence. Guests forget they subscribed. When an email finally arrives, it feels unfamiliar, and some mark it as spam. A steady rhythm, around one send a month, keeps the venue in guests' minds without overwhelming them.

This guide sets out an email calendar of twelve sends a year that cover the seasons, the holidays and the quiet weeks. It explains how to plan it in one afternoon, how to choose the right email frequency, how to adapt the calendar for different kinds of venue and for the Gulf, and how to fit the calendar into a wider restaurant marketing plan. It includes an email calendar template you can copy.

A calendar turns email from a task into a routine. When the year's sends are decided in advance, each month's email has a clear purpose, a rough date and an owner. Writing it takes an hour rather than a week of procrastination.

It also makes email more effective. Sends timed to the venue's own rhythm, such as a new menu, a quiet month or the run-up to the festive season, arrive when guests are most likely to act on them. Sends spread evenly through the year keep guests familiar with the venue's emails, which helps them reach inboxes and get opened.

And it makes email measurable. When every send is planned, you can compare them, learn which kinds of message bring bookings, and improve the calendar each year.

For most venues with no marketer, about one main send a month is the right email frequency: twelve a year. It is enough to stay in guests' minds and give them regular reasons to visit, and few enough that each email feels worth opening. It is also realistic for someone who also runs the floor.

Some venues add a few extra sends around their busiest periods, such as the festive season or a big event, and some send to particular segments in between, such as regulars or lapsed guests. But the twelve main sends are the backbone.

Avoid sending much more often without a reason. Guests who receive emails every week from a restaurant they visit a few times a year often unsubscribe.

Set aside an afternoon at the start of the year, or before a new season. Take a calendar and mark the venue's own dates: menu changes, the terrace opening, events, anniversaries, closures. Then mark the dates that matter to your guests: holidays, local festivals, school breaks, the start and end of the busy season.

Next, mark the quiet weeks: the periods when the venue is always slower, such as January in many places, or the summer months in the Gulf. These are the weeks email can help most.

Finally, assign one main send to each month, with a purpose and a rough date. That is the calendar. It need not be perfect; it can be adjusted as the year unfolds.

Here is a general email calendar for a venue in a place with four seasons and a festive season in December. Adapt the months and themes to your own venue and location.

Each send has one clear purpose. That is what makes it easy to write.

Seasonal emails are the heart of a restaurant's calendar, because the seasons change what a venue offers and what guests want. A new menu, a terrace opening, a winter warmer, a summer dish: each gives a natural reason to write and a natural reason for guests to visit.

Write seasonal emails around something real: the new dishes, the produce, the change in the room. Photographs help. A seasonal email that shows the first asparagus on the plate, or the terrace in sunshine, is far more persuasive than one that simply says "spring is here".

Time seasonal emails a little ahead of the change, so guests can plan. An email the week before the autumn menu launches gives regulars time to book the opening night.

Quiet weeks are where email earns its keep. A busy Saturday in December needs no promotion; a Tuesday in January does. Mark the quiet weeks in the calendar and plan an email that gives guests a reason to come then: a set lunch, a midweek event, a new dish, a cosy evening.

Avoid simply discounting quiet nights. A reason to visit, such as a supper club, a tasting or a new menu, fills seats without teaching guests to wait for offers. Our guide to promotions that fill the right seats covers how to choose a promotion by the gap you are filling.

Send quiet-week emails early enough for guests to plan, usually a week or two ahead.

Holidays and occasions give the calendar its peaks: Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day, Easter, the festive season, New Year's Eve, and local holidays and festivals. For many venues, these are the busiest nights of the year.

For the busiest, the email's job is often to give regulars first refusal before the public, rather than to fill tables that will fill anyway. For others, it is to remind guests that the venue is a good place to celebrate, with details of any special menu.

Plan holiday emails early. Festive bookings, in particular, often open in the autumn, and guests organising group dinners plan weeks ahead.

Venues in the UAE and the wider Gulf follow a different rhythm. The cooler months, roughly from October to April, are usually the busiest, with outdoor dining at its best. The hottest summer months are often quieter, especially when many residents travel. Ramadan changes the shape of the day, with iftar and suhoor at its heart, and Eid brings celebrations at its end.

Ramadan moves earlier by about eleven days each year, because it follows the lunar calendar, so the calendar must be checked each year. The general entry on Ramadan explains how its dates are set. National days, such as the UAE's National Day on 2 December, and local events add further dates.

A Gulf calendar might include: an iftar and suhoor announcement before Ramadan, an Eid celebration send, a summer offer for residents who stay, a welcome back as the weather cools, outdoor dining in the cooler months, and the festive and New Year season.

Twelve main sends go to the whole list, or to the broad middle of it. Alongside them, a few smaller messages can go to particular segments: a preview for regulars before a menu launch, a thank-you to new guests after their first visit, an invitation to lapsed guests. Our guide to email segmentation with only four segments covers how.

Keep the total frequency in check. A simple rule, such as no more than one marketing email per guest per week, stops segment messages and main sends from piling up on the same guests.

Automate the segment messages where you can, so the calendar's main sends stay the only ones anyone needs to write by hand.

