Social media provides powerful opportunities to reach new customers and continually engage with your restaurant’s regulars.
Sharing content online connects your business to potential customers. It’s the best way to get them from the internet and through your real-world doors. A sales-driving digital presence can be created by any operation, big or small. Even if you’re a restaurant operator with a limited (or nonexistent) marketing budget you can make a big impact by taking advantage of social media platforms – the right way.
Resources, Articles, & More
How to Boost “Likes”
Two main reasons that people unlike a brand page are that their posts are uninteresting, and they post too frequently (for the given platform.) Keep more of the fans you already have by creating context driven posts and engaging content that “meets the expectations” of your audience.
Keep blatantly promotional content to a minimum. One school of thought recommends an 80/20 rule as a starting point. 80% contextual or engaging content and 20% hard-sell. As you begin to discover your brand’s unique voice this can approach 60/40. Watch audience engagement to course correct.
An approximate guide to #hashtags
Ready to show off your #foodie chops? Hashtags, or the “number sign” # have established a permanent place on most popular social networks, including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and even Pinterest. Hashtags are the most effective means of categorizing content on social media. By grouping content with a click, hashtags increase the visibility of your content, making your business easier to discover. Hashtags allows you to connect with and engage social media users based on a common place, topic, or interest.
FACEBOOK
Use 1-2 Hashtags
Use hashtags sparingly and occasionally to associate your content with a specific event or effort. Too many and too frequent use of hashtags will start to annoy your audience.
INSTAGRAM
Use 7-15+ Hashtags
Always use hashtags on Instagram. You’ll want to experiment with which hashtags work best and how many of them to use. Bottom line, hashtags increase the visibility of and engagement with your content. They are also a great way to run a promotion or contest.
TIKTOK
As many as you can
TikTok uses hashtags for content discovery just like other platforms. It’s recommended to use as many relevant hashtags as you can think of to target users you want to see your content. And, while there is no limit to the number of hashtags you can use, TikTok limits captions to only 100 characters–which includes your hashtags. Best pracice for increase video views, keep titles shorter and utilize relevant and popular hashtags.
TWITTER
Use 1-4 Hashtags
Use hashtags strategically to “attach” your content efforts to a relevant trend, event or location. Twitter will offer you up some great options so you don’t always have to come up with them on your own. When using hashtags on Twitter – think local.
LINKEDIN
Use 3-5 Hashtags
Use hashtags to increase the visibility of your content – and as a result your brand – on LinkedIn. Using the right hashtags can help ensure your contributions to the professional conversations happening on LinkedIn are seen by the right people; potential collaborators, customers or future employees.
PINTEREST
Use 2-5 Hashtags
Use hashtags to help users find specific types of content; from food to locations and events. The Pinterest platform is unique in the sense that you don’t necessarily need to have created the content to benefit from sharing it.
Great Apps for Foodservice
When is the best time to post on social media?
From Sprout Social
sproutsocial.com
Each social platform has its own benefits depending on your goals, content type and audience. If you’re noticing your engagement isn’t where you want it to be, consider revisiting your social media goals and overall KPIs. Of course, knowing which days you get the most engagement helps you reach those goals as well.
While interpreting the data for each social network individually, we consistently noticed that the highest times of engagement were Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays at 9 or 10 a.m. Midweek mornings proved to be a successful time across most social platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.
- Best times to post on social media overall: Tuesdays through Thursdays at 9 a.m. or 10 a.m.
- Best days to post on social media: Tuesdays through Thursdays
- Worst days to post on social media: Sundays
There’s more to posting on social media than this quick stat though. Each network saw varying ranges of engagement throughout the week and at remarkably different times. And once industries are factored in, engagement varies even more. So while Tuesdays through Thursdays at 9 or 10 a.m. are generally the best times to post on social, there are a few more factors to consider before you schedule any posts.
See BEST TIME for each network…