http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2015/03/food_digital_marketing_trends_supermarket_recipe_pages_prove_popular_on_pinterest.php

http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2016/06/pizza_hut_revamps_website_to_reflect_new_neon_branding.php#more

Pizza Hut have rebranded their website and mobile compatibility, specifically targeted at millenials and is one of the first methods that pizza hut has implemented within their digital marketing strategy. The website contains bold neon colouring, strong aesthetically pleasing photography and a “fresh tone of voice”.

The business has paired with Amaze, to create their new brand in order to compete with other food retailers and their more modern approach of digital marketing, aiming to boost their brand image and to increase their revenue. Hoping to differentiate from their competitors with this alliance, they managed to maintain their original attributes of being a fun environment whilst implementing consumer personalization (through accounts and social media connections).

http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2016/02/pizza_hut_delivers_goldenpizza_to_super_bowl_viewers.php

Amongst Pizza Hut’s other digital marketing initiatives, they also paired with the Superbowl (unofficially), creating a brand new product specifcally for that occasion, opening them up to a brand new target market. They placed 12 advertisements on the final night of the Superbowl, promoting their #GoldenPizza on television and Twitter with this hashtag. They gave customers the chance to win one of these 50 #GoldenPizza ‘s (with edible gold on top) when they purchased another product.

Burger King also implemented a similar strategy, pairing up with ‘Back to the Future Day’ where they aimed to control their crowded retailers with hover trays, eliminating the problem of minimal seating during busy periods.

http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2015/03/food_digital_marketing_trends_supermarket_recipe_pages_prove_popular_on_pinterest.php

The digital trend of blogging, emailing or digitally supplying consumers with recipes has proven extremely popular on the social media platform Pinterest, as seen in the website above. The research conducted within the article states that the ‘most pinned’ consisted of recipes from food retailer Asda. Supposedly, recipes have always been a popular trend on Pinterest, especially with food retailers, (specifically supermarkets) perhaps food retailers should be promoting their own recipes on Pinterest, blogs and emails.

http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2015/11/marmite_sells_personalised_jars_on_facebook.php

Marmite adopted a similar approach through personalisation by selling personalised jars of their product predominantly amongst their Facebook community, however they did hold a stall in Shepherds bush for a limited time.

27 Restaurant Marketing Ideas: How to Market a Restaurant

Lastly, the website above contains a mixture of marketing methods specifically for restaurants. The digital initiatives they recommend consist of:

• Foody photos (professional/aesthetically pleasing photos of their products)
• Partnering with online loyalty programmes such as Perka
• Geo-Targeted advertisements (e.g. Google Adwords, you can choose a local area to advertise to).
• SM such as Instagram is imperative for food retailers and instagram
• UGC (develops customer engagement)
• Sharing positive press across social media accounts and websites
• Starting a blog (to build your business a community and alternative method of communication)
• Timed Tweets
• Have an online menu!

its all well and good having a strong online presence, however not having an online menu only insinuates the business’ lack of detail, as this is one of the vital pieces of information that consumers will look to, first.

Despite the many advantages of digital marketing, different platforms come with different flaws, so I decided to look into the risky methods of digital marketing for retailers.

http://www.smartinsights.com/internet-marketing-statistics/2015-digital-marketing-stats-the-good-the-bad-and-the-intriguing/

Some negative statistics suggested in the website above are to do with the process of digital marketing, some audiences and the acess of digital marketing, for example:

• 50% of companies are using digital marketing, but they don’t have a plan!
• 83% of consumers reported that they have had a “bad experience with social media marketing”.
• The top three social networks used by B2B marketers are LinkedIn (91%); Twitter (85%); and Facebook (81%). However, just 62% of marketers say that LinkedIn is effective, while 50% say the same for Twitter and only 30% of B2B marketers view Facebook as effective
• Almost half– 48%–of all emails are opened on mobile devices. Yet 39% of marketers say they have no strategy for mobile email, and only 11% of emails are optimized for mobile.

https://econsultancy.com/blog/67596-digital-transformation-in-the-retail-sector-challenges-opportunities/

Econsultancy provides a range of challenges and opportunities within the retail sector, beginning with a statistic of 150bn of retail sales were influenced by digital marketing in 2015 and providing a useful insight into failure being a necessity:

“What is unique to digital transformation is that risk-taking is becoming a cultural norm as more digitally advanced companies seek new levels of competitive advantage.”

http://www.willis.co.uk/documents/Industries/Willis_Retail_Risk_Insight_Digital_Risks_in_the_Retail_World.pdf

Some of the risks that Willis pinpoints can be seen in the academic pdf above.

Willis begins by stating that companies have become quite dependent on the internet, (including areas such as POS, NPD, supply chain) which has led the many risks to impact many businesses, including food retailers and goes on to supply businesses with questions they should ask themselves when managing digital risks:

Although digital marketing has proved successful for many companies, including food retailers, there are risks with each platform chosen and businesses should select those methods that are appropriate. For example, how could a food retailer use email marketing to their advantage? Surely there are more risks associated with emailing consumers rather than benefits?