Each send in the calendar needs the same few things: a clear purpose, one main message, a strong subject line, a good photograph, and a single call to action, usually a link to book. Keep it short. Most guests read an email for a few seconds; one clear message with one clear button works better than a long newsletter.

Write in the venue's own voice. A note from the chef about the new menu, or from the manager about the terrace opening, feels more personal than a generic announcement.

Send a test to yourself and read it on a phone before it goes, because that is where most guests will read it.

Here is a simple email calendar template you can copy into a spreadsheet or a notebook, one row per month:

Fill in the first five columns in your planning afternoon, and the last after each send. By the end of the year, the template is a record of what worked.

The email calendar is one part of a wider restaurant marketing plan, alongside listings, retention, social media, events and any advertising. Plan them together, so the calendar's sends support the venue's events and the social posts echo the same news.

A one-page plan, with the calendar attached, is enough for most venues. Our guide to a restaurant marketing plan on one page covers how to write one, and our guide to restaurant marketing strategies that survive a year covers where email fits among the others.

The twelve sends above suit a typical restaurant, but every venue's rhythm is different. A café may want its calendar built around breakfast and lunch: a new seasonal pastry, a summer iced coffee, a winter warmer, a back-to-work offer in September. A bar may build around events and nights out: a new cocktail list, a summer terrace, sports fixtures, the festive season. A fine dining restaurant may send fewer, more considered emails around menu changes and special dinners.

Start from your own year, not a generic one. The best calendar is the one that matches when your guests come, what they come for and when you most need them.

Events make the calendar easier to fill and more effective. A supper club, a wine dinner, a chef's collaboration, a tasting or a seasonal celebration gives an email a clear purpose and a date for guests to book. Plan a few events across the year, especially in the quiet weeks, and let them anchor the sends.

Announce events early enough to sell them, usually three to four weeks ahead, and give regulars first refusal before the main announcement. A short reminder a week before, to guests who have not yet booked, can fill the last seats.

A good calendar leaves room for the unexpected: a sudden heatwave that makes the terrace perfect, a sold-out event that needs a second date, a new dish the chef is excited about, a local news story. Keep the calendar's sends spaced so an extra message can fit without overwhelming guests.

Use these sparingly. An unplanned send is most welcome when it is genuinely timely and useful, such as "the terrace is open this weekend" when the forecast is good.

In a venue with no marketer, someone still has to write each email. Choose one person to own the calendar, and share the writing where it helps: the chef writes about the new menu, the manager about events, the bar lead about the new cocktails. People who know the subject write more persuasive emails.

Give the owner a little protected time each month, such as an hour on a quiet afternoon. Most monthly emails take less than that once the purpose is clear.

The calendar only works if it is kept. Put each send in the owner's diary, with a reminder a week before. Write the email a few days ahead, not on the day. Schedule it to send at a good time, such as a weekday morning, so nobody has to remember to press the button.

If a month gets busy, send a shorter email rather than skipping it. A short note with one photograph and one link is far better than nothing.

If a send is missed, do not double up the next month. Pick up the calendar where it is.

At the end of the year, look back. Which sends brought the most bookings? Which were opened but did not lead to visits? Which months were quieter than expected, or busier? Use the answers to adjust next year's calendar: keep what worked, change what did not, and move sends to match the venue's real rhythm.

Each year's calendar should be a little better than the last. Over time, it becomes one of the venue's most reliable marketing tools.

Here is an illustrative year for a neighbourhood bistro using an email calendar for the first time. The details are examples.

In servearound, Campaigns includes more than 150 templates in seven groups, events, offers, the seasons, the menu, the guests and the business among them, from a birthday table and a slow Tuesday to iftar and the terrace opening, each opening as a finished draft ready to make your own. Emails are built from blocks in your venue's theme and checked on a desktop and a phone before they go.

Sends can be scheduled on the venue's own clock up to 90 days ahead, so a quarter of the calendar can be written and scheduled in one sitting, and automations can send a campaign every week or month on their own, skipping anyone mailed by any of your venues in the last seven days. Each send's report shows who it reached and who clicked. See Campaigns.

For most venues, about once a month for the main email, with occasional segment messages in between.

A reason to visit, such as a set lunch, a supper club or a new dish, sent a week or two ahead.

Check the dates each year, because they move earlier by about eleven days, and plan iftar, suhoor and Eid sends around them.

Yes, but focus on first refusal for regulars and on bookings that need planning, such as groups.

Short: one message, one photograph and one link to book.

Yes, in outline. Write each email a few days before it goes, so it reflects what is really happening.

Many venues find weekday mornings work well, when guests are planning their week. Test a few times with your own list and keep what works best.

Write about something guests may not know: a supplier, a dish's story, the team, a quiet-night reason to visit. A short, warm email is better than a gap.

An email calendar lets a venue with no marketer send steady, useful email all year. Plan twelve main sends in one afternoon, one a month, around the venue's own dates, the seasons, the holidays and, above all, the quiet weeks. Keep email frequency to about one main send a month, with occasional segment messages and a limit of one marketing email per guest per week.

Write seasonal emails around real changes, give quiet weeks a reason rather than a discount, adapt the calendar for the Gulf's seasons and Ramadan, and use a simple email calendar template to plan and record results. Fit the calendar into your restaurant marketing plan, keep to it even in busy months, and improve it each year.