Inapub lets any registered user add missing pubs or update the details of pubs – as long as they haven’t been claimed by the publican anyway (if there is a blackboard on the page, the pub is being managed).

You can add/update the following pub details:

• All contact details
• Website and email
• Opening times
• Facilities
• Photos – step 5
• Beers served – step 6

So, how do you do it? Read below or get a printable PDF version here. Don’t forget – you get points for adding and updating pubs – and anyone scoring points goes into our draw.

Register or Login

The first thing you need to do is to login (or register) to Inapub.

Once you’ve done this you’ll see your personal homepage.

Search for the Pub

To find out if you need to add the pub or edit the pub you need to search for the pub to see if it already exists.

If the pub doesn’t already exist in our database – we’d love you to add it and if it does exist you’ll be updating it – skip to step 4!

Adding a pub

We’ve tried hard to make sure that adding a pub is simple.

There are 3 sections to fill in, Pub address details; Opening times; Facilities.

Simply fill in all the boxes you can or choose from the drop downs.

Tick as many facilities as you can as these are used in search and by mobile apps. To add photos and the beers served go to steps 5 & 6 respectively.

Step 3 note: As part of this we ask you enter tags – these are used to classify the pub you’re adding and are helpful for people searching for a pub they’d like.

Use comma separated words or phrases like (we don’t accept numbers):

“Pub, London, North London, Quiz, Open Fire, Music, Great Atmosphere, Cosy, Helpful staff”

Updating a pub

Once you’ve added or found a pub and your logged in you need to click the “edit pub” link – directly beneath the pubs name.

This will open up the same form used for adding a pub.

Simply add all the information you can about that pub – be sure to tick all relevant facilities boxes.

If you make a mistake, it’s OK, we keep a version history so you can rollback.

See the Step 3 note above for tips on tags…

Adding a photo

To add a photo, click the “Add images” or “View our gallery” links beneath. You’ll see these links either beneath the No Image box or an existing photo.

Clicking the links will take you to a page where you can add a photo. Click the Browse button and find the picture on your computer, then add a caption like “The Red Lion, Bray” and hit upload.

Once successful we’ll be notified to approve the photo.

Step 5 Note: We only accept pictures below 1mb in file size.

Adding beers served

To add a beer being served by a pub simply go to the pub detail page and look to the right hand side. You’ll see the beers section and within it it says “Add Beer” – just click that link.

Then, choose the brewery from the drop down – we’ve added loads but if your one is missing click “add missing brewery” – you won’t have to do it again!

Once you’ve chosen the brewery, choose the beer – again if the beer is missing just click “Add missing beer” and it’ll appear.

Finally click the “Add Beer” button and you’re done.

Awesome news!

The Inapub iPhone App went live a matter of weeks ago and already we’ve hit 500 downloads!

Actually we hit 500 between the 18^th and 24^th October and the total figure as at 24^th October stands at 532 downloads!

We’re naturally delighted to have reached this milestone so soon after launching so now we’re looking to get to 1000 as soon as possible – please help by letting your friends know about the App – and by giving us a good review on the app store.

We’ve got plans to develop the App –but you can still tell us what you’d like to see by emailing [email protected]. We’re also looking to get apps developed for Android, Ovi, Windows & RIM so watch this space.

App Overview

In case you’re new to the iPhone App here’s a quick overview of what you can do:

• Find pubs and bars near you;
  

  The app gets your location and searches our database and then shows the 30 nearest pubs, you can view all their details, get directions and even call them direct from the app.

• Find pub and bars by type;
  

  At the press of a link the app lets you find the nearest pubs with any one of a range of facilities, like Sky Sports, WiFi, Serving Food, serving Real Ale etc.

• Find events near you;
  

  Like finding pubs, you can also see what events are taking place nearby

• Find events by type;
  

  And you can refine the sort of events you’re interested in seeing, like quizzes, music, food, sport and DJs!

• Find beers served near you;
  

  A cool feature this one, you get a list of 50 of the beers being served near you, now you really can go somewhere serving your perfect pint!

• Search for pubs;
  

  Want to find a specific pub by name or pubs near a postcode, or find pubs by facility, event type or any pub serving a certain beer – well you can do all this in the search area.

And don’t forget – the app is FREE to download!

Earlier this week (Monday 18^th October) I had the pleasure and privilege to be invited to present at the Freehouse500 event organised by the Morning Advertiser. The event had a fantastic agenda which blended presentations from successful pub owners along with those running businesses which offer services to pubs. I personally really enjoyed hearing the stories of those who run innovative and successful pub businesses.

In the Morning

The day started with Richard and Loren Pope, BII licensees of 2010, who run the Bulls Head in Repton. It was such a great start to the day hearing from a former pub co employee and solicitor who started the journey 4/5 years ago to transform what was a closed and run down pub in Derbyshire to what is now a hugely successful, growing and frankly excellent business!

