Your Digital Identity Social Media Marketing News for Restaurants
2017.v2
Restaurant brings in ‘Instagram foodie packs’ so you can nail your #foodporn shots www.mashable.com
July 11, 2017
Article by Rachel Thompson
Making your avocado toast pop on Instagram requires a unique formula that isn't always possible to achieve. But one London restaurant is offering "foodie Instagram packs" so diners can up their #foodporn game.
According to a Dirty Bones statement, the conceptualization of the pack stems from "a recognition of the movement and importance of Instagram in present-day foodie culture" and a desire to "enable guests to share Dirty Bones Soho's best qualities without compromising the cost, atmosphere and design."
The free kits contain a portable LED camera light, a multi-device charger, a clip-on wide angle camera lens and a tripod selfie stick for overhead table shots. The kits have been designed to provide Instagrammers with everything they need to capture the perfect Instagram shot.
Instagram can be a source of new business for restaurants, so providing kits to make the food look more appealing on Instagram is a shrewd business move. If restaurants can't prevent people from tagging them in Instagram posts, then attempting to improve the quality of those shots might be their only option.
Dirty Bones has launched the kits at its newly opened location in Soho, London, which has been designed with the "Instagram universe" in mind.
But the restaurant isn't just providing kits. The restaurant's menu, as well as its interior, has been designed with the social network in mind.
"People love to share what they’re eating on social media, so we wanted to put together something that made it easier to get that perfect shot regardless of the lighting or time of day," a spokesperson for Dirty Bones explained.
"Dirty Bones’ menu has also been curated to provide picture-perfect shareable content, with new trending dishes such as Fish Tacos standing alongside the iconic Mac Daddy Burger and Cheeseburger Dumplings," reads a statement from Dirty Bones.
"More and more people are also using Instagram to help them decide where to eat, so as a restaurant group, it’s key for us to make sure that people are getting the best possible shots of all our dishes and drinks," the spokesperson continued.
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Inside Wendy’s Social Media Secret Sauce www.socialmediatoday.com
June 9, 2017
Article by Tom Ward
Even if you haven't had a Wendy's burger or Frosty in years, you've probably heard about their social media this year. It started with their hilarious clapbacks, in which they called out everyone from McDonalds to trolls.
1. Hire Good People Rhoten explained, “Don't just hire someone because they're young and have a Snapchat account. Follow their social accounts. Make sure they understand the platforms."
2. Let Them Do Their Job “When one of my team saw Carter’s tweet, asking for a lifetime supply of nuggets, they messaged me to ask if we could engage with him and possibly give away free nuggets for life. I told them, "Yes," and they ran with it. Hire good people, give them direction and a framework, and let them do their job,” said Rhoten.
3. Clear Voice Direction Then it was the #NuggsForCarter tweet that went viral. On April 5, 2017, Carter Wilkerson tweeted at Wendy's asking:
Most brands have several people handling the day-to-day posts, so you need a clear direction to develop and maintain a distinct voice. Rhoten said, “Our voice is Chris Pratt's in Guardians Of The Galaxy. We don't have any superpowers and we're not superhuman. We're just a regular guy who happens to be funny and a little sarcastic."
4. Know How You're Going To Engage Rhoten said, “Everyone needs to know how we're going to engage, how far we'll take it, etc. We've got to constantly ask ourselves, ‘Can we improve the conversation?'"
5. Take Risks “Everything interesting in marketing has an inherent risk involved," stated Rhoten. "It's better to take a take a chance and risk alienating some people then to play it safe." "If you're like everyone else then no one will care and you'll never command an audience."
