Marketing for restaurants and cafes
full tables, not just full feeds
A great plate of food on social media does not fill a table on its own - a working reservation link, a reminder that reaches the guest, and a reply to last week's review usually do more. We run all three as one system and report in covers, not likes.
Where the money leaks today
Restaurant marketing usually spends on reach while losing the booking itself: a reservation link that opens a generic contact form instead of an actual table system, no reminder so a chunk of bookings simply do not show up, and a Google Business Profile with old photos and unanswered negative reviews sitting above every ad a new guest might see.
What we do
Campaigns run locally, around specific occasions, dishes and time slots rather than the restaurant in general, so a weekday lunch promotion and a weekend date-night campaign speak differently. We connect or build a reservation flow tied to your actual table system, then add automated reminders that measurably cut no-shows. Review requests go out at the right moment after a good visit, and we reply to reviews - including the difficult ones - because in this category the Google Business Profile often does more work than any single ad.
Content stays close to the real food and the real room: short video and photos of actual dishes, produced on a simple recurring schedule, since audiences in this category can tell staged or AI-polished images apart from the real thing.
What we need from you
Access to your Google Business Profile and social accounts, your current reservation setup (even if it is a phone and a notebook), a handful of real, recent photos or short clips, and your slow hours and days - those are usually where a promotion earns the most.
How we measure
We report in bookings and covers where your system allows us to track them, and cost per booking rather than cost per click or follower. No-show rate before and after reminders is tracked explicitly, since it is one of the clearest wins available in this category.
Price and timeline
| Option | Price | What it covers | Timeline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Launch or audit | from $900 | Campaigns, reservation flow, review process, profile cleanup | 2 weeks |
| Monthly management | from $900 / month | Ongoing campaigns, reminders, reviews, light content | monthly, no lock-in |
| Full control, handover to your team | from $2,000 (one-time) + $350 / month for edits | Documented system, access transferred, your team runs it | 3 weeks to hand over |
Related
See performance marketing for the ad side and brand, creatives and social media for content. Related playbooks: marketing for hotels and villas, marketing for events and wedding businesses, marketing for beauty salons. For automated bookings, see restaurant reservations and reviews. Real-world reference: four years of local marketing for a tattoo studio, a comparable local-services playbook of steady ads, reviews and map presence.
Tables emptier than they should be? Get in touch and we will look at your booking and review flow first.
FAQ
How much does restaurant marketing cost?
Launch work starts from $900: campaigns, a working reservation link and a review process. Ongoing management starts from $900 a month, usually paired with light content production.
How long until we see more bookings?
Campaigns launch within a week. Bookings typically respond within days for promotions and events; steady growth in covers takes 4 to 6 weeks of consistent presence and reviews.
What ad budget do we need?
A realistic minimum is $300 to $600 a month for one location, mostly on local Meta and Google reach, kept lean because repeat visits and reviews usually matter more than paid reach at this scale.
What do you need from us to start?
Access to your Google Business Profile and social accounts, your current reservation or table system, a few real photos or short videos of dishes and the space, and your busiest and slowest hours.
How do you report results?
Weekly: bookings, covers where trackable, cost per booking, no-show rate and review volume, so you can see which days and promotions actually fill tables.