There was a good degree of logic to the decisions they’ve taken but at the heart of all of it was a commitment and drive to exceed customers expectations in every single aspect of the way the pub runs, from the food they serve to the “Bulls Head” paintings and sculptures on the wall to the staff training materials available via their website! They also ensure that all staff are motivated and rewarded for their hard work with some interesting financial incentive programmes.

Next up were Richard and Dee Slade who run the Battlesteads pub in Northumberland – I loved this presentation as it was all about how they run their pub/hotel to be as eco friendly as possible, something very close to my heart. Every single possible way of making the pub more environmentally friendly has been investigated and continues to be investigated and this has resulted in both a reduced energy bill making the whole exercise a cost neutral one but also a clear conscience which, if it didn’t mean burning 2 tanks of fuel to go there, would make them my local ;o)

Alex Lund of Coca Cola was next up to talk about the importance of the soft drink market, and how pubs probably don’t promote the soft drinks they stock as much as they could – I tend to agree with this as often, as a pub customer, I’ll just plump for an obvious choice when in fact there could be something more interesting hidden away in the fridge below the counter – something to bear in mind – particularly for lunch time customers…

My Big Idea

In the My Big Idea section Glyn Williams spoke about The Crown at Woodbridge and spork food; a spork is spoon and fork combined and the food to match. It’s a great idea for comfort food at any time of year. It’s an Inn that I’ll definitely be checking into when in the area! Ben Jones was next up talking about his Michelin starred
The Olive Branch pub in Clipsham, Rutland. Ben attributed their success to (as with Richard and Loren) always consistently delivering more than expected and make the customer feel special – this spanned all aspects of their operation from the product through to the training, and systems used.

Finally in the Big Idea section Mitch the co-owner and landlord at The Thatchers Arms in Mount Bures and one of Inapub’s newest customers; spoke about how they have built their business to be totally focussed on being in the heart of the community. He also spoke at length about how they have very successfully used both Facebook and Twitter to drive up footfall in his pub. He gave some really interesting insights into his “international” pub profile on Facebook and how he believes his customers spread the word about events they run.

After Lunch

After lunch Matt Brand of Carlsberg gave some interesting insights into how beer consumption has decreased over the past decade and that consumers definitely prefer to stay at home. As a result he suggested that pubs should look at their customer profiles and decide what lifestage they will be at, the assumption here being (obviously) that those who fall into the older bracket wouldn’t be interested in the same things as those in the 19-21 bracket.

He suggested that looking at the “Rhythm of the week” might be a simple way to allocate time slots to different target markets – i.e. weekday lunch time would be professionals and the older generation with time, weekday evenings would be young people out to socialise and weekend day time would be parents with young children each of these customer groupings requiring a different service offer.

After Matt came Charlie McVeigh describing how he has re-captured his idea of the perfect pub; a natural speaker (in my humble opinion) Charlie entertained and spoke frankly and honestly about why his Draft House pub is successful. Being a Londoner I’ll be sure to check it out as the huge range of ales and the opportunity to sample them in third pint measures is very appealing (it de-risks the purchase as if you don’t like one you don’t have to sup a whole pint!). Charlie also mentioned that Sambrooks Wandle – a personal favourite of mine is their biggest seller, so Sambrooks is one to watch for sure – on Inapub we hope to be able to show everyone selling it (don’t forget anyone can add the beers being served to any pub on Inapub).

After Charlie (who got rather a lot of questions helping to calm me down… not!) was me – my slides can be seen on slideshare.net – I spoke about Digital Marketing and gave ten simple tips for pubs to start their digital marketing campaign. Check out the slides! Obviously Inapub has been built to make this easy for pubs, we’re trying to ensure that we offer you the best possible routes to as many of your customers as possible.

I agree with Matt from Carlsberg’s idea that different customers will want different things from your pub – and Inapub can help you to manage each promotion/offer easily and ensure that it reaches the right audience. For example we connect to twitter and Facebook so you don’t need to update several sites, just Inapub. We also give you your own customer community so you can email everyone securely and safely. You get your own web pages via Inapub and via the free Inapub iPhone app, which you can update 24×7 and then we also have our data partnership network ensuring that your events and information travels as far as possible.

After me was Steven Pike from Mystery Dining Company explaining how monitoring your services using their service could ensure that you always meet or exceed expectations and therefore increase loyalty and repeat business.

Don’t forget

We rounded out the day with 2 quick overview presentations from Paul Smith of Wells and Youngs and Rachelle Peterson of Filmbank. Paul described how selling cask ale can really keep customers coming back and Rachelle described how running a film night can draw in crowds or keep parents happy!

To conclude

So – a packed day I’m sure you’ll agree, with some real gems of advice contained within.

To sum up I think the main points to note are:

• Exceed your customers expectations in every aspect of your operation.
• Invest in green to drive down costs and drive up customer loyalty!
• Look at the rhythm of the week and target each customer group with different offers
• Don’t forget cask ale and promote your soft drinks
• Look at the events you run to keep people coming back
• Make sure you use Digital Marketing and to that end sign up to Inapub!