6. Be Unique Rhoten said, “Most brands suck at social. There are maybe 20-25 brands that are interesting. Wendy's stands out because we're different…Think about what makes you interesting. Focus on that. You have to find that thing and leverage it across all platforms.” Whether you love the way they interact on social or hate it, you’ve got to admit that you know exactly who Wendy’s is now. You couldn’t say that ten years ago. So, whether you have a boring B2B company or a hot consumer brand, you can have fun on social. Wilkinson soon gained a following, and set a new record for the most retweeted post of all time, beating Ellen DeGeneres’s Oscar selfie, which had 3.2 million retweets. So how did Wendy's blow up on social? What can we learn? I had a chance to hear Brandon Rhoten, Head of Media, Advertising and Digital/Social for Wendy's, at the WOMMA Summit in NYC where he shared some great insights into their success:
Go ahead, take a chance and be different. Remember, if you try to appeal to everyone, then you end up appealing to no one.
Food Poisoning Website to Restaurants: ‘We’re an Ally’ iwaspoisoned.com seeks to provide data to consumers and restaurants and to prevent outbreaks www.nrn.com July 21, 2017
Article by Jonathan Maze
Patrick Quade’s life changed the day in 2009 he decided to get a bite to eat at a New York deli and wound up with food poisoning. The restaurant industry might have changed that day, too. “It was brutal, absolutely brutal,” he said. “I got better, and I called the deli to try and let them know what happened. They hung up on me. ‘It wasn’t us; goodbye.’” As a result of that incident, Quade started the food poisoning crowd-sourcing site iwaspoisoned.com. Today that site has been credited with spotting the norovirus outbreak at a Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. location in Virginia — an incident that might have sickened more than 100 people and helped send that company’s stock to a four-year low. For all the attention it’s received, however, Quade makes it clear he is not an enemy of the restaurant industry. “I hope the industry gets the message that we’re an ally,” he said. “We want to work together to try and improve outcomes.” The website collects reports of foodborne illnesses at restaurants from consumers. It has grown to have 17,000 subscribers who get access to the site for free. So, too, do health departments in 46 states who get data on potential outbreaks. By crowdsourcing potential illnesses, the site can find potential outbreaks. That said, people are not good at figuring out what made them sick, so just because someone says a restaurant made them ill doesn’t mean they’re actually the source of the outbreak. And some chains — notably Chipotle — could be subject to “selection bias” because consumers already associate them with potential illness. But if a group of people all say they got sick at the same restaurant, that’s a potential outbreak that should be contained. If 50 people say they get sick from a certain restaurant, “in our experience, that typically means there’s an outbreak,” Quade said.
The Chipotle situation was a perfect example. A number of people reported to iwaspoisoned.com that they got sick after eating there. The company said the symptoms were “consistent with norovirus.” Local health department officials have since confirmed norovirus as the culprit — and dozens of people have reported getting sick to the site, too. “We will never claim that Chipotle did this or someone else did that,” Quade said. “That’s the county health department’s job. What we do is say, ‘Hey, 30 people independently reported that they ate at this place and experienced symptoms of foodborne illness. To us, that’s something you should look at.” Quade had been working in finance when he got sick from the New York deli. He initially started the website as a side project, working nights and weekends to keep it going. “Foodborne illness impacts 48 million Americans a year,” Quade said. “3,000 people die a year, mostly children.” Six years later, the site evolved into a full-time job. The company now seeks to give information not only to consumers and health departments, but also to the restaurants themselves. Iwaspoisoned.com makes its money by providing data to restaurant companies. It provides a service that gives executives alerts on their brand across the country. They also get early warnings if clusters of reports begin to appear, as well as analytics and how brands compare with others. “The big companies are especially sensitive,” Quade said. “Something might go wrong at one store. But consumers think of them as a brand.” He said the data is valuable because it can give executives a sense about whether they could have potential problems. “If you’re 5 times or 10 times the average rate of reporting, that’s something a CEO might want to know about.”
“Foodborne illness impacts 48 million Americans a year. 3,000 people die a year, mostly children.”
– Patrick Quade, founder of iwaspoisoned.com
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Again, Quade brought up Chipotle as an example. While the Denver-based burrito chain suffers from selection bias now, given its high profile foodborne illness outbreaks, that wasn’t the case in 2015.
The company’s unit volumes fell 23 percent in 2016, a decline the company is struggling to recover from. The company has also lost $10 billion in market value on the stock decline, including $1 billion this week following the norovirus reports.
