Are you starting a new restaurant? Do you want it to grow faster with online marketing?
The number of people who are connected to the Internet is growing at an exponential rate. Many restaurant owners are looking at it, and they are trying to latch onto the trend.
There are many ways to market your restaurant online. In this guide, we will only look at practical ideas that a fairly new restaurant can do to bring patrons to its doorsteps.
Set Up a Restaurant Website
When restaurant owners engage a web design company for a website, they often make the mistake of focusing on website features.
Guess what? Potential patrons do not care about the number of columns on your website, fancy animations, and whether there is a fun-looking character.
The focus of your discussion with your web design company should be on what potential patrons are interested in knowing when they land on the homepage.
The following is a list of key questions a typical website visitor will ask when they come to a restaurant website:
- When are they open?
- Where is their menu?
- What is the price range of their food?
- Where is this restaurant?
- What do people say about them?
- Do they take reservations? How do I place a reservation?
- Do they host events?
- How can I ask more questions?
Use the questions above to structure your website. Above all else, make sure you have a form on the website to take reservations.
You can go ahead and bookmark this guide on building a restaurant website if you want to dive into the details.
Invest in Search Engine Marketing
There are essentially two primary channels when we talk about search engine marketing. You have search ads on the top and there is the search result, which are also known as the organic results, underneath it.
Search engine marketing is powerful because your website shows up right when an Internet user is looking for you. When someone is searching for “best steak in manhattan”, they are looking for the best steak in Manhattan, nothing else!
Search Ads
Let’s talk about search ads. In a nutshell, this marketing channel involves buying text ads that will show up when an individual performs a search with the keyword you specified.
For example, if you are an Italian restaurant in Portland, you would want your ad to show up when somebody searches for “italian restaurant in portland”.
We pay per click for these ads and impressions are free of charge. The ads run on an auction pricing model.
In simple terms, it is the advertisers and the competition for a keyword that dictate the price of your ads. Putting other factors aside, this means that your ad will show up on top of your competitor’s if you pay more per click.
Of course, search engines like Google look at qualitative factors too. For example, they look at the relevance of a keyword you bought to the webpage that you are pointing people to. Also, how often your ad gets clicked versus the number of times it is shown to searchers plays a role.
The following are some of the features that a restaurant can take advantage of when setting up its search ad campaign:
- Ad scheduling: Show your ads only during the days or hours you specified. You can also customize the messaging of your ads for different days of the week, and different hours of the day.
- Location extension: A snippet of your restaurant address will show up underneath your search ad. It links to Google Maps so searchers can retrieve directions to your restaurant.
- Call extension: Your phone number shows up underneath your search ad. On a smartphone, clicking on the phone icon will allow searchers to call you.
You can read this article by Kim Giroux on FSR Magazine to get three more ideas on how to use Google search ads to increase sales.
Organic Search Results
Other than search ads, customers can also find your restaurants through organic search results. These are non-paid listings which a search engine thinks are the most relevant to a query entered by its users.
Efforts made by individuals or companies to rank higher in the search results are known as search engine optimization (SEO).
SEO takes time and consumes resources because there is no direct way to buy your way to the top,
Moz has a great beginner’s guide on SEO. To give you a summary of the guide, SEO efforts include, but not limited to, the following:
- Performing keyword research to understand what your potential patrons are searching for.
- Setting up a search-engine friendly website with proper SEO elements.
- Creating useful or entertaining content.
- Building high quality links that are pointing back to your website.
- Reaching out and pitching influential publications, bloggers and website owners for coverage.
- Participating in relevant online communities.
Kickstart Press and Blogger Outreach Campaigns
Press and coverage by influential bloggers are essential to the growth of a restaurant.
Consumers follow their favorite press and visit popular food blogs to find the latest or the best dining spots in town. Getting a review from the press and these bloggers almost always guarantees a mention on their social media outlets too, so the reach can get very wide.
Food reviewers and bloggers need fresh content to retain their readers. Therefore, they will almost always write about a food sampling session.
Make a list of all the food reviewers and food bloggers in your area. Schedule the food sampling session with them, and make sure your team is well aware of it. Make yourself or your manager present at the session to take their questions too.
If you are lucky enough to get mentioned on top blogs or publications, you are in for a ripple effect because lesser-known bloggers are going to visit your restaurant on their own expense to write about you.
One way to entice the people who are reading these reviews to visit your restaurant is to offer them a deal. You can contact reviewers and bloggers, who wrote you a positive review, to offer their readers with discount vouchers to give your restaurant a try.
Last but not least, you can use excerpts from the positive reviews as testimonials on your website. The testimonials will assist to convince website visitors to place a reservation with you.
Leverage Social Media Platforms
Social media is a huge marketing channel for restaurants.
