We all know and use TripAdvisor, whether it´s near our home or abroad, to find a restaurant according to our criteria. This platform allows consumers to share their opinions and thus penalise or favour certain restaurants. But what happens when restaurant owners, who until nowwere depending on their customers’ ‘ratings’, decide in turn to use these platforms to their advantage to influence people’s decisions? With the rise of social media, amounting to 5 billion active users, restaurants have made sharing photos/videos of their dishes an essential marketing tool, and it’s working! Let’s take a closer look at how this tool creates a competitive advantage.
Firstly, in terms of media impact, statistics show that 63% of consumers use social networks to discover new restaurants, 38% of Instagram users watch foodrelated content and 45% share it. Restaurant owners are well aware of this latest trend and intend to take advantage of this ‘free’ advertising channel by paying more attention to the aesthetic appeal of the dishes they offer. By doing so, they are actively encouraging consumers to share their experience with their community by mentioning the restaurants in their posts. Some Chefs have also become stars on social media, with chef Philippe Etchebest boasting over a million followers and Cyril Lignac topping the 3 million mark on Instagram.
Secondly, from a persuasive point of view, 32% of the consumers state that they will visit a restaurant directly after seeing its content on social media, while 22% of the persons asked are ready to revisit a restaurant thanks to its media presence and 88% are following the recommendations made by their friends on these platforms when choosing a place to eat. The process of persuasion generated by these irresistible photos, further intensified by references of peers (friends, influencers, chefs), finishes off any remaining doubts that consumers might have about a food establishment, and even attracts those who were initially not even looking for a restaurant. This latter consequence, which is regarded as extremely favourable, can be described as a “Pull” strategy which is creating additional demand.
It is therefore clearly evident that being present on social media is fundamental to ‘surviving’ in the age of digitalisation. The important question is how to differentiate oneself from all the other restaurants that are trying to do the same? While independent restaurant owners are usually satisfied with publishing their small dishes and innovating their menu as far as possible, some major players in the restaurant industry are spending exorbitant sums of money on Machine Learning. By harnessing customer data, Machine
Learning enables restaurant owners to identify the consumers’ needs, predict their behaviour and understand trends in order to conduct more effective campaigns as well as create personalised experiences. The impact of personalisation should not be underestimated: 52% of the customers state that they would switch to another brand if their current one does not personalise its communication.
As an example, both McDonald’s and Burger King are using Machine Learning to suggest dishes to their customers based on their previous orders, the weather or the time of day. This obviously comes at a certain cost, with the Bite Back organisation revealing that the 10 biggest spenders invested 75%more in social media and digital advertising in 2022 than the previous year, and this will only increase in the future. The biggest increase was recorded by the American giant McDonald’s with a 300% rise in its advertising spend, followed by KFC with a 224% rise and UbearEats with 199%. Back in 2019, McDonald’s made its biggest acquisition in the last 20 years, by acquiring the startup Dynamic Yield for $300 million. The AI-based technology developed by this start-up enabled the fast-food giant to optimise its McDrive service by offering its customers a personalised recommendation engine.
In conclusion, we have touched upon two highly effective marketing techniques used by restaurants that primarily differ from each other in terms of their costs. While user-generated content on social media virtually represents a free advertising channel for restaurants, Machine Learning, on the other hand, pushes restaurant chains to spend exorbitant amounts of money to establish meaningful relationships with their consumers. Although currently, Machine Learning is merely used by a privileged few in the infinitely fragmented restaurant sector, this technique may well become the new necessity and trend for restaurant owners in the near future, as it is already the case with social media nowadays.
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