“Chipotle had a rate of reporting that was 10 times the next worst brand in 2015 before their first outbreak, while they were still a darling of Wall Street and loved,” Quade said. “Today, I would agree there’s selection bias. In 2015, there was no selection bias. People would say, ‘It couldn’t have been Chipotle.’”
Executives have taken notice and are taking steps to make certain it doesn’t happen to them — including using services like Quade’s.
“We think there’s real value in that,” he said. The Chipotle foodborne illness incidents have had a major impact on that brand. The stock fell below $350 per share on Friday, hitting a low not seen in four years.
“Things like this make bigger companies realize there’s value here,” he said. “It’s imperfect, but it absolutely has value. There’s too much at stake to ignore it.” “We have no bias against Chipotle,” he added. “When we were looking at the dashboard at first, we were just as surprised to see them as you were.”
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10 Examples of Great Restaurant Social Media Marketing pos.toasttab.com June 12, 2017
Article by Kendal Austin
Social media is an inevitable part of running a restaurant. Whether your business is active on social media or not, you can be sure that your guests are tweeting, posting, and Instagramming about your restaurant online. For many restaurant operators, managing social media profiles is just another item on the increasingly long list of to-dos. For others, social media is a priority in their business development and something they’ve built into their marketing plans. It is from these gurus that we derive inspiration and motivation. Here are 10 best practices and examples to inspire your restaurant’s social media marketing efforts. Have fun applying them to your own business!
1. Create a Consistent Voice Who: Sweetgreen What: Sweetgreen has built an iconic brand on the fresh and sustainable food ideology. Their clean and modern aesthetic is consistent in everything they do — whether you’re on the mobile app, in-store, or following them on social media. It’s subtle, but Sweetgreen uses only lowercase letters on social media, consistent with their app, logo, and website. The same vibrant photography is used across all their marketing materials. They even appear to have developed a clear emoji strategy on social media. The Sweetgreen brand is recognizable even when their logo isn’t on the screen. Why it's awesome: There’s no doubt that Sweetgreen thought long and hard about their social media strategy (and, admittedly, probably hired an experienced agency to help). Even without professional help, it’s possible to create consistent messaging and imagery for your business. It allows your to brand to become more than just a place to eat food, enabling guests to relate to your business outside mealtime. Use social media as an extension of the guest experience, solidifying your brand loyalty from guest’s mobile devices.
2. Respond to Online Reviews Who: Paris Creperie What: The managers at Paris are constantly monitoring their Yelp business page. A Paris employee responds to every single review – the good and the bad – with a personal response addressing the reviewer's comments. Why it's awesome: By addressing negative reviews and showing appreciation for positive ones, the Paris team has created a transparent and friendly persona online. They're not afraid to talk about their flaws and make a public attempt to improve upon them. The managers on Yelp! use any negative reviews as an opportunity to learn about their business and to turn naysayers into brand advocates. Even if you're not able to address every post on your Yelp! page, it's a good idea to address your disgruntled customers and to try to turn that relationship around.
The manager's diplomatic and helpful comment on this post inspired the reviewer to slightly retract his harsh comment and to change his review from 2 to 3 stars.
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3. Share Customer-Generated Content Who: Pieology Pizzeria What: Using the #MyPieology hashtag, Pieology social media followers get a chance to be featured on the large brand’s social media pages. Pieology is constantly sharing customer photos on all their social media channels. Why it's awesome: Pieology is turning their customers into valuable brand ambassadors by sharing their comments and photos online. By acknowledging these posts and encouraging them with the #MyPieology hashtag, Pieology is creating social proof for the brand and generating a backlog of social media content. It’s essentially free marketing!
4. Offer Exclusive Coupons to Social Followers Who: Pieology Pizzeria (again) What: When Pieology fans in Irvine, CA share a photo of their pizza on social media with the hashtag #MyPiology, they’re sent a coupon for free cinnamon strips. Why it's awesome: Pieology gets a second shoutout here because this location is taking the next step in encouraging customer social media engagement by offering an exclusive deal to customers who share online! Pieology is rewarding their social media network for talking about their business. Additionally, coupons like this are more likely to be shared among friends and can inadvertently increase the size of the restaurant's network overall. According to a study from Whaleshark Media, 74% of active coupon users indicated that they would be likely to try a new brand if they received a coupon or promotion code.
