Love this thread, such a good reminder to be intentional with marketing, and to direct your energy in the right directions for you and your customers -- instead of trying to do absolutely everything.
We like to do what we call "Experiential Marketing" which basically means giving people free food to try. We try to regularly drop off boxes of goodies to nearby offices/businesses, along with our catering info. We also donate a lot to local events -- often a gift basket of goodies with a gift card so they can come try us out. We also host some free menu tasting events when we're about to launch a new menu or item, which people always seem to enjoy. We figure getting the food into people's mouths is more effective than paying for a magazine ad, and so far, it seems to be working.
Other than that, we do a lot on social media -- mainly Instagram. Facebook engagement is very low, but we have an active Instagram presence and rely primarily on post & stories. We've recently started doing more reels, which has been fun and has increased engagement. That's a bit beyond what I have time for, so I've hired one of our social media-savvy team members to develop those with me, which has been awesome. It takes her about 2-4 hours a week.
We also engage quite a bit on review sites (primarily Yelp & Google), partner with other local organizations to do donation days or host events, and send out an email newsletter every 2 months or so.
One of my goals for this year is to begin pursuing/exploring some additional marketing channels, including: Square Texting, Google Ads (in moderation), and Square Loyalty. We had Square Loyalty in the past and didn't feel like it was giving us the return we were hoping for -- it also felt very time-consuming to get customers signed up and explain it each time. But, I think it's time to give it another try. Word-of-mouth and loyal, happy customers (our "raving fans") are our best ambassadors, so we want to make sure they know how appreciated they are!
