The fact that the vast majority of visitors to restaurants and cafes during their stay in an institution use not only mobile Internet, but also a local free Wi-Fi service, could not go unnoticed by marketers. Read our article about a new way to attract new guests and increase loyalty to the establishment. Where we will combine foreign experience and our realities on the topic of Wi-Fi marketing for a restaurant.
Functional
Two basic areas of Wi-Fi marketing are offered: service and advertising. Wi-Fi service is a communication channel aimed at customers who are already in a restaurant or cafe. These are questionnaires, menus, databases, with the help of which a business can solve specific problems at selected points of contact with the target audience. For example, hotels can provide a Wi-Fi service in the form of access to gigabytes of materials (books, audio and video content) available only to users internal network.
The service direction can also be associated with the duplication of the “mystery shopper” service. So, one foreign restaurant campaign included the following option: after connecting to the network, the client received a pop-up notification with an offer to fill out a short questionnaire about the quality of service in exchange for a discount on the bill (at least 15%). This had a positive effect on the staff: waiters, bartenders and administrators became much more attentive to their duties, knowing that any visitor can leave feedback about their work. Through the same service, the restaurant implemented loyalty programs, as a result of which secondary attendance increased significantly.
Now about Wi-Fi advertising. Its optimal format is as follows: connecting to the network, the guest sees a 20-30 second commercial (you can skip it), and then gets into the advertising menu – a screen with seven interactive banners, each of which is designed specifically for a specific advertiser. Choosing a banner, he goes to the corresponding site or landing page (landing page), while gaining access to high-speed Internet, after which he is no longer bothered by advertising messages. The audience of such advertising within the currently existing targeted program exceeds 5 million in UAE.
Location
Each institution has zones in which its target audience is concentrated. Looking at the map from the point of view of geo-marketing, you can determine the places that are most loaded with traffic. You need to work with them: for example, an expensive restaurant next to a fitness club (where a solvent audience is concentrated), it is worth WiFi advertising of the latter; if the location is near the airport, you need to use the network in waiting areas or business lounges. Instead of an advertising banner, you can use discount coupons that you can save to your phone or take a screenshot to use it later – for example, on a day off from training, or upon returning from vacation.
An example of impudent marketing: in the food court area of a shopping center that distributes free Wi-Fi, you can broadcast an advertisement for your cafe nearby – offer a business lunch at an attractive price, add an appetizing picture. There is a chance that the visitor will prefer your establishment to the food court, abandoning the queues and disposable tableware.
Equipment and costs
There are two options for technical implementation. The first is the integration of a router (if it is not available, the range is insufficient) and a controller that allows you to adapt commercials and banners to various devices into a local Wi-Fi network (the technical arrangement of one access point costs the customer an average of 2000 – 4000 UAH). The second is to conduct a network together with a partner provider and connect the same equipment. The full cost of services depends on a number of conditions, but usually does not exceed 19,000 AED. from one institution.
Broadcasting an advertising video costs an average of 70 AED per month. for 1 thousand impressions. Depending on the size, banners in the matrix cost from 15 to 20 fills. per impression, while the minimum conversion from the smallest banner is 15%. You can pay only for the transition to the advertiser’s website – 75 fills. (only those customers who actually used the site are taken into account, and not just logged in and out). The cost of an advertising campaign in Wi-Fi networks starts from 30,000 AED, although in order to get a tangible result, it is recommended to use more substantial budgets.
Indicators
Any institution is struggling for profit growth – an increase in the average check amount, secondary attendance and the number of new customers. The basic marketing principle applies here: if the additional profit received by the cafe after the implementation of the tool significantly exceeds the costs of using it, then it is effective.
The recommended minimum period for using Wi-Fi marketing is two months, ideally 6 months. Using the tool for less than a month does not make sense even in test mode: you will not receive any results or statistics, because weekdays and weekends have different traffic and different visitors. And if we are talking about restaurant specials, then it is better to change or alternate them regularly so that regular customers do not have the feeling that the service is not being updated.
Clients get access to a personal account, where they can receive real-time data on the number of views of an advertising message, real transitions to the customer’s website (the program captures transitions to the website only with a certain stay time). You can view both current statistics and track the result for a specific period of time.
Peculiarities
Wi-Fi marketing is designed primarily for the business audience and the younger generation. Representatives of the latter spend up to 60% of their time alone with phones and tablets, not noticing advertising billboards and commercials on TV, so advertising on gadget screens is an obvious and correct solution. Pluses – mass coverage and low price for each contact with the consumer with high conversion.
A serious advantage of Wi-Fi marketing is independence from seasonality, weather conditions and the human factor: the effectiveness depends only on the quality of the advertising message and the speed of the Internet connection. However, despite all of the above, less than 20% of restaurants in UAE use Wi-Fi marketing.
The requirements for the preparation of video materials mainly relate to technical parameters: format, timing, etc. In terms of content, the customer most often focuses only on his own vision and compliance of the content with the company’s image. There is a rule of F – key topics that attract the viewer’s attention in any video: feeding (nutrition), fighting (battle, competition),. The main thing is not to make a mistake with the message of the video and not spoil the appetite of visitors.
It is inappropriate to talk about the imposition of advertising in this case, Wi-Fi marketing is based on freedom of choice: free access to high-speed Internet is offered for a very modest fee, 20-30 seconds of personal time.
YouTube works in the same way, broadcasting customer commercials before watching videos, and only a small part of Internet users consider this unethical.
What happens: immediately after connecting to the Wi-Fi network, the client sees a 10 to 20 second informational video about the restaurant, after watching or skipping it, a banner with special offers on the menu appears. Then the guest can use the internet. Some time before paying the bill, a window appears with a proposal to fill out a questionnaire about the quality of service, encouragement – a 15% discount on the bill (you can also skip it).
Required equipment: router and controller
Costs: about 20,000 AED.
Result: an increase in repeat attendance by 27.5%, an increase in the quality of service, an increase in the number of downloads of the restaurant’s mobile application (tens of times), an increase in the amount of the average check.