Why Restaurants Should Use Social Photo Sharing

Restaurants are constantly striving to attract new customers and to retain former customers. In our social media intensive world, a great method for achieving these goals is through sharing photos. Pictures speak a thousand words and can be the most direct communicators as they require very little explanation–it is what it is.

That’s where Instagram and Pinterest factor in. These two social media applications are among the highest ranking photo sharing tools. When used correctly, they can prove to promote a positive image and build quite a social buzz for restaurants. Let’s start with Instagram, a simple, user friendly photography studio. Instagram allows for photos to be posted in a virtual portfolio–with or without specialized filters, frames and vignettes–on which followers like and comment. In other words, it’s like Facebook, except only with photos and videos. Restaurants can use this to build and promote a strong image, while attracting followers to their other social media pages as well as Instagram seamlessly connects to Facebook and Twitter.

Restaurants have experienced increased success when sharing portraits of their customers enjoying their meals, photos of the dining atmosphere, pictures of specialty dishes and snapshots of the scenery. This gives the customers a personal sneak preview of the delights they can expect, while extending beyond the reach of commercial advertisements. Through Instagram, restaurants can publicize their special events, unique atmosphere and customer satisfaction through photos, while subsequently staying linked to the major social media outlets, Facebook and Twitter. The recent addition of video sharing through this medium makes short promotional videos (up to 15 sec) available to either public or private followers. Thus, when used wisely, this platform serves as a personal photographer, videographer and publicist.

Pinterest takes a different, yet equally effective, approach to photo sharing. Incorporating a Pinterest within your restaurant’s social media allows for expression of your establishment’s individuality through “pinning.” Pinterest gives restaurants the chance to highlight their strong suits into one unique voice. Pinterest differs primarily in that it uses groups called “boards” to organize photos within a similar theme, whereas organization is irrelevant to Instagram.  Restaurants using Instagram tend to strive for building a public image based on a personal message, restaurants using Pinterest tend to portray a personal message based on a unique image.

Which one should restaurants choose? BOTH. When used creatively and often, these two social media outlets will prove to entice customers visually, keeping their mouths watering in between visits.

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