The restaurant marketing landscape is an increasingly complex and fragmented place. Today, most restaurant advertising strategies must include a healthy mix of social media ads, community sponsorships, search engine visibility, and traditional print media.
There’s an awful lot to think about as you build out your marketing budget.
It all begs the question, how big should my restaurant marketing budget be? And how can I be sure I’m really getting a meaningful return on my investment?
5 Restaurant Marketing Budget Tips
We posed these important questions to Law Smith, fractional Chief Marketing Officer at Tampa-based marketing agency, Tocobaga Consulting, and in turn, he provided a number of extremely valuable restaurant marketing budget tips.
1. Start with a marketing plan
Before you can build a budget, you need to know exactly what you’ll be paying for. Your restaurant marketing budget must be preceded by a restaurant marketing plan, one that outlines a proposed mix of restaurant advertising strategies, measurable benchmarks, and desired outcomes.
Create your roadmap before you attempt to calculate the cost of your trip.
“Operators will have the plan in their head," Smith explained. "But that’s a horrible place to store formal execution plans, plus it’s not viewable by staff.”
In order to make your overall marketing strategy successful, you have to begin with a clear sense of what you hope to achieve and a plan for how to achieve it. Only then can you begin crunching numbers.
2. Create a scalable marketing strategy
Succeeding in the restaurant industry requires both adaptability and agility. Sudden shifts if the economy, the cost of goods, or public taste can have a direct impact on your operation. You need to be ready to pivot in all aspects of your operation, including your marketing budget.
One of Smith’s most valuable restaurant marketing budget tips is to begin with a marketing model that is inherently scalable.
“Essentially,you want a model that lets you ramp up or dial down your marketing tactics (and spending) as needed," said Smith. “And if you ever plan to expand, you want to be able to duplicate what you’re doing — and take advantage of having those multiple locations.”
The restaurant business can be fickle. Choose restaurant advertising strategies that give you the flexibility to scale your marketing spend up or down as circumstances dictate. This gives you the power to control your budget while always keeping one eye on your ROI.
3. Think of your marketing budget as an investment
As the digital marketing landscape becomes more splintered and complicated, it can also become more costly. You may, as a consequence, start to view your marketing budgeting as a burdensome expense.
But Smith suggests thinking of your marketing budget as an investment rather than an expense. This perspective can also make it a lot easier to quantify your restaurant marketing budget.
“Marketing budgets should be dynamic to performance," said Smith. "Think percentages over guesstimate."
In other words, let your restaurant performance drive your marketing spend.
“A decent rule of thumb to create a starting budget,“is 10% of gross revenue,” said Smith. "This approach also ensures that your restaurant marketing budget always stays within a sustainable margin, even as conditions shift for your business."
4. Gather data, collect insights, and pivot accordingly
Create a plan, put it to work, and measure your returns. Gather segmented performance data on your full mix of restaurant advertising strategies.
Study the analytics from your Google Ad Words, Facebook, and Instagram Insights. Request reports from your third-party digital marketing vendors. Even solicit direct customer feedback. Ask your customers where they heard about you, keep track of their responses, and adjust your marketing budget accordingly.
Stephanie Swanz, owner of Tampa fast-casual restaurants Empamamas and Muchachas, shared her own experience with this latter method.
"I absolutely see a direct response from utilizing and investing in social media and marketing, as well as mixing up which platforms we use," said Swanz. "We had hundreds of people tell us they specifically saw us on TikTok and had to try us out."
In fact, Swanz reported a 40% spike in business one week after the restaurant scored a viral video on TikTok. And this return on investment is more than just a flash in the pan.
“Since we have added a marketing budget we have seen an increase in sales each year of roughly 20%,” said Swanz.
5. Get help from the pros
As a busy restaurant owner, you may not have the time to build a marketing plan, let alone construct a marketing budget. That’s why one of the most valuable restaurant marketing budget tips we can offer is to enlist help from qualified professionals.
Choosing the best mix of restaurant advertising strategies for your business shouldn’t be a guessing game. Nor should creating an effective restaurant marketing budget. The truth is, the very best restaurant marketing budget tips will likely come from those who do it everyday. The right provider can maximize the return on this budget by ensuring that you actually achieve the outcomes you’ve invested in.
Fortunately, you have a lot of options when it comes to third-party marketing vendors, whether you’re just looking for help managing a digital rewards program and driving customer reviews, or you’re seeking a full-service digital marketing and data analytics firm to take over your marketing operation altogether.
It all depends on your restaurant’s marketing needs. Not sure where to start? Check out our index of industry-leading vendors, where you can filter your search results according to geography and category.
[Photo by RODNAE Productions via Pexels]
