Viral Marketing for Restaurants

Updated September 2nd 2013

The most popular of all marketing practices.  It combines a well thought marketing concept with the buzz that is generated from it to ensure that people transfer the information from one to another. Viral marketing campaigns have a specific content that leads people to forward the message further and by tapping into the network effect, you can gain far more value than cost.  It can use its private, social or professional networks and depending on the connectivity and quality of the network it always has the potential for exponential growth as it spreads through its network.  To say that something has “gone viral” usually means that the content has been very well received and then widely shared.  For restaurant’s it should aim at creating brand awareness and buzz about the restaurant. Viral campaigns are today not linked to any budget requirements. Email communication or social networks are mostly free of charge. But viral marketing is also possible by SMS or posted mail. All depends on who your target market is and how this specific market chooses to communicate. Viral Marketing can be practiced by a small independent restaurant as well as on a large scale by a multinational chain.

Viral Marketing Best Practices include:

• A motivation or incentive that provides a reason for people to pass it on. This is most likely the most difficult part. Easy to create a concept where everyone receiving a message would get an iPad but financially almost impossible. So a brilliant idea often consists of something very psychologically manipulative so that it almost becomes a no brainer to forward it to someone else. But solutions are usually related to free digital products like e-books, access to a free service online or something highly entertaining like a video.
• Collection of early adopters, thought leaders, artists, celebrities, family, friends or employees or any other group linked to you that like to be first and even more like to initiate the conversation about something new. Recommendation! Think twice before you send a Viral Marketing Campaign to your boss(es). An idea always seems brilliant but seldom is. Do not bother others with a “not so brilliant” idea and bosses rarely admit that their staff came up with something incredible.
• Distribution channel allowing the message to be transferred limitless. As Viral Marketing Campaigns may grow exponentially you need it based on a communicational system that has no restrictions. Email, Social Media or SMS are used ideally.
• Initial resource: You need to have a group of people with good social networking potential to initiate the campaign. Your best resources for catalyzing a viral marketing campaign are loyal customers, friends and family, and employees.

Viral Marketing Psychology

Viral content relies on two things: The content itself being worthy enough to share and the content being distributed widely enough for you to enjoy the benefits of it. So, why do people share things?

• It makes us laugh – When we laugh, it is a natural remedy that makes us feel good and lifts our mood.  That pressure moment from the daily stresses and strains of life.
• It is beyond belief – When something is incredible or unbelievable it has the ability to surprise and amaze us.  In turn this triggers us into wanting to share with friends and family to get a similar reaction.
• It connects with us on a personal level – When something touches us on a personal level, either positively or negatively, it is a natural thing to share with others as we want to engage with overs over the experience.
• It relates to our own opinions – In today’s society, we all have opinions that we like to share or believe in. When you find content that supports your views, it is only logical to want to share it with others.
• It will put a smile on someone’s face – This is simple and serves as a reminder to enjoy the fun, silly and lighter side of life.  Something we all need gentle reminders of every now and again.
• It makes us consider or evaluate things – When someone makes us stop and wonder about questions in life, we like to share with others so that they can also take a moment to contemplate things in their own lives.
• It is dramatic – We all love a good drama, whether it is in soap land or real life. Something that is going to have high levels of any type of drama will certainly be shared with others.
• It is humiliating – Something that is totally embarrassing or uncomfortable to watch normally entices people so much that they cannot look away or stop reading.  It is the guilty pleasure of seeing content that focuses on the cringe-worthy moments of others.
• It is provocative – Any content that might be seen as a little risqué (but suitable enough to be openly shared) adds that little excitement to our lives and results in people not being able to resist sharing it.

Viral Marketing Tools

For sure there are several tools available.  The ones that are at the public’s disposal and recommended are: SMS Text, Email, Social Media and traditional word-of-mouth. Important is to know what tools your target market prefers or your message requires.

• SMS Text: All goes mobile but is not limited to the Internet. SMS is generating billions worldwide on New Year’s Eve because it is still the most popular text messaging tool among mobile phone users. You can create a viral campaign for a dance club where every sms sent to you, is a new member registration. Mobile numbers are personal so usually are not transferred. Connected to a preferred or paid number you could even charge for guest list entries.
• Email remains the most popular text communication tool. Convenient to write and always personal Email allows you to target your audience precisely. Shocking lack of use of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solutions, affordable today to pretty much everyone, allow you to tag and categorize your target markets and for the very brave and cutting edge of technology, the application of marketing automation connected to your CRM can boost your turnover by really engaging your business with your leads and customers and build up or solidify a relationship.
• Internet is the perfect breeding ground for a viral marketing campaign using blogs, social media networks, sharing sites, review and rating sites. Besides comments, some tools allow you to post coupons or promotions.
• Word of Mouth: Word of Mouth can be positive or negative. Research pretends that people prefer to promote or communicate negative experiences to positive ones. But this might also depend on the culture. For sure it is true that people require subjects to talk about and restaurant or hospitality news are a favourite in our society. Maybe not because they do not have anything else to talk about but rather because everyone thinks to understand the business better than anyone else just because (s)he was or is a regular customer, which makes everyone a restaurant expert. Simply said, word of mouth viral marketing directly asks for a subject that is good enough for people to gossip about it.

Viral Marketing Ideas

• Coupons: A discount or free gift coupon is always a good reason to forward a message, get involved or register somewhere. But this could become a costly plan unless you offer something digital.
• Facebook “Like” button is a 100% Viral Marketing based service.
• Multilevel Referral Partner Programs represent viral business concepts where everyone gets a piece of the pie.
• Provide free online viral services. Project management tools like basecamp, booking experts or q4work are based on offering free services to manage work and people but you need to invite them by email and they have to register in order to use this free tool. The leader in these services is Google who consistently develops new applications for people to use but you need to be registered.
• Do not forget about your employees who all have a network themselves and can multiply the results in the beginning of launching a viral campaign. You can give them gift bonuses for every person that registers through their contacts. Don’t be stingy; any other marketing activity would be more expensive before it even starts.

Viral Marketing Risks

• Once it is launched, the campaign is out of your control.  It may become too big for you. It could turn into a negative campaign. All and everything is possible so give your best and use the best resources when planning it.
• As you are not in control of its distribution, you may have issues to reach your target market. Therefore the more general a viral campaign is the less it can miss a target market ;)
• People may recognize it as a marketing tactic. Well it is one so not really an issue.
• By careful planning your initial launch and avoiding gimmicky campaigns that involve blatant sales pitches, you can reduce the amount of risk involved in a viral marketing campaign.

Examples of Successful Viral Marketing Campaigns:

• Dropbox lets you invite people to register for their services and in return you get more disk space.
• Burger King’s “Whopper Sacrifice” campaign: A free whopper for dropping 10 friends from their Facebook social network.

Written by Daniel Grossmann & Julie Cole