How to Use YouTube to Promote Your Restaurant

YouTube, now famously owned by Google, has rapidly evolved over the past seven years since its inception from a video upload website to a fully-fledged social channel. Of course as we discuss in depth on this blog, it’s these social channels that you, the restaurant owner, can use to promote your restaurant.

Today, we talk about how you can use YouTube to promote your restaurant, connect with customers, and offer a more engaging digital presence than plain old writing and images.

So Why is YouTube Important for Restaurants?

YouTube offers a large potential audience for every business, especially one within the hospitality industry.

Over four billion videos are viewed every day. Over three billion hours of video is watched every month. And YouTube is the second most popular search engine on the Internet; second only to Google, which of course, owns YouTube.

It’s quite an understatement, then, to say YouTube offers a large potential audience for every business, especially one within the hospitality industry.

How do I Add my Videos to YouTube?

It’s incredibly easy to add videos to YouTube, and the best way to do so is by setting up a YouTube channel. Essentially your own online video channel for your restaurant. Here, we walk you through, step by step, the process of creating a YouTube channel for your restaurant.

Step 1

You have to first be a registered member of YouTube. Since Google owns YouTube, if you already have a Google account you will need to sign in to YouTube with that account information by clicking the “Sign In” link at the top right of www.youtube.com

If you don’t already have a Google account, click “Sign In” at the top right corner, then click “Create an Account” at the top right corner.

Step 2

Type in all your details to create your account. Check the Terms of Service box and click “Next Step.” Google will then verify your account.

Step 3

Return to the YouTube home page and click the “Sign In” link if you are not already signed in.

Step 4

Click the “Upload” button at the top of the page to add a video to your account.

Step 5

Click your username at the top right of the screen to be taken to your YouTube Channel. You do not need to sign up for a channel; it is created automatically. Once you are on your channel, make note of the website address so that you will know what address to promote on your restaurant website.

How do I Promote my YouTube Videos

The best way to position your videos in front of your audience is by embedding them within your website. It’s incredibly easy to do so, requiring no more than two minutes of copy/pasting.

To do this, view your video, then click “Share”, then “Embed”. Copy the code provided by YouTube, and paste it inside your web page. By doing this, your potential customers will be able to watch your video on your website.

Promoting Your Restaurant Videos Via Social Media

YouTube by itself is a fantastic social channel, providing an area for viewers to comment on your videos potentially allowing you to interact with your prospects and customers.

With that said, YouTube is also integrated well amongst all other popular social networking platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus. Each video allows viewers to share the video with their friends in all three of these social networks, allowing their friends to watch the video inside Facebook or Google Plus, or via a simple click of a link on Twitter.

Restaurant Video Ideas

Using video to help promote your restaurant should bring an air of personality and interaction to your business. With this in mind, ‘behind-the-scenes’ videos of your kitchen preparing a meal, or your chef cooking his or her favorite dish, will resonate with customers and help you stand out in the mist of competition.

A promotional video showing your busy front-of-house and hard working staff will be a little more corporate, but also rewarding and more interesting than words and images.

A video of customer testimonials will also be an excellent way to engage with your customers and promote your restaurant in a positive light.

Do you use video to promote your restaurant? Do you use YouTube to market your videos? Let us know in the comments below.