Industries
Marketing for restaurants
Websites, Meta Ads and local SEO for independent restaurants that want more tables booked direct, fuller quiet nights and a menu diners can read on a phone. No pinching, no zooming.
The situation
How the work is won.
Choosing a restaurant takes a few minutes on a phone. A look at the photos, a check of the menu and prices, a glance at the map and hours. Then a booking, or a swipe away. For many independents, booking platforms and review sites sit in the middle of that decision, charging per cover and keeping the diner's details. The job is to make your own channels the easiest place to decide and book.
What sends them looking
- Per-cover and commission fees from booking platforms are starting to add up.
- Weekends are full. Tuesdays and Wednesdays aren't.
- You've got a new menu, chef, refurb or opening to tell people about, including people who've never been in.
- You're in a tourist area, and visitors can't easily read the menu or book in their own language.
- Private dining, set menus or wine dinners need a steady flow of bookings to pay their way.
The problem
Why it's harder than it looks.
Where the work slips away
- PDF or photo menus are slow on mobile, hard to read and close to invisible to search engines.
- Photography that doesn't match the room or the plates leaves diners unsure what they're walking into.
- Opening hours, kitchen closing times and holiday closures can disagree between your website, Google and the booking platforms, and diners notice.
- Overseas visitors find you on Google Maps, then leave when the site, menu and booking route are English only.
- Send a diner to a third-party booking page and that platform can market other restaurants to them.
What makes customers hesitate
- The booking platform brings in covers. Pushing diners elsewhere feels like a risk.
- Proper food photography sounds expensive, and hard to fit around service.
- It's hard to see how a new website changes how full the dining room is.
- Past social ads brought likes and comments, and no bookings anyone could see.
The approach
Where Arête would start with restaurants.
Every service works on its own. Which one comes first depends on how your customers search and decide.
- Website design
A website that works like good front of house
Good front of house reads the guest and gets them seated. Your website should do the same. Arête builds restaurant sites around the decision a diner is making: the room, the menu, hours, the map and a direct way to book, with language versions where your visitors need them.
Websites for restaurants - Meta Ads
Meta Ads aimed at the nights that need it
Instagram and Facebook campaigns for particular nights, set menus, events and private dining, shown to diners nearby. The creative shows your room and your plates honestly. No surprises when the food arrives.
Meta Ads for restaurants - SEO
SEO built on menus, location and cuisine
Search work covers your Google Business Profile, text menus, and cuisine and neighbourhood pages. It targets diners who already know roughly what they want. Thai near the station. Sunday lunch for eight.
SEO for restaurants
Proof and measurement
What customers check, and what counts.
What customers look for before they call
- Photos of your own dishes and your own dining room, lit the way diners will see them.
- An up-to-date menu with prices, dietary markings and allergen guidance.
- Accurate hours, a map that works and a line on parking or transport.
- Recent Google reviews, with your replies on show.
- A booking route that confirms the table straight away, or says exactly how and when it will be confirmed.
What counts as an enquiry
- A table booked direct through your own site or booking system.
- A WhatsApp message or call to book, started from your website or Google Business Profile.
- An enquiry for private dining, a group or an event.
- A seat booked for a set-menu evening, tasting night or seasonal special.
What gets tracked
- Direct bookings against platform bookings, month by month.
- Where each reservation and enquiry came from: Google Business Profile, Instagram, ads or elsewhere.
- How many mobile visitors view the menu, start a booking and finish it.
- Covers on the quieter services you've targeted, compared with the same services before the campaign.
Worth knowing
The rules and the practicalities.
Constraints for restaurants
- Information on the 14 regulated allergens must be available, and for food sold online for delivery or collection, it's needed both before purchase and on delivery.
- In England, businesses with 250 or more employees must show calorie information on menus, online menus included. Most independents fall below that threshold.
- Ads featuring alcohol, wine pairings included, must follow the CAP Code's alcohol rules and Meta's age restrictions.
- Online menu prices should match what you charge in the restaurant, with compulsory charges included and any discretionary service charge shown as optional.
Questions
Marketing for restaurants: your questions answered
Should a restaurant stop using booking platforms?
Not necessarily. Platforms still bring in new diners, particularly visitors. The aim is for regulars and people who already know you to book direct, so the platform helps with discovery without sitting between you and every regular.
Can WhatsApp replace a booking system for a small restaurant?
For a small restaurant it can. It's familiar, works across languages and keeps the conversation personal. Someone does need to reply promptly, and diners need to know how their booking gets confirmed. Bigger, busier dining rooms are better off with a booking system that manages tables and capacity automatically.
Does a restaurant need a multilingual website?
It depends who walks through the door. In tourist areas, or cities with plenty of international visitors, a menu and booking route in the main visitor languages can remove the barrier between a hungry visitor and a table. For a neighbourhood place with mostly local diners, English alone does the job.
Start a conversation
Tell Arête about the business and what currently feels missing.
You will receive a direct reply with the most sensible next step, even if that means recommending that nothing needs changing yet.
A direct reply
A personal reply, usually within one working day. No sales script, no chasing.
A short conversation
A look at the business, your current website and what a good result would look like for you.
A clear recommendation
The leanest sensible next step, with fixed scope and a fixed price. Sometimes that's nothing yet, and you'll be told so.
Prefer email? Write to info@aretemarketing.co.uk.