A good example is one we can see above by Pizza Express, displaying a promotion and an additional code as well as a selection of products available. However, is this only appropriate for larger brands? Would an independent food retailer want to email their customers with similar promotions? From the top of my head, I can only distinctly remember promotions and discounts being available in-store from independents that I have visited, but this could just be down to food retailer preference.

http://www.gorillagroup.com/trending/insight/5-email-marketing-strategies-food-beverage-retailers/

The above website suggests that email marketing is actually a very important stage and it is actually expected from most consumers as long as the content is relevant, personalised to that particular consumer and well-timed. The author also brings up an incredibly valid point which is that past purchase data is crucial with food and beverage retailers, for not only R&D, but is “central to the perception of quality and overall satisfaction”.

The author also provides five strategies applied to food and beverage retailers which are:

• To leverage gifting to foster lift growth
• To proactively communicate delivery information
• To leverage geolocation to improve offline management
• To provide exclusive access to curated experiences
• To personalise content based on past purchases.

http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/32854/10-simply-awesome-examples-of-email-marketing.aspx#sm.000pco8x1dh9e5q11c01v3dah4asd

Hubspot provide multiple examples of email marketing at its best, sent by a variety of businesses, such as paypal who display new services that they provide and a link to their website which provides them more information if the consumer wishes to seek it.

There are also websites and companies that can create prototypes and emails specifically for any type of business. The example below shows Vistaprint and a snippet of their selection solely for food and beverage companies, proving to be quite cost effective therefore available to any business, small or large.

A Mckinsey (http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/marketing-and-sales/our-insights/why-marketers-should-keep-sending-you-emails) survey concluded that email marketing is 40 times more effective that using Facebook and Twitter combined, when acquiring customers.

Food retailers can use email marketing to not only target particular customers about promotions, but they can also include things such as a consumers favourite dish recipe, what’s new with their business/menu/locations etc. However, obviously businesses have to ensure that they aren’t overloading their consumers and potential customers with repetitive emails, mutiple emails a day as they will easily be ignored in the future or potentially marked as spam and never seen again. There are some arguments that food marketing and even mere restaurant menus should have plenty of information about their products, for health and nutritional information – three studies were conducted on this topic and concluded that restaurants with more nutritional information on their food gained more favourable attitudes from their consumers, which led to positive purchase intentions (Kozup et al, 2003).

References

Kozup J. C., Creyer, E. H. & Burton, S. (2003) Making Healthful Food Choices: The Influence of Health Claims and Nutrition Information on Consumers’ Evaluations of Packaged Food Products and Restaurant Menu Items. Journal of Marketing: April 2003, Vol. 67, No. 2, pp. 19-34.

Facebook dominates the social media platform market, with over 1.71 billion users recorded in the second quarter of 2016, so one can assume that the use of this platform would probably help businesses and retailers to not only communicate with their customers, but also boost brand awareness, SEO, access and to produce cost-effective content.

http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/new-facebook-features-help-retailers-connect-ads-store-visits/1398491#

Campaign Live’s article published earlier this year, mentions a new Facebook tool which allows retailers to connect their adverts with store visits (which still prevail over online shopping by a whopping 90%, according to research conducted by eMarketer in 2015).

There are supposedly three new methods for retailers to connect their digital marketing practices with their brick and mortar sales; the first one being “Store Locator”. This consists of a map that enables users to see closest locations of particular store and all of the relevant information such as opening times, website, contact information and travelling time – which will cut out the use of Google Maps seeing as it will supply you with multiple routes, including the shortest.

The second feature is called “Store Visits” where the retailers can measure and view when exposed consumers (the customers who have seen the advert) have actually entered the retailer. Despite how it sounds, it does have one ethical concept (if the consumer remembers) as the consumer must have their location data switched on for this metric to be enabled.

The final feature that is yet to be introduced, is that of “Offline Conversations API” which aims to support retailers and business owners to control and measure their advertisements. This is said to differ to their previous method of measuring by tracking real-time purchases to demographic insights (linking in-store transactions to facebook advertisements).

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1558-Facebook-Twitter-Help-Online-Food-Store-Extend-Its-Reach

Another useful source and concept is shown in the website above, which states how the use of Facebook and Twitter help an American food retailer extend their reach of consumers.

The articale approaches social media driving traffic, stating that when the couple implemented their SM accounts, (after seeking advice from a marketing professional), they proceeded to other approaches, such as SEO  and pay-per-click which all aided in their social media becoming the chief traffic driver to the website, which is considered to be responsible for some sales (though the amount of sales is not measured).

Lastly, a study conducted by Nafarrete et al (2013) deduced from interviews with 18 marketing professionals from Facebook, suggested multiple themes for successful fan to buyer conversion through:

• Building brand awareness
• Engaging fans through conversation with the retailer
• Electronic word of mouth communication
• Promotions
• Consistent communication.

