Managing a restaurant in today’s fast paced, digital environment can be very difficult to keep up with. It’s well known how competitive the restaurant industry is, so how can your venue stand out from the crowd? Implementing effective digital marketing strategies is critical when it comes to increasing restaurant traffic and overall revenue. If your restaurant is unfamiliar with SEO, social media marketing, or any other aspect of digital marketing, this post will provide strategies to help your business stand out.

Invest in a Highly Functional Website
Investing in a responsive, professional website may seem like a major expense to restaurant owners, but it’s essential in today’s digital world. According to a survey from OpenTable “86 percent of consumers go online to view a restaurant’s menu prior to visiting the venue.” This demonstrates how today’s consumers are visiting venues online before physically entering restaurants. Because of this it’s also important to ensure your restaurant’s website is optimized for mobile, as the industry is known to experience a massive amount of mobile traffic. Be certain to never hide important information from potential consumers on your site such as menus, hours, contact information, photos, and any call to actions (reservations).

Prioritize Social Media Advertising
Having an effective social media strategy is essential to restaurant success. This seems obvious, but many restaurants don’t know how to reach the right audiences or execute their overall plan. According to an article from Forbes, some common mistakes seen in the industry are “not connecting Facebook and Instagram accounts, marketing to a national audience instead of local, using hashtags on Facebook, and many others.” This mistakes are not too difficult to correct, yet it requires an investment of both time and money to be properly executed. Ultimately, because social media marketing is such an integral part to restaurant success and takes time, outsourcing to an experienced digital marketing agency like ours is probably your best bet.

Pay Attention to Google My Business
Google My Business (GMB) is an important tool that provides local businesses with an opportunity to appear in Google search and map results to essentially increase local SEO rankings. Having a GMB listing and being active is critical in today’s digital world for local restaurants in order to stand out from the crowd. Including restaurant information, uploading appealing images, optimizing your GMB listing, and frequently posting updates will greatly improve a restaurant’s digital visibility. Utilizing Google My Business allows your organization to take charge of what people see when conducting a local search for your business, and it should never be overlooked.

Analyze Website Traffic and SEO Rankings
Having a professional website is great, but does it rank well on Google? The survey from OpenTable also found that “87 percent of potential consumers go online to find a restaurant in their area prior to visiting any venue.” Therefore, an enhanced SEO presence is critical, especially for local businesses. Not ranking on the first page of search engines for relevant search queries in the restaurant industry can potentially set your business up for failure. Monitoring website traffic is also crucial so be sure to install Google Analytics on your website to help with traffic analysis.

Bar & Restaurant Case Study
Wondering what kind of bar & restaurant digital marketing experience Onimod Global has? Take a look at our Case Study and read about how one of our clients in downtown Chicago is outranking their competition and seeing sales soar as a result. We developed a highly functional website, increased organic SEO rankings, and spread the word about their incredible services across all major social media platforms. As displayed in the chart below, in the first 3 months alone of 2018 our client has been found 146,000 times in Google Maps and a total of 321,000 times on Google.

Contact Us
Is your restaurant in need of superior digital marketing services? Reach out to us at Onimod Global and see what digital solutions we can provide for you!