Two-thirds of US consumers intend to spend the same or more on dining out.

Naturally, as 2027 approaches, this is a useful time for restaurant owners to review which customers they want to attract, which channels deserve attention, and how they’ll measure their restaurant marketing.

If you’re also in planning mode, this restaurant marketing guide gives you 15 practical strategies you can apply in the year ahead.

What Is Restaurant Marketing in 2027?

Restaurant marketing is the process of identifying customer demand, directing it toward available restaurant capacity, such as covers, delivery slots, or event bookings, and converting that demand into orders, reservations, and repeat visits.

It combines targeting, channel selection, offers, timing, and performance data to match what the restaurant can sell with the customers most likely to buy and increase revenue over time.

Which Restaurant Marketing Strategies Matter in 2027?

A. Decide Which Customer Demand You Want to Win

1. Choose 2 to 3 dining occasions you want to own

Start with occasions, because an audience such as “people who like Italian food” is too broad to guide a restaurant marketing plan.

Choose two or three situations where you want to become a stronger option in your local market, such as weekday lunch for office workers, family dinner on Friday, date-night reservations, late-night delivery, weekend brunch, or private dining.

For each occasion, write down who is buying, when they buy, what matters to them, and what may stop them from choosing you.

For example, a fine dining restaurant targeting anniversaries may need to focus on service, atmosphere, food quality, and reservation ease, while a quick-service restaurant targeting weekday lunch may care more about price, convenience, pickup time, and location.

A successful restaurant marketing plan requires target audience analysis and local engagement. Once those occasions are clear, you have a much stronger filter for the marketing decisions that follow.

2. Audit 5 local competitors against those occasions

Pick five direct competitors targeting the same occasion and review them the way a customer would. Check Google Maps, their website, social media accounts, accurate menus, promotions, reviews, delivery apps such as Uber Eats, and their reservation or ordering flow.

Compare prices, hero menu items, hours, high quality photos, ratings, delivery services, offers, and recurring complaints. Then ask three questions:

• What are they doing better?
• Where are customers unhappy?
• What are they failing to offer?

Perhaps several restaurants serve office workers, yet none offers reliable 15-minute pickup. Maybe every nearby restaurant promotes dinner heavily while weekend lunch gets little attention. Those gaps give you something concrete to work with.

If you want to take the exercise further, use a restaurant SWOT analysis to examine your strengths, weaknesses, market opportunities, and competitive threats. Your competitor audit should still finish with one or two specific gaps you can act on.

B. Capture People Who Are Already Searching

3. Fully optimize your Google Business Profile

Nearly 90% of customers research a restaurant online before visiting. That makes your local search presence one of the first places to look when you want to improve discovery.

Open your business profile as a customer and work through it from top to bottom.

Check the restaurant name, category, location, phone numbers, website, accurate hours, holiday hours, menu, reservation link, pickup and delivery options, and attributes such as outdoor seating. Consistent business information across directories boosts visibility.

Then check how your restaurant appears in local search results and on Google Maps. Add recent photos of your exterior, dining area, food, and drinks. Keep your menu, prices, and business information up to date, and check the public profile after major changes.

Finally, test every action button. A customer looking for directions, a reservation, or an order should reach the correct destination easily.

4. Fix conversion leaks across your website and menu

Open your website on a phone and use it as a first-time customer. Find the menu, check the prices, confirm the location and hours, then try to place an order or make a reservation. A restaurant’s website should be mobile-friendly and feature clear menus and hours.

Fix anything that slows those actions down. Replace hard-to-read PDF menus where possible. Remove outdated menu items and prices. Make the main Order or Reserve action easy to find. Use professional photography for signature dishes and drinks.

Check the ordering path as well. If a combo requires a drink order, make sizes and substitutions clear. If customers move through unnecessary screens before checkout, shorten the process. The aim is a seamless experience from search to menu to checkout.

5. Build a repeatable review-management process

Make reviews part of a regular process: ask, monitor, respond, categorize, fix, and reuse. Ask for feedback after a positive interaction, and monitor Google, Yelp, delivery apps, and other third party platforms that contribute meaningful traffic or orders.

Restaurants should respond to every review to build trust. Responding to reviews can improve search engine rankings.

Keep review responses specific to what the guest said, then tag recurring issues under categories such as slow service, food quality, order accuracy, packaging, price, or staff behavior. If five reviews mention late orders, trace the delay to its source and fix it.