5. Ask Guests to be Evangelists Who: Monteverde Restaurant & Pastificio What: Monteverde won Chicago Eater’s Restaurant of the Year because of their unapologetically adventurous Italian food and support of local fans. They used social media to spread the word about their Eater Award nomination and directly asked patrons for their support. Clearly, it worked. Why it's awesome: You work hard to develop a relationship with guests when they’re in the restaurant. Social media is an opportunity to capitalize on those relationships. If you've delivered a knockout experience and guests are connected with you online, followers will be happy to support the business. Bonus points to Monteverde for sharing other people’s posts on Twitter, creating social proof that they’re a great spot.
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6. Spotlight Your Employees Who: Mei Mei Street Kitchen What: Mei Mei was founded by three siblings and has since developed a reputation for award-winning food and staff that’s like family. Mei Mei has put their staff at the center of their brand. Why it's awesome: Profiling the people behind any business is a great way to humanize the experience for customers. Whether or not your team is winning awards, posting pictures from "behind the scenes" or sharing funny anecdotes about the staff can make followers feel more connected to the business and the people that make it possible.
7. Ask Questions to Engage Followers Who: Which Wich Superior Sandwiches What: Improve engagement on social media by asking fun questions and encouraging responses. Followers are more likely to remember the content of the post, like the fact that Which Wich now offers Ultimate BLTs, if they interact with it in some way. Why it's awesome: Social media is about more than just telling your followers what's happening at your restaurant. It's also about listening to them. Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are a great way to create a two-way dialogue with your customers. Ask questions like "fill in the blank," "what is your favorite item?" and "what item would you like to see on our menu?" to inspire followers to engage with your posts and to interact with you, rather than simply continuing to scroll down the page. Which Wich, which topped the charts for social media engagement in Q1, uses Twitter polls to engage social media followers and show off their fun brand (see #1 on this list).
8. Capitalize on Trending Topics Who: Upper Crust Pizzeria What: When social media was abuzz with a vicious Nor’easter named Stella hitting Boston, Upper Crust Pizzeria chimed in on social media using the already trending hashtag (#openinBOS) and a photo of their team bundled up with a local weatherman. Why it's awesome: Jumping on topics that are already trending on social media is a great way to increase exposure for your posts, especially if you have a clever take on the topic. Marketers call this strategy "newsjacking" and use it as a way to be seen by everyone following the popular trend. Upper Crust also took this opportunity to show off their staff (see #6 on this list).
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9. Host Social Media Contests Who: Capriotti's Sandwich Shop What: They select a winner for the most creative comment and send them a coupon to use the next time they visit the restaurant. Why it's awesome: There are a million types of contests you can run on social media. They're quick wins for both the restaurant and the fans. By asking guests to participate in fun trivia questions, riddles, fill-in-the-blanks, photo contests (see Example #3), or caption contests, the restaurant is building rapport with guests and encouraging engagement online.
10. Use Video to Bring the Brand to Life Who: Il Primo Pizza & Wings What: Il Primo posts a video about once per week to promote new specials, a local sports game, or an upcoming fundraiser. They use video to show what life is like “behind the scenes” and build a fun, family-friendly brand. Why it's awesome: The team at Il Primo is proof that you don’t need a professional marketing team to make a splash with video on social media. The 6-location pizza group uses budget-friendly services and even their mobile phone cameras to shoot video and share with their social media followers.
While starting and maintaining a vibrant social media network can seem like a daunting task, the bottom line is that it's about people. Social platforms provide a direct line of communication with existing and potential customers. Use these examples of social media restaurant marketing as inspiration to kick your own social media marketing into shape.
