14 May 2024 | By - Sudha Mariappan

Have you ever experienced working day and night on a product or service only to see that no one is interested in it?

Don't worry because it is more common than you think. With a lot of competition going on in the current market, only having a good product is not enough.

You need to step up your game.

Creating demand requires a plan that will change your game, it's basically a need to know about your audiences or members who are in need of your company's offers.

What is demand generation?

Let's picture that you’re the owner of a brand-new restaurant. But the problem is that it is unknown, and you want to let people know that you have opened a restaurant. You want to attract customers but it's been a struggle.

Despite all your efforts of having made tasty food and a fabulous interior, you’re having trouble doing your business.

Demand generation primarily means planning marketing campaigns so that your restaurant gets noticed, people should talk about your restaurant and create anticipation among the locals.

What is a demand generation strategy?

Imagine a scenario where people are ear to ear-gossiping about something. We all know how fast those gossips travel. Similarly, using a demand generation strategy, you can make people talk about the awesome restaurant you've now poured your entire heart on.

You have to make people talk about your tasty menu and nice interior. With a demand generation strategy, you create a restaurant marketing strategy that will make people talk about your restaurant, boost up your business, and make your restaurant famous.

With this, you’ll find a way to have a line of customers waiting to eat at our restaurant instead of hoping any customers would come by.

Elements of a Successful Demand Generation Strategy:

Understand Your Audience: Before sending out your menus everywhere, you should know who your target consumer is. You might have started your food menu with a different cuisine, so you need to know your customers' culinary preferences.

What are their needs in terms of a restaurant? Customer profiles make it easy for one to mold their message as well as menu into their particular wishes.

Content is Everything: High-quality content that will increase your customers’ appetite is the foundation of an effective demand-generation technique. You can show aesthetically stunning food photos, behind the scenes of your chef working or post videos on your special drinks list.

So, showcase your customers about your restaurant to a point where many people will prefer to enjoy tasty food they can never forget while dining.

Multi-Channel Marketing: Customers don’t just rely on word-of-mouth presently. You need to use different platforms to get to potential customers including your latest specials represented on social media posts, email marketing campaigns that inform your audience of upcoming events, search engine optimization (SEO) to make sure your restaurant appears top in online searches, and targeted online advertising to help reach those looking for dining in your area.

Nurture Your Leads: You don't need to look anywhere for your leads, your satisfied customers are your leads. Don't let them go once they are attracted. The process of keeping the connection between business and customers is what lead nurturing hopes to achieve.

For example, Dominoes, KFC, and all other multinational restaurants ask for the customers' mobile numbers to give them further information on future deals and offers.

Track and Analyze: Data makes you special in every strategy. Measure your marketing performance and track your customers' engagement on every diner to use those data to make more of those strategies. In this way, you can maximize your Return On Investment (ROI) from your marketing activities by analyzing what works and what doesn’t.

Three demand generation strategy examples:

Social media campaigns: For the promotion of your restaurant, you can use different social media platforms such as Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Youtube including Threads. Posting memes about your restaurant will bring relevancy to your audience.

One of the most popular social media campaigns was of McDonalds, when the American Super Bowl took place in 2015, they launched “Pay With Lovin” and volunteered to pay for customers' meals by randomly picking them out.

Influencer marketing: You can collaborate with big influencers who have an active audience. This is a great strategy to showcase your restaurant. You can invite a micro-influencer to have a meal at your restaurant, by doing that, their fan following will get the impression of your restaurant being good, and it’ll make them want to visit.

Email marketing: Letting your audience subscribe to your mailbox can be the most efficient way to keep in touch with them personally. You can let them know about your latest menu, your newest offers and discounts.

Demand generation and data:

Without data there is absolutely nothing we can do. It is the only fuel that powers your demand generation engine. Data allows you to track the performance of your marketing campaigns, understand your audience better, and identify any areas for improvement.

By choosing a proper digital marketing agency, you can leverage your business, create demand generation strategies by using the right tools.

Your efforts matter. We at Ontogen Digital can offer you a wide range of solutions from website development to video editing.

If you need any assistance with leveraging your analytics tools, boost up your business, optimize your content, or filter out your target audience, make sure to contact us at info@ontogendigital.com. Subscribe to us for more such blogs.