Positive reviews can also support future marketing. With permission, reuse strong comments on your website, in social posts, or in email so new guests can hear from regular customers as well.

C. Create a Social System Your Team Can Maintain

6. Choose no more than 2 priority social platforms

Consider platforms based on your target audience, local reach, content capability, and team capacity. For instance, Instagram or TikTok may suit restaurants with strong food visuals and short-form video opportunities.

Facebook can help when local groups, families, events, and neighborhood recommendations matter. YouTube Shorts can make sense if you already create vertical video and can repurpose it efficiently.

Give yourself one primary platform and one secondary platform for the next 90 days. Decide what you will publish, how often you can maintain the standard, and what action you want diners to take.

You also need enough time to engage customers through comments and messages. Add more posts when your current publishing rhythm is working and your team has the capacity to support it.

7. Create 4 repeatable social content series

A simple way to make planning easier is to stop stepping into a new week with a blank content calendar. Create four recurring content series around:

• Food can cover signature dishes, daily specials, menu items, preparation, or ingredients.
• People can feature chefs, staff, suppliers, or regular customers.
• Proof can include user generated content, reviews, celebrations, and customer favorites.
• Current activity can cover events, seasonal menus, and promotions.

Consistent social media posts increase customer engagement. Short-form video content is favored by social media algorithms.

Match the format to the idea. A plating sequence may work well as a Reel or YouTube Short. A tasting menu may need clear static images that customers can stop and read.

Plan the shots before production so one focused photography and video session can give your team material for several weeks.

8. Create a customer-content and local-creator process

Add simple prompts on receipts, table cards, or post-order messages asking guests to tag the restaurant. When someone shares a strong photo or video, ask permission to reuse it on your channels. Designing for shareability increases user-generated content creation.

User-generated content influences purchasing decisions for 79% of consumers. In fact, micro-influencers have 5,000–100,000 followers and drive action.

For creators, shortlist people whose audience overlaps with your target customers and location. Review their recent posts, comments, and local relevance before agreeing to a collaboration.

Then make the activity trackable with a specific link, reservation code, or offer when appropriate so you can connect the partnership with orders, reservations, or foot traffic.

Local businesses can also make useful partners. A nearby theater, office complex, gym, school, or event organizer gives you access to a highly relevant local audience. Look for businesses serving people who have a natural reason to visit your restaurant.

D. Use Email to Bring Customers Back

9. Build your email list at high-intent touchpoints

Acquiring a new guest costs significantly more than retaining one. That’s why your restaurant marketing plan should include a clear way to reach customers after the first visit or order – emails can help with that.

Collect email permission when customers are already interacting with your restaurant. Useful collection points include direct-order checkout, reservations, loyalty program signup, Wi-Fi access, QR ordering, digital receipts, and your website.

Keep the signup simple and tell customers what they’ll receive. “Get new menu launches and member offers by email” gives someone a clearer reason to subscribe than a generic newsletter invitation.

Building a customer database through email and SMS increases retention. If a large share of your orders comes through delivery apps or other third party platforms, check which customer information you can access and use with permission.

Over time, you want to grow a customer base you can communicate with directly.

10. Segment customers using ordering behavior

Once you have usable customer data, divide it into groups you can act on. Begin with first-time customers, repeat customers, high-value customers, loyalty members, lapsed customers, and customers linked to a specific location or ordering pattern.

Use order count, last order date, spend, location, and order type to create the groups. A first-time customer may receive a second-order offer. A customer who hasn’t ordered for 60 or 90 days may enter a win-back campaign.

For regular customers, use ordering history, preferences, or loyalty activity to choose relevant offers. Personalized communication fosters customer loyalty.

Restolabs’ 2026 Online Ordering Behaviour Report gives us a useful benchmark here.

Across more than 4 million orders processed between March 2025 and March 2026, 38.2% of customers placed more than one order within a six-month lookback period. The median interval between repeat orders was 8.9 days.

Compare that benchmark with your own reorder pattern before deciding when follow-up and win-back messages should begin.

11. Automate the emails that should not depend on memory

With the segments in place, automate communication around predictable customer moments. You can identify a welcome email, a post-order message, birthday or special-occasion communication when you have that information, a loyalty milestone, and a win-back email.

Use your normal reorder pattern to set the timing. Keep each email focused on one next action, such as leaving feedback, trying a new menu item, redeeming a reward, or placing another order. Programs rewarding repeat behavior drive better customer retention.

