7 Creative Restaurant Marketing Ideas to Help You Market Your Restaurant

Would you be happy if I tell you some great ideas to help resuscitate your restaurant marketing ideas and strategies? If your answer is yes, then this post is for you!

Gone are those days when a restaurant business is run only offline and restricted to brick and mortar shops.  The days when restaurant owners have to depend only on the traditional word of mouth to market their restaurants. Nowadays, people are already taking advantage of mobile technology and digital media to bring their restaurant business back to life.

The competition is getting fiercer and more and more restaurant businesses are collapsing by the day. So it is super important that you get your marketing strategy right to stay on top of the competition. In this post, we have put together some effective and creative restaurant marketing ideas that will be of great help to your business.

Restaurant Marketing Ideas for Restaurant Owners

#1: Get a Website

Create a restaurant website

Setting up a good website for your restaurant is more like creating a food shop in every part of the world. Having a professional website is a huge step you need to take to make sure your restaurant grows big. A website opens up opportunities for a much larger market of consumers. Your customers – both the potential customers and the existing ones will be able to find your restaurant more easily.

If you know how to build a site, do that because the reward is definitely worth the time and stress required. If you can’t get your head around how it is being down, then consider hiring an affordable professional to get the job done for you.

#2: Create Foodie Photos

Create foodie photos

Whether you believe it or not, we are in the food porn era. Today, when you visit most social media platforms, they are filled with several food photos of delicacies that will make anyone want to spend some extra dollars.

So without any doubt, one of the most effective ways to help you get your restaurant online is by creating high-quality, drool-inducing photos. People are getting more and more attracted to visual content these days. So having delicious looking photos on your social media channels and website is a good way to draw in hungry eyes. That is why we consider it as one of the creative restaurant marketing ideas everyone should consider.

You may need to hire a food and beverage photographer to take some high-quality food photos for use in social online media or for your restaurant website. You can attempt to do it yourself with a phone. However, remember that many factors play a role in making sure your photos stand out and look good. You will need the right positioning and correct lighting. You can learn a few more tips here about things you need to consider when hiring photographers for your restaurant.

#3: Create Social Media Contests or Challenges

Create Social Media Contests for your restaurant

Virtually everyone likes free stuff and staging a social media contest is a cool way to market your brand. You can organize cool giveaway contests where you encourage people to tag their favorite dining buddy!

This will not only help promote your brand visibility but will also help you attract more followers and customers to your business. Let the winner enjoy the privilege of coming down to your restaurant to dine and enjoy themselves for free.

#4: Create Customer Loyalty Programs

Every restauranteur knows that customer loyalty is as important as generating new customers to widen the customer base . Without any doubt, points-based rewards system is still the most popular loyalty program model among restaurants. Here, you get to state the number of points a guest stands to earn on every dollar spent. Then, you will need to come up with different compelling reward offerings, discounts, freebies, and specialty promos. Below are some popular foodie apps that offer integrated loyalty programs which you can partner with:

• Foursquare
• Belly
• OpenTable
• Loyal Blocks
• Perka
• LevelUp

Create customer loyalty programs

#5: Focus on Local SEO

If there is any one most important out of all these creative restaurant marketing ideas, it should be this. Local SEO for restaurants is very important. You can’t expect to get much business growth when you aren’t showing up when potential customers search in their local area for restaurants.

The purpose of local SEO is that it helps more people find your business when they search online. So hone in on your local SEO and get yourself ranking at the top three spots on Google map when users search.
Here are some tips to help you revive your local SEO:

• Google My Business and local listings: your GMB page gives potential customers information about your restaurant. This includes your address, the time you open, contact information, photos, and reviews from your customers. You also need to get your restaurant into local listings. Get it registered on some review sites like Yelp and Foursquare. All these have their unique ways of increasing your chances of appearing in local searches.
• Get good reviews: your potential customers need to see some things to boost their trust in you, and that’s exactly what reviews do. Find a way of encouraging your happy clients to leave reviews for you on platforms like Google, Yelp, Facebook, etc. However, remember that there will be sometimes that bad reviews will come in. So make it a point of duty to constantly check the reviews so you can quickly address any negative comment in a professional and friendly way.
• Be consistent: not only in your food and dining experience do you need consistency. You also need to make sure you stay consistent with your information online. This includes your restaurant name, phone number, and address. Even the slightest alteration can leave both the search engine and your customers confused.
• Update your website: ensure you keep every detail on your site correct at all times. This will keep both search engines and your customers happy.

#6: Leverage Local Writers, Food Bloggers, and Influencers

Use foodies or influencers to create leverage for your restaurant.

This is another important area you need to consider in your restaurant marketing strategy. Send out a press release whenever you have some new things about your restaurant. Encourage the local writers and bloggers to write good reviews on their pages about your restaurants. Let journalists and local food bloggers come interview you and share the good news about your business.

Another one like it is using food influencers. As a restaurant owner, you will need to employ the popularity of food influencers to grow your business. Encourage them with some incentives like free meals to help share content related to your restaurant on their network. This is a smart way of marketing your restaurant to the locals.

#7: Make Your Food “Inta Worthy”

Serve your dishes in a unique way to make if worthy of sharing

You will be surprised that most people visit a restaurant just so they can photograph the food. This is very common among millennials. If you regularly update your Instagram page with beautiful photos, you can easily draw in this target market.

Look around to figure out some creative ideas you can implement that other restaurants aren’t doing. When you find this, then you will need to take amazing pictures of it. Taking your shots, make sure they are sharp, clear, and of high quality.

When posting photos on your Instagram page, try to be unique with your posts. Don’t post the same style of photos every time. Make sure you employ good lighting when shooting your photos. And also post content from your followers.

With all these creative restaurant marketing ideas, you will be surprised how easy it is to grow your business. Remember to stay unique and put in every effort required. One thing is certain, your restaurant will thank you one day for all the good decisions you make today for the business.