LATE-BREAKING NEWS AND STATISTICS Twitter is now losing users in the U.S. with their monthly U.S. user base declining from 70 million to 68 million in the June quarter, sending their stock into a tailspin. July 27, 2017 – money.cnn.com Facebook now has 2 billion monthly active users, above YouTube’s 1.5 billion, WeChat’s 889 million, Twitter’s 328 million and Snapchat’s estimated 255 million. June 27, 2017 – techcrunch.com Instagram users may soon be able to make restaurant reservations through the app. The service is currently being tested, and is expected to roll out to all users in the coming months. March 23, 2017 – fortune.com Twitter is testing a $99/month subscription platform that boosts your Twitter presence, ensuring your tweets appear in your followers' feeds more often, and your profile surfaces more often in searches. July 29, 2017 – mashable.com Papa John’s receives more than 6 in 10 orders from one of its digital platforms, mostly from its mobile ordering app, and expects the number to exceed 80% over the next several years. July 29, 2017 – mashable.com Restaurant guide Zomato (formerly UrbanSpoon) was hacked; 6.6 million user passwords stolen.
May 18, 2017 – techcrunch.com
Restaurant Customers Increasingly Go Digital www.nrn.com April 26, 2017 Article by Lauren Friedman It might be a stretch to say that having an effective digital strategy is a matter of life or death for restaurant chains in 2017. But it’s not much of one.
• McDonald’s Corp. has high expectations for its own efforts. The company is planning to expand mobile order and payment to all 14,000 of its U.S. locations by the end of the year.
At a time of heavy competition in the industry, online and mobile ordering are increasingly becoming points of consideration for consumers who have plenty of options for their meals.
It's also adopting a Panera-like, ‘Experience of the Future’ model at those restaurants, with plans to have kiosks in most U.S. locations by 2020. The company says sales are stronger at restaurants that have the kiosks.
• Panera Bread Co. on Tuesday noted that digital orders are now 26 percent of total sales at company-owned locations. Panera has added online ordering and kiosks at those locations, and consumers have clearly responded. And same-store sales at those units increased 5.3 percent in the company’s first quarter, and rose 11.5 percent over two years. By comparison, franchisees’ same-store sales are up 7.3 percent over two years. Panera is one of the stronger restaurant chains in the country right now. • Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. said this week that digital sales increased 53.5 percent in the first quarter. The company used “smarter pickup times” technology that assigns pickup times based on transaction volumes. And the company has a second make line to help with those orders. Chipotle’s same-store sales increased 17.8 percent in the first quarter, far above the 15-percent growth analysts expected. The chain has a long way to go to recover sales it lost last year, but it was a strong report. To be sure, digital ordering is hardly a panacea to what is ailing U.S. restaurants. Starbucks Corp. struggled in the first quarter in part because the company couldn’t handle all of its digital orders. In other words, if you’re going to have digital ordering, make sure it doesn’t make things more complicated. I also remain somewhat skeptical about the overall potential for a specific mobile app at most restaurant chains. Most of them simply don’t get enough habitual business to warrant valuable space on consumers’ mobile phones. Oh, and food and service still matter. People won’t online order food they hate. Yet the success of restaurant chains in generating digital orders is a vital consideration at a time when many companies are investing heavily in this area — it’s arguably amounting to one of the biggest, overall shifts in the way the industry interacts with consumers since the invention of fast food.
CEO Steve Easterbrook said the efforts could generate sales for years – far longer than, say, the introduction of a new product. “It takes time for consumers’ behavior to change,” he said. The biggest example of the ability to drive sales using digital orders is, of course, at Domino’s Pizza Inc., where digital strategies and innovative marketing have combined for a three-year same-store sales increase of more than 30 percent.
Digital ordering is one of the
biggest, overall shifts in the way the industry interacts with consumers since the invention of fast food. Pizza chains were early adopters of technology, and the largest concepts are all takeout and delivery, which lends itself to quick adoption of online and mobile ordering. Yet the restaurant business is an increasingly takeout business, itself. More than two-thirds of McDonald’s customers, for instance, use the drive-thru. And 61 percent of all restaurant orders right now are takeout, according to market research firm The NPD Group. Even at casual-dining chains, takeout is an increasingly important element. It’s the only traffic in that business that’s growing, according to NPD. Consumers are increasingly strapped for time. They don’t eat inside restaurants as much as they once did. So restaurant chains looking to cater to large numbers of consumers need to look at digital ordering if they’re going to keep up with the industry.
