Marketing Restaurant Online

There is no doubt that Youtube has been a blessing to all of us who as an average user can upload their own videos on Youtube and broad cast virtually to the whole world. Last year in 2008 Youtube also released Youtube Live which they have wanted to release it sooner but couldn;t do it because of the technology issue and not enough resources available to do it properly at the time. However with the backing of Google, Youtube Live have been a reality.

What does Youtube Live means to the restaurant owners and the chefs around the world ?

Well, it means that any chefs can have their own tv show like Chef Emeril Live or may be even better. They can create their own lets say Italian cooking session live in their kitchen assuming you are Itlaian Restaurant which can be viewed live by  interested fans all around the world. It means that consumers have options  to watch either Chef Emeril Live show or any other Local Chef Live show that they can see on internet streaming video like Youtube or Ustream. They can choose to watch his or her local town chef Live show which resonates to his or her taste.

Another good thing is that your live show can be mobile too. It doesn’t have to be confined to the traditional tv set or the desktop in the room. The Chef Live show can move with you. Lets say I was on a road trip back to Atlanta. The Live show is at 6pm. There is no way that I can reach home to Atlanta to catch the Chef Live Show on time. No problem. iPhone is at rescue. iPhone has Youtube integrated into it. Since 3G high speed internet can handle the big video file downloads the streaming of video is smooth and the quality is great. I have seen the video on my own iPhone and the quality seems to be as good as on the computer or even TV.Verizon also has integrated the Youtube on their platform. So all the Verizonwireless subscribers with the data plans can stream these Youtube videos and Live if you choose to do so. Verizon Wireless and At&T combined has more than over 100 million subscribers. Tmobile and Google have teamed up and released GPhone with their own software anroid. I am sure they also have incorporated Youtube. So you have a great mobile audience too if you can tap into this market.

Walmart and Apple has also made a deal to offer an iPhone at a very low price of $99. Apple has strategically chosen Walmart for mass distribution. Can you imagine how many people would be persuaded to buy iPhone. Any body would buy it. Why not ? if you are getting phone, ipod and internet connection almost at the same price you would get the regular phone with no bells and whistles. What this indicates to us is that more and more people will be carrying the internet enabled mobile devices like iPhone. So it would not be at your best interest to neglect this mobile youth generation who holds the power of consumer at a touch of mobile buttons.

When I saw the ad about ustream.tv that would enable  watch the President Inauguration Live with the ustream iPhone mobile application, I was excited and wanted to try as soon it was available. It was not available on the 20th Jan 08, the day when I checked out on the internet. However I applied for the mobile application for ustream via email. On the 21st I got the email that they were approved by Apple to release the ustream.tv mobile application. I downloaded the ustream application on iPhone on the same day to check if it does work. Also I was excited to watch the President Inauguration on Ustream tv on iPhone. It gave me a connection error which was understandable considering it was their first release and that they have lots of bugs to findout as in every first release application. Well these things might not be important for us as the technicians at ustream and apple will figure out how to stream live videos flawlessly. The thing that is important to us is that once all the technological aspects are perfected how as a restaurant owners or chefs can take advantage of this technology to get your restaurant brand exposure to your loyal fan customers and may be new potential customers.

If you have iPhone I would recommend you to download ustream application from itunes.com and test for your self if does work for your restaurant chef live show. If it does you have created your own private tv network where you can create several shows about your restaurant and this time you don’t have to pay a dime to those local tv networks. If you try this experiment we would love to hear from you. Please do share your findings to us by commenting on the blog.