If you want to remain competitive both outside and within your local area, then marketing your brand is essential. It’s particularly important for restaurants because they’re constantly competing with dozens — if not hundreds — of other brands. If a business serves food, it's a competitor. It doesn’t matter whether it has a similar menu or not.
Before you get started, arm yourself with some tips that can help you build an excellent restaurant marketing campaign.
1. Get Involved with Your Local Community
Marketing is about exposure, with the ultimate goal of getting your brand recognized by as many people as possible. When your restaurant has strong local roots, community involvement can help with this.
Show up at local events and hand out food, or simply set up a booth and sell food to patrons. Rent a food truck and do some traveling in your area. Sponsor events and activities. You can even put your restaurant’s name on the local children’s baseball team jersey or something comparable.
The main point is to get involved in some capacity.
2. Build a Strong Online Presence
Many marketers will tell you to get involved with social networks. That is valid advice, as these networks are a relatively cheap yet powerful form of marketing for any brand, big or small.
You should be building a strong online presence in its entirety, not just focusing on a single platform or network. That doesn’t mean you should wear yourself thin trying to be a part of anything and everything online. It just means there's a lot more besides social networks.
Respond to online reviews — negative and positive. Get in touch with influencers, brand advocates and fans and incorporate them into your marketing strategies. Post some tutorials on YouTube, such as showing people how to cook a fan-favorite dish. Interact with other brands and sites. Poke your head into community discussions or forums and weigh in on popular topics.
3. Mind the Competition
It’s easy, once you get going, to put your head down and ignore all the things happening around you, but that’s a bad thing to do in today’s world. You can learn a lot simply by reviewing what others around you have or have not done.
What are your rivals doing that seems to be working out well? Which of their marketing campaigns have failed? What is the public sentiment surrounding your closest competitor, either positive or negative, and why has it shifted in that direction?
4. Get a Website
If you don’t already have a website, well, let’s just say you’re traveling in the wrong direction. Get a website up and running as soon as possible, and ensure it’s designed well, offers all the features your customers might expect — online ordering is a good example — and remains functional.
5. Lay the Promotions on Thick
You can never go wrong with offering deals. Think drink specials and happy hours, coupons and exclusive discounts, and email specials. Offer a free appetizer during one day of the week. People love getting deals or specials, so keep them coming. In turn, that will keep new customers flowing into your restaurant and turn many into loyal supporters.
6. Get a Content Stream Going
Content marketing usually involves the upkeep of a blog, but there are additional forms of content you can produce too, such as YouTube videos or tutorials. It’s all about giving back to your community in some way, providing people with useful, relevant information.
You don’t necessarily have to host the content stream via your official website — you can use an alternate platform like Tumblr or even Medium. Just get a consistent content stream going and you’ll find many of your customers will start to get more involved with your brand. More importantly, they’ll get in the habit of viewing your regular content.
7. Crowdsource Marketing Efforts
Thanks to social media and online communities, it’s more possible than ever to network and interact with your customers. You can use this to your advantage in many ways, the best of which is to encourage them to do some marketing for you.
You don’t have to pay thousands of dollars for an online TV spot or billboard in a heavily trafficked area. Simply ask your customers to spread the word about your business online. Host a contest that calls for them to post about your company on social media. Give out rewards and incentives for referrals. These are all great ways to amplify good old-fashioned word-of-mouth marketing techniques.
8. Don’t Ignore Local Search
SEO is its own beast, but one element you cannot afford to overlook — especially if you’re a small- or medium-sized business — is local search. Simply put, a local search listing reveals the closest companies based on a custom query. So, for example, if you look for “pizza places” in your area, the local search results will display relevant businesses nearby.
You want your restaurant to show up in local search for the most relevant terms and queries. You not only get a headlining space right at the top of search results, but you also get the most important information out there in front of potential customers. A local search listing includes options for directions, contact info and numbers, digital or online menus, and much more.
Marketing Is Essential for Success
In today’s landscape, marketing is essential for building a strong reputation around your brand and introducing your business to new customers and demographics. If you don’t get your business out there and get people talking about it, you might as well not exist.
Lexie is a designer and typography enthusiast. She enjoys writing HTML code and creating new styles guides. In her spare time, she works on her design blog, Design Roast.
