Marketing Restaurant Online

It has always fascinated me how President Barack Obama has used the web 2.0 technology to influence the voters and win the hearts and minds of millions. Never in the history has any politician been able to use the emerging web 2.0 technology this effectively. His presidency has proven for the politicians to rethink about campaign marketing effort in reaching their supporters during the time of election. I believe the marketing in the politic arena has changed for ever and will never be the same again if at least the smart, emarketer at heart politician wants to win.

Timing could not have been as right as 2009 Presidential Election for president Barack Obama to seize the opportunity to change that was taking place not just only in web 2.0 technology with several social media tools that were emerging but also the sentiment of the frustrated people who were seeking for change in Washington. The social media tools like myspace.com, facebook.com, twitter.com, youtube.com and many more were emerging with pools of people building huge community in the cyber world. With virtually no money and resources available to him, the only option he had was a  web 2.0 technology which was virtually free readily available to him. Without those technologies, it can not be denied that it would have been harder if not impossible for Barack Obama to win the election and be the president of the United States.

Now after winning the election, it is apparent that the president Obama is using web 2.0 technology to make his government more effective, efficient and transparent. I can not think of other great marketer than our own president Barack Obama if we want to learn and incorporate some of his ideas into your restaurant marketing effort. Below are some of the ideas that can be incorporated into your restaurant online marketing should you want to win the 21st century restaurant race in a new digital age of web 2.0 and social media.

Communicate Effectively

Through your restaurant website or blog you should be able to communicate what exactly your restaurant specializes in. Lot of restaurant websites are generic with no one unique selling proposition. As soon as a customer checks out your restaurant website one should be able to know all the details about your restaurant from menu to contact information like phone number, address, maps and directions. I would recommend a dynamic blog over a static website because it tends to get indexed by Google, Yahoo and Msn in their search engine which would enable your restaurant to be found on the web when customers make searches for local restaurant online.Another advantage of the blog is that you can have two way communications in the form of comments when they post their feedbacks to your informative articles or new menu dishes. Alternatively you can also provide a separate link as a suggestion box for customers’ feedbacks and suggestions. So that you can make improvements whether it is the quality of food, service or any thing that needs change.

Provide Service Efficiently

One of the things that Web 2.0 technology allows to all the small restaurants is to provide leverage against the big chain restaurant by leveling the marketing field plain. It means that you also have the same online marketing tools as big chains and that you can compete at the same level. Money is not the prime factor here to decide who wins or loose. But it is the innovative online marketing ideas that wins at the end regardless of the size of the company. We see Pizza hut, Dominos and Papa Johns using online marketing effectively. So can the small restaurants if they strive to learn about it and pursue to implement the online seamless ordering system. The restaurant would be so efficient especially during the busy lunch and dinner time. Think about it, it is dinner time. People are calling on phone non stop to order pizza from your restaurant. You have one staff for telephone order taking. Since phone is analog and can handle only one customer at a time, you can only take one order at a time and not more than that. When you do it with online seamless ordering system, you can take orders for as many people as you want at one time without you having to take the orders which ultimately saves your time. Time is money after all. So integrating online ordering web based system can help your restaurant provide the service faster and accurate.

Engage your customers to participate

One of the mistakes with restaurant website design that I often see is that it is not made with the mind set of customer online interactions. Due to the lack of time or proper knowledge restaurant owners don’t seem to engage their customers on the internet. When you have a restaurant blog, then people have a chance to comment on the latest signature dishes you recently introduced. It becomes two way interactive communications between you and your customers. You will be better equipped to understand what your customers like and dislike. This way you can plan accordingly for your new seasonal menu that you might update next summer.

There are other ways you can engage them to your blog. You can have a video talent contest like Chipotle and Dunkin Donuts. Once your restaurant videos are ready you can upload it in You Tube free video sharing site. It would provide a chance for the customers to comment on the videos that you would upload in You Tube at http://youtube.com. That way it will create excitement to your customers and itself become a marketing vehicle for your restaurant. You don’t have to work as hard. Your customers are going to proactively do the marketing for you. We like to call this marketing by entertaining.

Have them submit their pictures of best moments in your restaurant. Create a flickr profile at http://flickr.com/ and make an archive of all the photos. Send them the links and they would be interested looking at not only their pictures but also other peoples pictures. It is just human’s nature to be curious.This in itself is a viral email marketing. If some of your customers like some of the videos then they would definitely email them to share with their friends and family. This would create another viral video marketing.

If you use the web 2.0 technology to your advantage and adopt just some of the online marketing techniques then your restaurant would be far ahead than those average restaurants who one day will wake up to realize that their customers have moved away to their competitor’s restaurant at a click of a mouse and push of a mobile phone button.