“Facebook retailers may benefit from the study results by incorporating the study findings in their marketing strategy. The implications for positive social change include retailers using their retail Facebook page as a means to build awareness, and promote the support of charitable work to a potential audience of millions”.

References

Nafarrete, R., Malone, T. & Gajewski, A. S. (2013). Abstract. In: A qualitative study of how facebook storefront retailers convert fans to buyers. Minnesota: Walden University.

Electronic word of mouth is a cost-effective type of marketing conducted solely through consumers, similar to some aspects of viral marketing. Shamhuyenhanzva et al (2016) state that this form of communication is one of the most influential drivers of purchase decisions.

Although there have been very few efforts on the research of ewom and food retailers in particular, there is plenty of evidence that supports and suggests ewom can positively affect the brand awareness and brand association of a company (Page and Lebpowska-White, 2002).

Electronic Word Of Mouth presents a window of opportunity for businesses

This website offers a definition of ewom as a window of opportunity for a business and states that ewom is probably the oldest method of marketing to this day, being that consumers will exchange information to other consumers on the internet – the largest market. Ewom has become the new version of viral marketing with the ever-growing size of the internet and its users, consisting of interpersonal communication “which sets it apart from mass-communication such as advertising”. This is an interesting concept, as consumers will often trust other consumers and use other experiences, opinions etc. as a base for their decision making on a brand or even a purchase. As the information processed is through either copy, images or video, the content/communication is seen as genuine and unbiased. However, contrastingly to the traditional word of mouth, ewom can be seen as less trusted by consumers as receivers, because the status and networking of the publisher is used to judge the publisher’s trustworthiness and reliability.

Finding digital influencers for word of mouth marketing

Some good examples of digital influencers are seen in the website above, based around their “reach, relevance and resonance” concept.

http://www.newretailblog.com/electronic-word-of-mouth/

This blog poses some interesting theories and paradigms with regards to ewom and retailers, stating that happy consumers will tell three friends as compared to unhappy consumers who will tell ten. This concept has therefore expanded as consumers will no longer need to see eachother in order to share experiences or opinions on a brand or particular retailer, as they can now electronically communicate between blogs, texts and other platforms of social media for masses to see. This blog is a good starting point to understand the quantity difference between the traditional style of word and mouth, ewom and their contrasting effects on retailers.

References

R. Shamhuyenhanzva., Tonder. E., Roberts-Lombard, M. & Hemsworth, D . (2016). Factors influencing Generation Y consumers’ perceptions of eWOM credibility: a study of the fast-food industry. TandFOnline.  pp. 433-435.

Blogging and vlogging have become a modern part of today’s social media platforms, which has encouraged businesses that use SM as their predominent digital marketing method, to jump on the bandwagon. However, does the process of blogging aid the business positively? Does blogging impact different sectors of business, for example retailers?

Andriole (2010) conducted a study whereby five different companies answered questions regarding web 2.0 and the impact different platforms had on their businesses. All five companies involved in the study, claimed that blogging boosts morale and actually improves productivity. Results also showed companies stating that blogging is  an easy and fast method of communicating between consumers and businesses, as well as blogs being used to vet decisions, codify information and a method to which companies and businesses can gain consumer acceptance, which are all positive strategic drivers. Interestingly, this study also shows businesses using blogs for successful training purposes – improving the business internally rather than focusing on their external consumer audience.

http://www.sproutcontent.com/blog/19-Reasons-Why-Your-Business-Should-Be-Writing-a-Blog:

The above website provides some strong reasons as to why businesses shoud be writing a blog, with some of the key points being that blogging enhances SEO, (collaborating with my two initiaves for my pecha kucha). According to a HubSpot Survey, 60% of companies that blog acquire more customers (though neither the % or amount of customers are mentioned or measured). They also suggest that blogging can share a company’s expertise, create a voice, focuses on content market strategies, businesses can “tell their own story” as well as being an extremely cost effective method of SM marketing.

http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/business-blogging-in-2015#sm.000pco8x1dh9e5q11c01v3dah4asd

This HubSpot survey includes some statistics regarding blogs and businesses, with some of the following factors:

• blogging only costs you your time
• companies that blog receive 97% more links to their site
• blogs have been found to be the 5th most trusted and accurate source
• they suggest that by 2020, customers will manage 85% of their relationship without talking to a human.

https://www.ometria.com/blog/retailer-blogs-that-you-will-love

The link above provides examples of retailer blogs in particular, that have proven their worth to their consumers and followers by targetting each post to their desired market. For example we can see Boohoo’s post below:

References

Andriole, S. J. (2010). What do wikis, blogs, podcasts, social networks, virtual worlds, and the rest do for corporate productivity and management? . Business Impact of Web 2.0 Technologies. 53 ( ), pp. 67-79.