Restaurant SEO Agency
The beverage and food industry is one of the most diverse when it comes to the different types of brands and companies operating digitally in some form.
This range includes everyone from the biggest brands in the world to successful restaurant chains and fast food outlets, all the way down to the actual distributors and producers.
But there is only so much attention to go around for food items, and if you aren’t using digital advertising to gain traffic to your business, you’ll quickly be left behind.
How Digital Marketing Has Affected the Food Industry and Food Business
The digitisation of the food and beverage sector like so many others have had a huge effect.In fact, over 40% of people learn about food via a digital method. We are not just referring to the fact social media sites, Instagram in particular, are overrun with food and drink promotional posts and reviews, but looking beyond that there are also all the review sites, the bookings sites and delivery services. Everything has been affected.
As a result of this shift, there is one form of marketing that is most important to any business and that’s digital marketing. Food and beverage brands like yours need it.
If you are a food brand or have a business in the food and drinks industry and are looking to capitalise on digital marketing, you may feel a little like a fish out of water. Our restaurant SEO agency are here to help.
SEO Strategies For Your Food & Beverage Business
1. Perfect Your Website
First, even though you own a local restaurant that’s anything but digital, your storefront is no longer the face of your company. Your website needs to be professional, functional, and user-friendly.
Potential customers need to be able to navigate your site intuitively to find things like menus, hours of operation, and your address. Additionally, remember that most people use their smartphone to research things like this, regardless of if they’re at home, in the car, at work, and so on – your website must be optimised for mobile devices.Finally, invest some time and money in professional pictures of your restaurant space, foods you offer, and your staff. The food will look more appetising and your staff will appear more professional. It gives potential customers a sense of intimacy with your restaurant, even before they visit.
2. Focus on Local SEO
One of the most important steps in restaurant digital marketing is perfecting your search engine optimisation. SEO is everything in terms of getting organic traffic to your website, and ultimately, customers in your seats. When someone types in “Italian (or whatever) restaurants near me,” your SEO rating will determine how quickly they find you.
Whether people are locals or travellers, you need to make sure your website’s SEO makes you a local hotspot. You can boost your SEO by taking the following actions:
- Create a blog on your website full of engaging and relevant content
- Make sure every page of your website utilises local keywords and other forms of SEO coding (metadata embedded in pictures, videos, headings, etc.)
- Use both internal links (to other pages of your site) and external links (to affiliate websites, sources of data, etc.)
- Create a Google My Business Account
- Make sure your contact information and address is listed multiple times and is easy to find
3. Gain Followers on Social Media
Having a website that’s teeming with SEO coding is great (and necessary). However, there are some more proactive ways you can drive traffic to your site as well.
Restaurant digital marketing without a social media strategy is folly. Not only can you amass a following of people who are attracted to your restaurant and are likely to be repeat customers, but social media also provides effective networking opportunities. The best part is, you have plenty of options for both free and paid advertising campaigns.
You can host raffles or competitions offering free meals, gift cards, or even cash prizes to the winners. The key is to use the competition to extend your reach by encouraging users to like, comment, and share your posts. In turn, their followers will see their activity, be exposed to the competition, and likely start following your profile to compete for prizes as well.
Alternatively, you can look to paid social media marketing which allows you to choose how much you spend per day toward your campaign as well as your target. This also comes with the perk of analytical data that breaks down the success and performance of your ads. You’ll be able to see how each ad performed in terms of engagement (link clicks, likes, follows, shares, comments) to help you fine-tune your advertisements.
4. Implement Email Marketing
Another effective restaurant digital marketing strategy is called email marketing. First, you need to build an email list of recipients who have subscribed to your email. Gaining subscribers can be done by offering discounts to previous customers who subscribe, through social media, your website, affiliate websites, and landing page ads.
Once a customer subscribes, you need to have an automated set of emails that go out once or twice a week. These emails should be friendly and express gratitude to your subscribers while subtly pushing them toward coming back to your restaurant. However, they also need to contain valuable content (discounts, promotions), or people will stop opening them.
Email marketing has proven to be a top contender because it falls back on marketing to people who’ve already shown interest in or eaten at your restaurant.
5. Take Advantage of Online Reviews
When people research restaurants online, one of the things they’re looking for is what other customers had to say. You need to take advantage of online reviews and the level of credence consumers put in them.
Start by encouraging every paying customer to post a review on Google, your website, or on your social media profile.
Most people need to be incentivised, so offer a respectable discount on their next meal once they’ve completed the review. While offering a chance to win ‘x’ amount of dollars can be helpful, most people won’t take the time to review your restaurant for a mere chance of winning something – give them something definite.
Restaurant SEO Agency
Tree Post Agency is a London based SEO agency that specialises in optimising your digital presence. SEO should be part of a comprehensive marketing strategy that includes search engine optimisation best practices.
If you need help your food marketing, our restaurant SEO agency would be happy to share our expertise, please do not hesitate to contact us today to see how we can take your food product to the next level. Alternatively, follow us on Facebook, or LinkedIn to stay-up-to-date.