It is now a norm for people to take pictures of their food before they eat. Take advantage of this behavior. Make your food items and the interior design of your restaurant worth sharing.
In general, food photos are more likely to get a lot of attention on social media if they have any of the following characteristics:
- Unique, adorable or rare presentation.
- Bizarre portion.
- Rare ingredients.
- Extremely healthy or sinful.
People are already sharing a ton of food pictures online. Thus, it is not difficult to figure out how to design a dish for social media.
Go to #foodporn on Iconosquare. Browse through the collection of food photos. Next, open up those with many likes and comments. Write down the reasons why do you think they took off.
Do this for about 20 photos. At the end of this activity, you will see a pattern which you can apply to your own dishes.
The next tactic you can use is to tag your photos with hashtags that foodies tend to search for. Hashtagging possible on most popular image-based social networks like Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
If you are not familiar with hashtags, you can refer to A Field Guide to Instagram Food Hashtags written by Regan Hofmann.
Actively Monitor Local Directories and Review Sites
There is an abundance of local directories and review sites out there for restaurants.
The major ones like Yelp, Google Places and Foursquare have become the primary destination for people who are looking for restaurants.
The first step to take is to establish a solid presence on these sites by updating the listings for your restaurants with as much details as possible.
Search engines like Google also monitor mentions on these sites as part of their algorithm to rank local businesses in their Google My Business listings, which appears in the search results.
You can read Where to Get Citations for Local SEO? by Erin Everhart to get a list of sites that are useful for this purpose.
Apart from just a presence, you have to monitor the listings too. This step is even more important on sites like Yelp and Foursquare, which allow users to post reviews about your restaurant.
You can try to seek mediation with users who left a negative review by fixing the problems they pointed out. For example, if they are dissatisfied with the cleanliness of your washroom, it could be time to pay a little attention to its cleaning schedule.
Once the problems are fixed, reach out to these users and invite them to visit your restaurant again. A discount will sweeten the offer and it also shows that you are sincere with your request.
However, forcing users to edit or remove their negative review will make your efforts look pretentious. Leave the decision to them.
Be Accessible on Mobile Devices
According to the Pew Research Internet Project, 90% of Americans adults have a cellphone while 58% of them have a smartphone.
At the same time, StatCounter, a website analytics company, has seen mobile Internet usage grow from 17.1% in August 2013 to 28.5% in August 2014, primarily at the expense of desktops.
Fire up the browser on your phone, and go to your restaurant website. Are you able to view the content clearly without zooming or scrolling from left to right? If yes, then congratulations! If not, speak to a company who can help to make your website mobile responsive.
Making your website mobile responsive is only the start though. There are many apps that your patrons are using to discover places to eat. These could be deals app, local discovery apps, meetup or dating apps, food apps or even navigation apps.
Want to really make your presence felt on mobile? Find out what are the apps with the potential to drive visits to your restaurant. Take cues from the Top Apps or Trending Apps section of the App Store or Google Play Store. You can also ask your customers about the apps they use daily.
Get More Patrons from the Internet
There you have it. Here is the comprehensive list of essential online marketing ideas for restaurants that you have been searching for.
To make things easier for you, I came up with a handy checklist for all the ideas that I covered above:
Set Up a Restaurant Website (If You Have Not)
- Design it around information that potential patrons are looking for.
Invest in Search Engine Marketing
- Perform keyword research with a keyword research tool of your choice.
- Set up a search ad campaign using keywords relevant to your restaurant.
- Consider using features such as ad scheduling, location extension and call extension.
- Learn more about search engine optimization (SEO), content marketing and link building.
- Start improving the on-page SEO elements on your website.
Kickstart Press and Blogger Outreach Campaigns
- Make a list of top food reviewers and bloggers in your area.
- Organize a food sampling event.
- Offer a deal for their readers to encourage visits to your restaurant.
- Use positive reviews as testimonials.
Leverage Social Media Platforms
- Find out why food photos get more likes on social media.
- Based on the findings, make your interior design and menu items worth sharing.
Actively Monitor Local Directories and Review Sites
- Establish a presence on popular local directories and restaurant review sites.
- Engage users who left a negative review by acting on their feedback.
- Invite these users to give your restaurant a revisit once remedial actions were taken.
Be Accessible on Mobile Devices
- Check if your website is showing up properly on mobile devices.
- Hire a web development company to make your website mobile responsive.
- Monitor the App Store or Google Play Store for apps with the potential of driving foot traffic to your restaurant.
- Establish a presence or marketing plan for these apps.
With so many marketing ideas, which one will you start with? Share with me in the comment section below.
If you have any questions, feel free ask them in the comment section as well.
Images courtesy of Robyn Lee, Min Liu, Yelp, Dave King and foodieSarah.
