How to Increase Restaurant Customers

Location, uniqueness, famous chefs, and many other factors that can make a difference. 

The restaurant industry is very complex and it's difficult to actually increase a restaurant's clientele.

However, there are adjustments and marketing techniques that can easily facilitate these operations.

Useful tips to increase your restaurant's clientele: marketing and web marketing

Through effective marketing and well-planned web marketing, the flow of customers to your restaurant will not just be seasonal but continuous throughout the year.

The first move could be to create strategic partnerships with complementary businesses and influencers on social media.

On the web level, it will be essential to have a modern and functional website, as well as a significant number of high-quality positive reviews.

It will also be equally important, of course, to have a precise web advertisement strategy through Google and Facebook ads.

In the tutorial on how to find clients for hotels, I explain how this is possible but let's go into the specifics of your restaurant.

Increasing your restaurant's clientele: creating partnerships with influencers and celebrities and having a strategic social media presence

Both online and offline, you should try to create a network of related and complementary activities: famous chefs, live events and musical accompaniments, but also influencers and well-known celebrities on social media (for a fee, of course). All this will do nothing but shift attention to you and increase audience engagement.

As for social media, in this case as with hotels, it's about leveraging the possibilities of Facebook and Instagram.

On these social platforms, it will be important to show photos of your restaurant's dishes, perhaps contextualized within the interiors of your venue or in special locations that only you can offer, photos of the staff and chefs at work, so that they convey the passion they have for cooking.

Create a friendly yet professional communication, establish a unique style and convey emotion and passion!

Only by doing so can you resonate with your potential clients.

Finally, use warm and welcoming filters, and try to standardize the tones and colors of your posts, this will only please the algorithm and bring more visibility.

How to increase your restaurant's customers: website

Just like a hotel, a restaurant also needs a significant online presence. In addition to strategically set up social media, a modern and reliable website can and should funnel visits from these very platforms as well as from sponsorship campaigns on them and on Google ads (useful for intercepting users' explicit needs).

Moreover, a restaurant's website should include a detailed form capable of showing availability and allowing table reservations, displaying remaining seats (a key element of Robert Cialdini's principle of scarcity).

How to increase your restaurant's customers: offers

Offers are important both on the website and on social media.

In fact, they are a great tactic to use in conjunction with Facebook ADS, creating targeted sponsored campaigns for that specific offer.

The characteristics of offers for a restaurant are:

• Real benefits for the customer (discounts, hotel stays or unique and exclusive events);
• Limited-time offers, also quite restricted, and limited availability too (following the principle of scarcity we mentioned earlier);

Develop promotions throughout the year with the support of portals like TheFork.

• Create weekly themed days with wine tastings and free dishes (for example, Fish Friday or Aperitif Buffet Thursday)
• Build a connection with your customers through the automation of your newsletter campaigns.

It is important to manage your database intelligently, for instance by reminding those celebrating their birthday about the offer dedicated just to them.

How to increase customers in your restaurant: reviews

Your goals at this juncture are clear: get many good reviews and avoid negative ones.

To do this, it is important to follow these guidelines:

• Analyze current and negative reviews, study them to see if the criticisms are valid or not. At this point, try to solve the problem if you realize that one actually exists.
• Always respond to criticism in a constructive manner.

If a review states that your staff is rude, but it's an isolated case, the user probably isn't telling the truth.

However, if there are ten other reviews with the same issue, then try to solve the problem (in this case, the alleged rudeness of the staff).

Not only that, if you have many positive reviews, leverage them, share them on your website, on social media, in short give them maximum resonance.

A satisfied customer brings more satisfied customers and word-of-mouth... works!

How to increase customers in your restaurant: build customer loyalty

It's very difficult for a new customer to return after their first visit, apart from loyal customers; there's just too much competition!

But it will be precisely differentiating yourself from the competition that will allow you to overcome this difficulty with customers.

You will indeed be able to get in direct contact periodically via messages or emails, including promotional ones, with customers who have already had an experience at your establishment

It will therefore be important to collect the customer data (perhaps through a system integrated with the venue's Wi-Fi connection or a brief online survey at the end of their experience, if they are willing), and use it to not miss the opportunity to build customer loyalty.

However, always make sure to not be too intrusive or persistent, as customers usually appreciate discretion and formality in contacts with a business in the restaurant industry.

In addition, your presence on social media will be essential for attracting repeat customers, perhaps by enticing them with new dishes and fresh ideas.

Last useful tips for increasing customers in your restaurant and retaining current ones include:

• Meetings with the chef: the customer might appreciate a visit from the chef during service for a quick exchange of words on how the dining experience is going.
• Maximum visibility for reviews: in addition to your website and social media, display your awards and reviews inside your establishment, and print out certificates of excellence.

Creating a web marketing strategy for restaurants with Framework360

Framework360, the innovative essential marketing platform, will allow you to do everything we've explained thanks to the ability to create an ultra-optimized website for speed and functionality for your restaurant, which integrates with web marketing strategies such as the sophisticated system of newsletters and marketing automation, as well as an integrated CRM.

No web building or programming skills are required, you will just need to install the most suitable plugin for your website idea and start configuring it thanks to the intuitive integrated visual builder.

Showcase photos of your menu and dishes on the homepage, add customers through the dedicated form, and create a newsletter automation campaign to communicate with them.

In addition, the platform offers the possibility to install a specific plugin made for restaurant businesses, which allows you to manage aspects such as reservations, inventory, and home deliveries; plus an additional one called "cash register", should you want to handle this operation through the platform.

All of this and much more can be done easily, quickly, and efficiently thanks to Framework360.

In conclusion, increasing your restaurant's clientele, in addition to continuous management and monitoring of customers, is the result of an integrated marketing approach both online and offline.