Marketing Restaurant Online

It’s interesting to watch Robert Scoble’s argument Why Facebook should buy Yelp rather than Twitter. Robert Scoble is a prolific blogger, Geek enthusiast and an author.

It got my attention because he is talking about the future and the promise it holds to small businesses like restaurants. In fact he is already forecasting the future of social networking sites convergence and how it is going to affect the businesses like your restaurant. More important thing to note here as a restaurant owner, manager or operator is how as a restaurant business one can position your self to take advantage of the promise that social network sites like Facebook combined with Yelp provides in the future.

I do believe that Facebook buying Yelp makes more sense than buying Twitter. After the purchase deal that didn’t go with Twitter, Facebook in a way has started it’s own version of twitter though it is not as dynamic as twitter.

Now lets see closely why Yelp integrated into Facebook makes a powerful combination. Yelp is a social site for reviewing local businesses like restaurants by regular people like you and me who are also Facebook users.

Yelp has all the the datas about restaurant reviews-likes and dislikes from your friends about particular restaurants in their neighbourhood. Now the same friends are also in Facebook. The problem here is that since Yelp and Facebook doesn’t share the datas at least for now you don’t have the power to leverage your friends restaurant likes and dislikes at Facebook. However this dynamic could change if Facebook decided to buy Yelp.

Like Robert Scoble said, if Yelp were to be integrated into Facebook then it could be a very powerful virtual word of mouse recommendation tool. Lets say if you were walking down the Golden gate in San Francisco or Manhattan in New York, and wanted to try the restaurant that your friend would recommend you based on their review. All you would do is go to your Facebook app on your mobile phones like iPhone, android or others and type in restaurants with zip code. You would have an access to the restaurants that were rated by your friends based on likes and dislikes. This way you wouldn’t have to worry about those directories that are full of junk datas. Instead you would be getting an honest reviews and recommendation from your own friends. Obviously you would trust your close friends than some random group of people’s review about a restaurant. Can you see the power now of the Yelp combined with Facebook?

Successful people in sports or business are always on top of the future trends. In a way they can predict what is coming next and get ready before it is there. That is how they win. Take an example of Magic Johnson in the Sports of basketball. He talks about knowing where the ball is going to be before it is passed and run to that spot while the ball is being passed and NOT after the ball is passed. It is about timing and knowing where the things are headed next. Being in the right place and at the right time makes a person or business winner.

If you look at Steve Job of Apple, he is a winner with his revolutionary product iPhone. Well he didn’t succeed just because he came out with his great product over night yesterday. He predicted this couple of years before 2008-2009. He knew very well where the mobile market was headed. Even thought their main core business were computers he suddenly jumped into the bandwagon of mobile phones may be to the surprise of even NOKIA. Now he is enjoying his right predictions and actions taken well before.

So the point behind this story is to have that edge on the future where things are headed to and be able to position yourself so you can take advantage of, like Magic Johnson and Steve Job.

I see these convergence of Yelp and Facebook coming in the future. If not this two there will some sort of this. So I highly recommend all the restaurants to get ready for that. For now I would suggest that restaurants start building presence at Facebook and Yelp and other social networking sites and building reviews of cource good ones from your your online customers which can then be benifitted when Yelp is integrated into Facebook. You will be well positioned by then to take advatage of that integration.

At a push of a button on mobile devices your restaurant would be found and recommended by their friends at Facebook. I am sure they would visit your restaurant instead of the advertised restaurant that they saw on the television. Well at least I would visit your restaurant recommended by my friends because I trust my friends than the television or online directories full of junk datas about restaurants from random people whom I even don’t know.

That is the difference and power Yelp Integrated into Facebook would bring to your restaurant business. So I hope you see the possibilities what Yelp and Facebook combined can do for your restaurant business. More importantly I highly urge you to position yourself well to take advantage of the new dynamics of convergence of Yelp with Facebook or any other sites that can add value to the restaurant diners.

Do you think Facebook will buy Yelp? How about Microsoft, Apple or Google? Will they compete with each other to buy Yelp? Regardless, who ever buys Yelp, how will it impact restaurant marketing in this new age of social media where convergence of social media sites will take place and LOCAL will be the focus in the future?