7 Ways To Make Your Restaurant Popular In Your Area
Remember the days when running a restaurant meant serving good food in a clean and pleasant ambiance? When a town or city had only a bar, a diner, and probably one fine dining restaurant?
Today, restaurant marketing means standing out from a pretty large crowd. The competition is pretty steep and it’s not just about good food anymore. This means it’s very important that everyone in your locality knows who you are and how good you are. Restaurant marketing goes beyond creating a website for your restaurant and linking it to your social media pages.
Your restaurant should also be the first one to pop into their mind when their stomach growls and here’s how you can do that:
While appearing in local listings like Yelp and Foursquare are important, they are quickly becoming irrelevant thanks to Google Search. So to make sure you show up when someone in your locality is searching for a ‘restaurant near me,
- Create your Google business profile
- Update location, website, menu, pictures
- Link your reservation to the profile
Restaurants tend to see a solid 20% boost in reservations by doing just this!
Get Your Website Right:
Considering 90% of consumers in the US choose a restaurant to dine at based on online search results, a website that can show up when searched and be linked to your google business profile can be a great marketing asset.
Here’s how you can make your restaurant website get searchers’ mouths watering:
- Simple, attractive, easily navigable website
- Search engine-optimized content
- Some ridiculously yummy food photography
- Your menu (ideally with pictures)
- Specials and offers that you are currently running
- A take-our ordering and online reservation system
DO NOT forget to make sure your website looks as stunning if not more stunning on mobile because 73% of users perform online searches on their mobile devices.
Get Yourself a Mobile App:
Browsers on mobile phones, even the best ones, can be such a hassle sometimes. While you might have to work a little to get your customers to download your app, once they do, you can be assured that they are more likely to order or make reservations directly from you! You read that right!
Studies show that 70% of consumers would rather order directly from a restaurant than through a 3rd party app. Plus, imagine how much you’ll be saving on commissions and hidden costs?
Geo-targeted Digital Advertising:
Another easy yet effective way to reach people in your locality is geo-targeted ads. Facebook and google allow you to choose who to show your ads to based on your location. Since all the locals in your region are your potential customers, you can choose to display your ads only to those who live in or are currently in your locality.
You can also use google trends to identify on what days and time people in your location search for restaurants the most and run your ads during those hours or days!
Give Email Marketing a Go:
Did you know email marketing works better than mobile marketing (push notifications, etc.)?
When timed well and optimized to mobile, you are sure to have customers opening your email AND making reservations or ordering food!
So here’s what to keep in mind when you try email marketing:
- Timing it well
- Do not spam but surprise them
- Personalize your emails
- Keep it simple, attractive, and not too heavy
- Give information of value – offers, specials, recipes
Invest in Food and Restaurant Photography:
Nothing gets a person’s stomach growling like pictures of delicious food! While good food photography can be an expensive ordeal, you can use those mouth-watering pictures for literally all the ideas mentioned above and then some.
You can also use these images offline on your menu, flyers, local newspaper ads, social media, billboards, and banners around your locality.
Try Geofencing to Target Potential Customers:
Geofencing is using the location of your customers' mobile device (laptop, tab, smartphone) to get their attention. For example, you can send your customer a coupon code when they are in your 10-block radius!
With over 60% of people in the world using mobile devices, this is an excellent up-and-coming tool that you can capitalize on before anyone else!
All these ideas may sound daunting or challenging, but we can assure you that it is not. All you have to do is start somewhere and take it one at a time.
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