Why Text and Email Marketing is Important for a Restaurant

In recent years, it seems that bars and restaurants - among other industries - have focused heavily on utilizing social media as the main marketing tool to promote their business.  Rightfully so.  Over 80% of the US population is currently on some form of social media… 80%!! That’s over 260 million people.  Obviously after hearing those numbers, there’s no reason not to use social media to promote your brand.  But what other ways can businesses find ways to attract customers and bring in new business?

We’ve seen food service businesses use things like rewards, promotions and their own app to promote their product.  These are all useful, but another way you can promote your company by sending out big deals or rewards is to utilize a texting list to directly communicate with your customers, and also create an email marketing campaign to ensure you are reaching the widest audience possible.  Oftentimes when people think about email marketing campaigns as a customer, they start thinking about the large amount of junk emails seemingly everyone gets nowadays.  The key is to find a way to stand out from these other ‘junk’ emails that people are getting to get as many engagements as possible when people are reading through their emails.

The first part of an email campaign is actually finding the emails of customers where you can send them your promotions. There’s a few different ways to go about this.  Many bars and restaurants will have a way to sign up for updates, newsletters, etc. on their website.  If your company has an app, customers usually will need to create an account using an email to log in as well.  You can also utilize social media as we mentioned earlier to promote signing up with an email to receive news and updates as well.  The more emails you are able to get the better.

There are many tips you can use to boost your email marketing.  Perhaps the most important part of an email you send to customers is the subject line.  It’s the first thing people see when they are going through their inbox and is typically the determinant as to whether they are even going to open the email or not.  Come up with something that grabs their attention, but doesn’t seem too over the top.  Using words and phrases like ‘discount’, ‘free’, and  ‘limited time only’, among others are all attention grabbers.  Who doesn’t want a discount?  Once they open your email is when you can get into the details and call-to-action.  Still, you don’t want to seem too over the top or pushy.  By keeping your message brief and direct, you will have a much better chance at converting these emails into more business.  The longer the customer has to spend reading through your email to get to the call-to-action, the more likely they are to click out of that email and ignore whatever it is you are offering.  

You should try to keep your emails consistent with how often you are sending them.  Try to send out weekly deals, promotions or events that are happening that week.  Keep it consistent, but don’t flood their inbox with emails every day.  If you can come up with a consistent schedule as far as timing and content, it will give you a better chance to engage your customers through these emails and acquire customer loyalty that is so valuable.  The same can be said if you are sending out push notifications through your app, or through text.  If you send content too often it can seem very pushy and turn the customer away.  Finding that balance is key to ensuring your success when it comes to these different marketing techniques.

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