Running restaurant ads online is one of the best ways to increase your sales instantly, and create a better brand presence. Online marketing gives you the freedom of targeting the desired audience, track the ad performance and monitor the conversions.
Best Online Platforms To Run Your Restaurant Ads And How To Do It!
Running your restaurant ads online would help you attract the desired audience and also builds a strong online presence of your restaurant. These techniques would help you design a strong online restaurant promotion strategy to lure in more customers.
1. Show Up On Google
Restaurants are the most searched industry in the US which makes it imperative for you to show up on Google search. Running your restaurant ads on Google would help boost your business and increase your online presence.
Google provides you with different services to help promote your restaurant business like Google Ads, Google My Business and organic searches.
Google Ads is a platform that allows you to run paid restaurant ads on Google or partner sites. It gives you the freedom to decide the budget and the keywords for which you would like to show your ads for. Google ads have a pay per click(PPC) module. You are charged only when someone clicks on your ad.
There are several campaigns available on Google Ads:
- Search campaign: Search campaigns are the ones that appear on Google itself and the partner sites. You can use relevant keywords like an Italian restaurant, best restaurant, etc. that best describe your restaurant business. Whenever someone would have these terms in their search queries your ad would start showing up. Therefore You need to bid on these keywords that you wish to show your restaurant’s ads for. There is nothing like a minimum bid amount; you can choose whatever amount you want to spend on one click.
- Display campaign: They are also known as picture ads because they let you add pictures along with your ads. Unlike search ads, display ads do not use keywords because people can’t search for it. Google shows your ads on the partner sites based on the audience or the topic you have targeted. Display ads are very eye catchy and attract a lot of attention.
- Universal app: If you have an app of your restaurant which you wish to promote and have people download it you can go for the universal app campaign. It promotes your app on Google search console, Google play store, YouTube and partner sites.
Remember, for creating a Google ad, it is mandatory to have a website or a brand page where people would be directed to once they click on your ad.
- Organic listing: Organic listing is something that can’t be paid for. To show up on Google’s organic searches, your website needs to have a good quality score i.e. if the content is relevant to the search query, how original the content on the site is, etc.
These listings are decided by the Google bots when they crawl through your website and if they find that the content is informative and valuable to the person looking for the information. Your ad is shown higher on the search results.
Promoting your business on Google is a good idea as this would help you reach out to more customers globally as well as locally.
2. Running Ads On Facebook
India has the highest number of Facebook users in the world, and most people refer to social reviews before choosing a restaurant to dine at. You can only imagine the kind of impact Facebook marketing could have on your restaurant sales. It allows you to share content that lets your customers know about an upcoming event, offers or special discounts.
The advertisements on Facebook have a fixed goal that helps you in reaching out to the right audience.
What you need to start creating Facebook ads:
- Your business goal– It is the reason why you’re running the ads, which would be for generating sales for a restaurant business.
- An understanding of who you want to reach– This will help you Facebook in showing your ads to the apt customer base
- A daily or lifetime budget for your ad– It is the amount you are willing to spend on Facebook to run your restaurant ads.
- Photos or videos to feature in your ad– Ensure you add high-quality videos and photos.
In digital advertising, Facebook by far has the largest available audience of active users to target your restaurant ads. Therefore, pay attention to every detail.
3. Running Ads On Instagram
According to Kissmetrics, ninety-three percent people say the visual appearance of a restaurant and the food pictures influence their purchasing decision. Making it imperative for you to pay a lot of attention and thought into curating the best restaurant ads.
As a restaurant owner, you know how important it is to entice your customers and Instagram lets you do that. It helps you put your best “food” forward and interact with your customers in the most authentic way. Therefore, Instagram is becoming a growing source of income for the restaurant owners!
There are different formats of Instagram ads to choose from:
- Photo Ads: They allow you to tell the story of your restaurant along with compelling pictures. You can target the desired audience and Instagram would show your ads only to them. They are also supported by call-to-action buttons like Book now, Call now, Contact us, Get directions, etc.
- Video Ads: There is no denying that videos ads are more capturing than pictures. Because they make it easier for your audience to recall your brand. Video ads can be up to 60 seconds. They are also supported with a call-to-action button similar to picture ads.
- Carousel Ads: These ads let your customers swipe through a series of images or videos, with a call-to-action button to connect them directly to your website. They offer the creative space to tell a longer story about your restaurant.
- Stories Ads: These Ads are full-screen ads that appear to users between Stories. They’re the ideal format for sharing limited-time offers and promotions since they expire after 24 hours. The call-to-action takes the form of a swipe-up feature that takes audiences directly to your restaurant’s website.
Instagram is a great tool for promoting your restaurant business. Therefore make use of the user-friendly interface, the hashtag and story features available on Instagram and see your restaurant business flourish.
4. Running YouTube Ads
Running video ads on YouTube is an excellent way of reaching out to your customers. In fact, according to Vidyard, using video in your restaurant marketing grows revenue forty-nine percent faster than restauranteurs who don’t use it.
You do not require a professional videographer to create YouTube ads for you. You can post short videos about the daily operations of your restaurant. Post videos of an event at your restaurant this would help in giving some insights to the people who are looking forward to arranging an event at your restaurant. They can see for themselves what the restaurant looks like during an event or start posting interviews with your staff, customers, food critics, etc.
There are several YouTube ads format you can choose from:
- In-stream ad: The in-stream video ads are the ones that are played before, in between or after a YouTube video or on other display networks.
You pay when a user watches the ad for more than 30 seconds or interacts with your ad. - Discovery ads: They are also known as in-display ads. These ads show next to the related YouTube videos or as a part of the YouTube search result. A thumbnail of your video shows next to the video which invites people to click on it. You will be charged only when a person decides to watch your ad and clicks on it.
- Bumper ads: It is a six-second video ad. They work on CPM bidding i.e. you pay each time your ad is shown 1,000 times.
- Display ads: These ads appear to the right of the feature video and above the video suggestions list.
- Sponsored cards: Sponsored cards display content that may be relevant to your video, such as products featured in the video. Viewers will see a teaser for the card for a few seconds.
While creating the YouTube ads you can select the topic or the audience you wish to target. Your ads would be shown next to those Youtube videos or searches which you have identified to be relevant for your restaurant business.
Online marketing might seem like a daunting task at first but it is not if done strategically. Once you master it, keep it up while you move onto another platform and continue to expand as you go.
