7 Digital Marketing Tips That Can Work Wonders for Restaurants

The restaurant biz can be challenging, especially with cyber kitchens ruling the industry. But it doesn’t always have to be that way, mainly because there are numerous less-explored growth hacks like digital marketing. In this article, you’ll see the top 7 digital marketing tips that can work wonders for restaurants.

And if you thought restaurants only have a minimal chance of increasing sales with digital marketing, sorry, but you’re terribly wrong. When was the last time you hit a new restaurant without checking it’s review online? Probably never.

Especially the digital natives – who can directly boost your sales with word of mouth and user-generated content – check reviews and see if your place is socially desirable.

When such opportunities knock your door, you don’t want to miss them. While looking for recipes to succeed with online marketing, there are plenty. But the ones that cost the lowest yet reaps the best results should be chosen and embraced.

To save you the trouble, we’ve listed some of the best digital marketing tips you can readily implement if you desire to enhance the footfall figures and, more importantly, sales and revenue. Have a look and get inspired.

1. Build a Website

Your website can be the digital front door of your business, giving the customers a glimpse into the type of foods you offer and also more reasons why they should make a visit soon. You don’t have to blow a fortune on it, nor does it have to be a fancy one.

Instead, a cleanly designed website that can creatively display pictures of your dishes and interior will do the trick. There are plenty of online website builders for that matter.

The key is to make it appealing and, more importantly, mobile-friendly as the majority of your prospective customers will be using a smartphone to browse your website.

You can include information about hours of operation, menus, location, contact details, social media links, and, if possible, coupons for the visitors who are willing to subscribe to your email lists.

And yes, emails are pretty important and beneficial to boost your online presence. We’ll get to that part shortly. We’re intentionally skipping the social media marketing part as it’s even used by restaurants that are yet to build a website.

2. Leverage Local SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO), aka the organic methods to improve online visibility and traffic to your website, is of utmost importance.

For example, if you serve Thai dishes and a hangry customer searches “best Thai food near me,” your website or any online listing must come up overhauling your competitors – hence SEO.

Here are some of the fastest ways you can boost your SEO.

• Create a blog and consistently publish relevant and engaging articles.
• Make your blog posts easily scannable.
• Perform on-page SEO.
• Include relevant keywords in your website copy.
• Make your website crawlable for search engine bots.
• Repurpose your content into multiple formats and link back to your site.

3. Try Email Marketing

The power of email marketing is often overlooked. Many regard it as a primitive form of online communication, but the reality is that every US$1 you spend on it will deliver an average of US$42 as return on investment.

You can use email marketing to inform users about the weekend specials, deals, discounts, events, and more. You can use an invitation maker to entice customers to your restaurant with words and images.

Embrace GMB to the Core: Restaurants Digital Marketing Tips

It’s no secret that Google is the biggest search engine (SE) in the world. And so, Google My Business (GMB) will obviously be the search engine with top priority. And the best part. So, you don’t have to pay a penny to get listed on GMB.

You can even use it as a mini-CRM (customer relationship management) software, and it has tremendous potential to enhance your online visibility. You can also try listing your restaurant on online directories and restaurant review websites like Yelp.

5. Give Video Marketing a Try

Video is the king now. Instead of struggling to read long-form content, consumers prefer watching a video. The cognitive load is lower, and the message is with a shorter time. You can use YouTube as a platform for video marketing and embed the videos you publish on your website.

Think quality over quantity – like how people want your food to be. Try posting quick tips on making, or you can post making videos of your weekend specials as well. Are you stuck thinking about how to create a video? Well, that’s the easiest and most exciting part – thanks to online video editors like InVideo.

6. Invite Influencers: Restaurants Digital Marketing Tips

Interestingly enough, word of mouth and user-generated content (UGC) are still effective – even beyond the reach of paid advertising. Nearly 74% of consumers state word of mouth as a critical influencer on their purchase decisions.

You can invite influencers who have significant fan followings on Instagram and YouTube and request them to leave a heart-warming review on their social media accounts. As influencers help you directly reach the customers, more customers will drop by within a short time.

7. Experiment With Paid Ads

If you want an expeditious boost to your online visibility, then paid ads can be your go-to. You can try Google Ads, YouTube Ads, Bing Ads, and Facebook Ads for that matter. Online advertisements also have the ability to increase your website traffic – given you use witty ad copy and mesmerizing graphics or video.

You can always hire a professional graphics designer to create ads. But that can be costly, depending on how much you are keen to invest in digital advertising. Fortunately, you can use an online ad maker to create eye-catching creatives at a fraction of how much you’ll otherwise spend on a professional.

Digital Marketing Tips Restaurants Bottom Line

By this point, we hope you have zero excuses not to try out digital marketing for your restaurant. Implementing the tactics discussed in this article will undoubtedly help you strengthen your business’s online presence.

If you become digitally presentable and available, more foodies will pour in and logically bring their friends along. But there’s a catch. You need to be consistent with digital marketing, just like any other strategy, to see results.

So, what are you waiting for? Start today and give a broader range of consumers the opportunity to relish on your specialties.