If you’re going to have digital ordering, make sure it doesn’t make things more complicated.
Snapchat now lets you create custom geofilters right in the app www.techcrunch.com
June 28, 2017
Article by Darrell Etherington
Snapchat introduced a way to create custom geofilters back in February of last year, and now it’s making the feature easier to use. U.S. Snapchat users can now create and submit custom filters directly in the app, rather than having to go to the studio website to make their custom filter. The mobile creative studio is now located in settings, under a menu item called “On-Demand Geofilters,” and it allows you to pick from a list of pre-set occasions, select a template and edit to customize using text, Bitmojis, and Snapchat’s Sticker library, too. You specify the time and the location where you want it to be available, defining the area on a map, and then submit the design for Snapchat approval. Payment for the filter feature is also run entirely in-app, once the review process is complete (which typically takes about a day) on both iOS and Android. You’ll get a push notification on your device once the filter goes live. Pricing for custom geofilters kicks off at $5.99, and runs up from there depending on different factors like how large the area it covers is, and how long a period you want it to run for.
Snap says this feature is designed for everyday Snapchatters, and that businesses that want to get the most out of custom geofilters should continue to use the web-based studio option. But the company also says that “tens of thousands” of custom filters are being made every day using their existing tool, so they’re clearly hoping that number grows even larger with easier access to the creation tool. On the consumer side, this is mostly just a fun thing you can do for weddings, birthdays and more, but Snap still provides analytics including total swipes, uses of the filter and the number of views across the campaign via a dashboard for geofilter purchasers. While On-Demand Geofilters are available in a number of markets via the web, the in-app creation tool is debuting only in the U.S., with plans to expand to additional markets where they’re offered on the web over time.
McDonald's looks to Snapchat to hire 250,000 for summer Company, franchisees taking ‘Snaplications’ www.usatoday.com June 12, 2017
Article by Zlati Meyer and Kellie Ell
McDonald's is taking a savvy social-media approach when it comes to trying to help round up the estimated 250,000 workers it's going to need to fill its ranks this summer. Forget trolling LinkedIn to scroll through resumes. McDonald's is going straight to Snapchat, where teens and college-aged men and women gossip and share photos. The fast-food titan is calling its hiring tool "Snaplications." A Snapchat user can view a 10-second video ad about how great it is to work at McDonald's, and if the job prospect wants to know more, there's a link to McDonald's career page in Snapchat and to the job application. More than half the people hired at company-owned McDonald's are in the 16- to 24-year-old bracket and for many of them, these summer gigs are their first jobs ever, the chain said. Snapchat is a great way for McDonald's to connect with young workers, said Susan Hay, founder of the career coaching firm Launching U. “Showing up as someone who knows how students spend time on social media is smart of them,” Hay said.
Though employers say they want to hire younger workers, teenage employment has taken a nosedive since the late 1970s when nearly 60% of teenagers were working. Today, it hovers around 35%. Even during the summer months, when teenage employment typically peaks, fewer teenagers are working. More than 71% of teens aged 16 to 19 had a summer gig in July 1978 versus 43.2% last summer, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Economists say increased competition from older workers, lack of opportunities and more desire for flexibility among teenagers are just some of the reasons leading this trend. McDonald’s use of Snaplications might just be what the industry needs to tempt teen workers, whose preferred method of communication is social media, into filling out an application. “Their phones are the center of their lives,” said Peter Harrison, CEO of Snagajob, an online job search engine, adding that one reason why fewer young people may have jobs is because many want to apply for jobs on their phones only. “Quite frankly, it’s hard to complete an application from a phone." McDonald's expects that its own and franchised restaurants will hire an estimated 250,000 people across the country this season.