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Originally Posted On: https://rivercrabmarketing.com/7-effective-restaurant-marketing-strategies-in-2020/

 

Need to get more patrons to your restaurant quickly? Trying to find the best restaurant marketing strategies?

While there are many ways to market a business, promoting a restaurant comes with its own unique challenges.

Especially with global health concerns making waves in the industry and making it more likely that people will just stay home, encouraging people to go out for a nice meal can be tricky. It can also be a challenge to convince guests to return time after time with so many other great restaurants out there.

Luckily, we’ve got some ideas. Below we’ll list the most effective restaurant marketing strategies you need to be making use of in 2020.

Read on!

1. Build Your Restaurant’s Online Presence

One of the very best ways to market your restaurant effectively is to build a strong online presence.

At the very least, you should have a great-looking website that lists your menu, your contact information, great pictures, and your location. Your website will give off a first impression to many potential restaurant visitors, so if well-optimized, it can convince a lot of people to come by for a visit.

It’s also important that you have at least a few social media accounts that you use. Managing social media correctly can allow you to advertise new menu items and promote special offers for free and in a very intuitive way. Social media is a great way to stay in touch with previous patrons while building brand awareness at the same time.

2. Start Using Local SEO Techniques

While building a great website should be part of building your brand online, you’ll also need to make use of local SEO techniques. Few people will find your website if you haven’t optimized it in a way that will make it more attractive to Google and other search engines.

Signing up for your Google My Business (GMB) page and using other local SEO tactics will help your website to show up in search engines more often compared to the competition. It will also help your business to be featured more prominently in Google Maps as well.

Many people use Google Maps to find restaurants to try, so using local SEO techniques can be a big help in the fight to get more visitors to your restaurant.

3. Create an Amazing Loyalty Program

Another top technique for marketing a restaurant is to implement a great loyalty program in which you give frequent guests a discount on future meals.

Many POS systems feature built-in customer loyalty tools. These can help your business to easily take customer information and log customer transactions and rewards while also preventing fraud or misuse. Once it’s set up and automated well, it’s not too hard to manage a customer loyalty program. However, the benefits are significant.

Launching a loyalty program can help encourage customers to come back to your restaurant, and doing so is much easier than gaining new patrons entirely.

4. Message Restaurant Patrons Directly

If you’re looking for ways to build ongoing relationships with your restaurant guests, you need to consider using some type of communication channel to keep in touch with them and send them regular alerts, updates, and special deals.

It’s important to consistently look for ways to collect an email or a phone number from restaurant visitors. You can do this by placing opt-in forms on your website or social media pages or by asking for it in person when a customer pays for their meal.

By collecting emails or mobile numbers, you’ll be able to send patrons marketing messages at any time. If not overdone, this type of marketing can help you build a stronger relationship with restaurant visitors and they’ll be more likely to come by in the future.

5. Use Wi-Fi Connection

If you’re looking for ways to get emails or mobile numbers from restaurant visitors, you may want to use your Wi-Fi connection to your advantage.

If you have a Wi-Fi network that customers can access, make sure that you’re not wasting an opportunity. Instead, you should create a signup page for the Wi-Fi connection, requiring that patrons give you their email or mobile number in order to log in.

By doing so, you’ll be able to collect a huge amount of contacts and will have a great way to market new promotions and keep your restaurant in the minds of your guests.

6. Manage Your Online Reputation

If you want to get more business for your restaurant, it’s important that you take great care to manage your online reputation.

Online reputation management will consist of getting more online reviews for your business on sites such as Yelp, Google, and Facebook. These reviews will serve as great social proof for your business. When potential visitors search for restaurants online, they’ll see these reviews and will be more likely to visit your restaurant if there are a lot of positive ones.

On the other hand, if you have managed to get some negative reviews online you need to do everything you can to mitigate the damage.

7. Build Buzz With a Giveaway

A very effective way that you can gain new patrons is by hosting a giveaway. Consider creating an event, either online or offline, in which you give a lucky winner the chance to win a gift card, a free dinner, or another special deal that relates to your restaurant.

Facebook can be a great tool for launching giveaways or contests and can help you to build up some excitement around your giveaway. This is also a great excuse to collect some email addresses that you can then use to promote your restaurant later on.

By launching a giveaway and promoting it online you’ll be able to build some extra buzz surrounding your restaurant while at the same time getting email addresses or mobile that you can use for marketing as well.

Growing Your Business With These Restaurant Marketing Strategies

While promoting a restaurant in 2020 may not be the easiest task out there, it can be done. By using one or several of the restaurant marketing strategies above, you’ll be able to gain new patrons and keep your restaurant thriving even in the most uncertain of times.

Looking for help building your restaurant and gaining new customers online? Click here to learn more about our digital marketing and management solutions now.