Review these automations every quarter. Look at clicks, orders, repeat visits, and unsubscribes alongside open rates. If a sequence doesn’t lead customers toward the intended action, adjust the timing, offer, audience, or message.

E. Run Campaigns Against Specific Revenue Goals

12. Build every campaign around one objective and offer

When you need restaurant marketing ideas, start with the business problem you want the campaign to address.

Maybe Tuesday dinner has weak foot traffic. Perhaps weekday lunch is underperforming, direct orders are low, private dining needs more inquiries, or you want more repeat visits from new guests. Write a short campaign brief with six fields:

• Objective: What should change?
• Audience: Who do you want to reach?
• Offer: What are you asking them to buy?
• CTA: What should they do next?
• Distribution: Which channels will carry the campaign?
• Target: What result will define success?

For example, a restaurant near office buildings could target office workers with a weekday lunch bundle, promote it through its Google Business Profile, email list, local groups, and paid social, then measure lunch orders and average order value.

Using seasonal promotions keeps offerings fresh and attracts customers. Community marketing builds goodwill and local awareness for restaurants.

F. Plan, Track, and Improve Marketing Every 90 Days

13. Build a rolling 90-day marketing calendar

Plan the next quarter in one working document.

Add operational dependencies to the same calendar. If a campaign requires menu changes, packaging, additional staff, different delivery services, or more outdoor seating, schedule those requirements before the launch date.

If you work with an agency or outside restaurant marketers, assign one person to each campaign and one measurable outcome.

14. Set up measurement before the campaign launches

Decide how you will measure a campaign while you are planning it. That may mean a promo code, UTM parameters, a campaign landing page, reservation-source tracking, a unique ordering link, or a baseline for orders and revenue.

For paid campaigns, record spend, attributed orders or reservations, and acquisition cost. For email, track clicks and orders alongside opens. For social media, compare menu visits, reservations, or completed orders with reach and engagement.

Tracking advertising effectiveness helps in optimizing marketing strategies. Record the baseline before launch as well. If weekday lunch currently averages 70 orders, write down 70. That number gives you something concrete to compare against when the campaign ends.

15. Review performance monthly and move the money

Hold one monthly marketing review with the people responsible for spending and execution.

Keep the scorecard focused on metrics that help you make decisions: orders, reservations, average order value, direct-order share, repeat rate, campaign revenue, acquisition cost, loyalty participation, and channel-specific customer actions.

Then decide what to keep, increase, change, or stop. Compare channels using the customer behavior and revenue they produce. A smaller channel that generates regular customers may be more cost effective than one producing large volumes of low-converting traffic.

Your top priority is to connect marketing efforts with customer behavior and money coming back into the business.

Where Should Restaurants Use AI in Marketing?

AI is most useful when it removes repetitive work or helps you process information faster. For example, take one campaign brief and use an AI tool to create first drafts for an email, social posts, a short-form video script, and variations for different customer groups.

Your team can then check the tone, menu facts, prices, dates, and offers before publication. AI can also help you work through larger volumes of information.

Use appropriate, permissioned data or anonymized review exports to group recurring complaints, summarize campaign results, identify possible customer segments, or find patterns worth investigating.

Restolabs’ AI marketing guide also covers content creation, social planning, campaign targeting, and segmentation as practical restaurant use cases.

Be careful with customer information. Check how an AI provider handles data before sharing anything sensitive. Menu facts, prices, allergen information, serious complaints, and customer-specific decisions also need human review.

Use AI for repetitive execution and first-pass analysis, with your team responsible for final judgment and factual accuracy.

How Can Restolabs Support Your Restaurant Marketing Plan in 2027?

Once the restaurant marketing plan is clear, the next step is giving customers a clean path from marketing to ordering and giving your team enough data to understand what happened afterward.

Restolabs provides the direct online ordering infrastructure behind that process.

Orders can flow through a branded ordering system and connect with POS systems, payment gateways, and delivery partners, while customer and order information remains available for reporting and future marketing decisions.

That connection also needs to hold up when order volume increases.

Weston B of Eli’s Coffee Shop describes Restolabs’ “ability to integrate easily with our POS and Loyalty platforms and process a high number of orders without issues” as part of the restaurant’s positive experience with the platform.

As you plan for 2027, decide how much of the customer journey you want to manage through your own ordering channels and which external platforms will support the rest of your marketing.

Schedule a demo with Restolabs to see how the platform can support your 2027 restaurant marketing plan.