High-Impact Marketing Ideas for Catering Businesses.

Every catering business requires a good portfolio when it comes to marketing. Here are some of the tips and tricks to follow when putting leveling up your marketing strategies.

1. Get a great website
Your website should be a powerful sales and lead-generation tool. Share useful blogs, updates, and recipes to become a local voice of authority. Work with a developer who can make your website conversion focused. Beyond content and design, your catering website can include self-service features like ordering and payments, saving you and your customers time.

2. Optimise your website for mobile
With a mobile-friendly business website, you’ll be much more accessible for those customers using a mobile device. Your customers will find it easier to view your content, submit orders, make payments, and interact with you no matter where they are. A high percentage of your leads could be searching for your business on a mobile device, and you’ll be providing them with an optimised experience if your website is mobile-friendly.

3. Use testimonials and reviews
Testimonials can build trust and credibility for your catering operation. Have a systematic way of capturing customer feedback; for example, through an all-in-one catering solution. Highlight great reviews on your blog and social media posts, and have a dedicated page for testimonials on your website.

4. Touch base regularly
You should have a system for staying in touch with existing customers because generating repeat business is probably much cheaper to do than converting new customers.
When touching base, consider these approaches to optimise your messaging.
Personalisation – Personalise your marketing messages to make your customers feel valued and appreciated.
Add value – Share useful content rather than only sales messages. For example, you can educate customers on how to use your website to order and make payments. You could share exciting information about new dishes
Use different platforms – Explore different messaging platforms, including social media posts, email newsletters, and physical mail-outs.

5. Take professional photos!
Don’t leave it up to potential customers to visualise what they’ll be getting. Invest in professional photography and showcase your signature dishes. Use only high-quality photos for your brochures, website, menus, and marketing collateral for strong visual impact. Consider which gourmet creations capture your brand and what you want to be known for. Think about which dishes have the most visual appeal, and what your customers demand the most.
When sharing on Instagram and other social media platforms, size your images correctly. Use hashtags so your posts show up in more searches. Mix up your content with different types of photos, videos, and stories.

6. Style your food
Prioritise making your dishes look irresistible for photos and video, as well as the catering event itself. A platter of food that looks scrumptious sells itself by stimulating the senses. Aesthetic appeal can become a compelling value proposition for customers looking to impress with their catering.
Great ways to make a strong visual impact include:
Centrepieces and feature items – Include dramatic centrepieces or feature items in your menus.
Colour – Use splashes of colour and contrasting shades to highlight your dishes.
Odd numbers – Threes, fives, and other odd numbers help underscore items off, whether it’s dumplings, rolls, or meatballs.
Drizzles – Use drizzles of sauces, syrup, and liquified ingredients to bring a little flair to your dishes.
Smaller portions – Smaller portions is the secret to great photos and videos.

7. Standing out from the crowd
Standing out in the foodservice industry comes down to the quality of your service, and how you market that service to the public. From optimising your online presence to the way you brand and photograph your products, there are plenty of strategies you can implement to reach your target customer.

Researched and Compiled by Ng’ash Sage