Consumer behaviour is changing. This is inevitable as the realities and ‘new normal’ of pandemic and COVID-19 conditions are viewed in a more long-term way.
International drink market analysts, IWSR, recently highlighted six macro trends that a shaping the global industry because of COVID-19. These are:
- Digital and Ecommerce
- Sophistication and Premiumisation
- Evolving Traditions
- External Pressures
- Health and Ethical Consumption
- Social Drinking Experiences
The emphasis on Digital and Ecommerce as a macro trend being influenced by the pandemic is an important one for venue operators to understand. This is not limited to an increase in online shopping and delivery services, but the way that consumers are using digital media to inform decisions about where they will go out is also changing.
If you are not making the most of your venues digital presence and understanding this shift in consumer behaviour then you may well be missing out on crucial business.
Food and Beverage Media, publisher of Bars and Clubs, recently hosted the Road to Recovery webinar, which brought together industry leaders and experts to give key advice for venues operating in the current environment.
Bars and Clubs conducted a Q&A session with Trish Barry, Managing Director of Mastermind Consulting who gave some great advice on ‘making the most of your digital presence’.
That advice included making the most of tight budgets, understanding the variety of tools available to help with the digital marketing mix and thinking of your website as an extension of your premise.
In addition to this advice, we also asked Trish for her top tips for venues when it comes to digital marketing, and as always, she delivered some great insights.
Focus on your website and the things that you can control
Trish said: “Make sure you are integrating your communications, so don’t rely on just one mechanism alone to be able to get your message across. It’s often a combination of search and organic traffic and some paid advertising that really completes your marketing mix. So don’t look at things in isolation.”
Importantly don’t go dormant
In the current environment your digital home can easily, be forgetten, but Trish advised: “Use the role of social media to tell your story, to educate, to bring your brand personality to life.
“It may not necessarily give you that immediate conversion at the moment, but consumers want to know what you stand for. They want to know the hygiene practices that you have adopted as you are reopening.
“So there are some great tools that you can leverage and use things like Instagram Live or Facebook Live, to bring the people and the stories to life, in a way that is meaningful for your customer.”
Don’t forget to track and measure
As a digi-geek, I know this is crucial and Trish explained: “Google Analytics needs to be your best friend.”
She added: “The ability to adapt and try things and test them and absolutely use that data to make decisions is really important. Often you will find, particularly when you are only spending a small amount of money, having a really good analytics understanding and looking at the data on Google, gives you a really good way of focusing moving forward and knowing where to put your efforts and what is working.”
There is more great advice from Trish and the team on the Mastermind Consulting website, including How hospitality venues need to market out of COVID-19 and Five digital marketing tools for hospitality venues.
You can also still watch the whole Road to Recovery webinar, to find out more simply register here and you can watch the webinar.
