What is the next best thing in restaurant marketing? The answer is video production. Let’s not confuse today’s video marketing with the high-priced television commercials plastered on televisions, in live-streaming events on YouTube TV, Hulu or other comparable platforms. The vast majority of today’s companies are focused on finding where the people are. The people are on social media platforms, scrolling, engaging, and interacting with content. In fact, today’s video marketing strategy is both highly affordable, and highly effective.
Today, you can take your phone or tablet, and shoot some video of you preparing, grilling, charring, plating, or finding other ways to catch the attention of your audience. Pizzerias are flipping dough in slow motion, adding sauces, and toppings in slow motion to get more calls, clicks and customers.
Why Should You Consider Video Production for Your Restaurant Marketing?
Repurposed
One video can roll across LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to name a few.
Engagement
Websites with videos have a higher click-through rate, lower bounce rate, and higher time-on-page. This is all good, because Google tends to reward websites with good metrics for these categories.
Shareability
Today’s consumers are 12x more likely to share a video than they are any other social media post (Small Biz Trends, 2022)
Preference
72% of consumers reported they would rather learn about a product or service through a video
Retention
Viewers retain nearly 95% of a video compared to just under 10% from reading text
Growth
Businesses that use video growth revenue 49% faster than businesses that choose not to use video (Wordstream, 2019)
What Is The Best Restaurant Video Marketing Strategy?
The best restaurant video marketing strategy is to make your restaurant come to life. Share every facet of the business from the hostess to the servers, the prep line to the grill.
Here are a couple of helpful tips to help you take your restaurant video marketing strategy to the next level
Be Brief, but to the point: It sounds simple, but a 30 second video of your servers bringing an entrée to the table, a skilled chef showing off knifing skills, plated food, and your specialty cocktails or drinks.
Remember your ABCs: Always Be Collecting. Use video marketing to boost your marketing efforts to have customers join an email newsletter with promotions for recurring customers, or offer a lunch special redeemable with a promo code. Collecting customer information can help you market directly to them through periodic helpful email newsletters to share weekly specials, or special events.
Highlight what you do well: Highlight what you do well. If you’re a fine dining restaurant, then share the polished version of your operation. If you’re a quick-serve restaurant, share the dishes, the happy faces and paint a picture that your establishment is the place to be.
Differentiate yourself: Every city has competitors on the same block and in the same neighborhood. Highlight what you do differently and why your patrons should have that experience.
Ideas for Restaurant Marketing Inspiration
Share a Signature Dish
Identify a couple of your most popular dishes, and highlight them with a video from prep to table in a short 30 second video with a call to action to reserve a table for dinner.
Live Cooking Demonstrations
Very few restaurants will do this, but it is a very bold move to show your patrons how you prepare the food, which ingredients go into your signature dish or appetizers. Is it a fresh free-range slab of meat with garden hand-picked vegetables, turned to a mouth-watering and juicy steak? Show your patrons what you’re doing.
In-depth Interviews or Introductions
The latest trend is to conduct interviews with your servers, bartenders or chef. What makes them special in terms of what they bring to the restaurant, and why patrons should care.
Announcing New Promotions
Various pubs and brew houses are doing Thirsty Thursday, or the business card promotion whereas you offer a free lunch to your local businesspeople. Find a promotion with a low-cost menu item, and provide that in lieu of your customers information.
Crafting Your Restaurant Video Marketing Strategy
A couple of take-aways from this piece is to identify how to beef up your restaurant video marketing strategy.
Plan the video shoot: Identify a date and time that works best when you have your hostess, servers, kitchen staff, bartenders and managers
Editing: Editing can be done by yourself on a mobile app, or through a company like Solo Visions, as we specialize in Video Production Services in Peoria AZ. Factor in the context, call-to-action, and customer-base. Some businesses do this on the fly, and grab pictures or video throughout the dinner service.
Optimize for Mobile: Make sure your video looks great on a smartphone and formatted to fit your primary platforms.
Where Should You Share Your Restaurant Marketing Video?
Identify the platforms that you want to focus on, and utilize those platforms to share your video. You can use the following platforms, for consideration:
Facebook
Pinterest
Instagram
Twitter
LinkedIn
YouTube
Bonus Hack for Restaurant Video Marketing Strategy
Publish the video to YouTube with your city and restaurant type as the title. Once published, embed that video onto your website with the YouTube URL specific to your published video.
Don’t forget to include information about your restaurant in the description of the video, along with links to your website, menu, and Google Business Profile page.
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