Information in this blog post was obtained from the National Restaurant Association, Startup Professionals, and Successful Blog magazine.
Social media marketing is the key to success for a consumer products business. Any customer-facing business needs to know its customers. Social media marketers are using analytical tools and social media listening data to understand and develop a rich relationship with their customers.
Even a small company like Cuernavaca’s Grill is using social media to find and develop deep relationships with the customers it desires. According to the National Restaurant Association’s recent blog, “Cuernavaca’s Grill owner finds her voice on social media”
As part of Hispanic Heritage Month, we focus on Nayomie Mendoza’s challenges during the pandemic and success.
COVID-19 helped Nayomie Mendoza find her “marketing” voice on social media. The 24-year-old, who with her family owns and operates Cuernavaca's Grill in Los Angeles, says the pandemic empowered her to reach out to the community regularly, first to let them know the restaurant had temporarily closed, then to tell them it had re-opened to sell takeout and delivery only, and then when the restaurant fully reopened. Using Twitter, Instagram, and Tik Tok, she “talked to” and “friended” customers.
Mendoza and her family emigrated from Mexico to the United States more than 15 years ago. Her mother and father worked to save enough money to open the first Cuernavaca Grill in Long Beach, Calif. It was a success, so they opened a second in downtown L.A. three years ago. Everything was fine—until the pandemic.
The restaurant shuttered for five months, taking a huge toll on everyone including her family and employees. Everyone was fearful about whether the business could recover after being closed so long, but Mendoza’s social media messaging paid off.
As they reopened, the community started to come back. Returning customers, plus a loan in the second draw of the Paycheck Protection Program and a grant from the PepsiCo Foundation’s Juntos Crecemos (Together We Grow) initiative, helped the Mendozas get back on their feet.
Innovation and creativity are keys to success
“COVID-19 affected us tremendously, but also forced us to become more innovative,” she says. “Before the pandemic, we weren’t as active on social media. We resolved to find more opportunities to reach out to the community for the support we needed. Once they showed up, we were so thankful. We knew everyone was fighting tough times and feeling pain. Their support made us grow closer to them, not just as a restaurant in the community, but as a member of the community.”
The labor shortage is still a pain point
There are still pain points, Mendoza says, particularly where labor is concerned. Like most restaurants, Cuernavaca’s Grill is dealing with a reduced workforce, which affects its day-to-day operations. They’ve had to close an extra day during the week and reduce the number of items on the menu because they don’t have enough staff to prepare the food.
“We’re short-staffed and overworked doing everything from cooking to dishwashing to serving guests,” she says. “We’re all wearing different hats and handling multiple tasks, but everyone is being a great sport about it.”
To entice employees, Mendoza has, again, turned to social media, creating innovative 15- and 30-second reels for Tik Tok and Instagram videos that focus on the benefits of working at her restaurant. Despite the challenges, she says she’s thankful to be a Latina businesswoman living the American Dream.
“Three years ago, I was in college, studying business,” she says. “My parents worked hard to get this business up and running. It was very difficult. I wanted to come in and help, try to make things easier for them. It’s been difficult, and as a [minority] woman, it’s made me work even harder!
Mendoza offers 4 tips to other Latinas looking to succeed in business:
Get out of your comfort zone. “I closed myself off for a really long time, but now I embrace posting on social media and going to networking events.”
Market your culture, and business, in positive ways. “Educate and entice people to learn about and experience your culture.”
Be innovative and creative. “Don’t be afraid to spread your message on social media.”
Get involved with your community. “Get to know them, and let them know you. Share your stories. Become ‘friends’ in person and on social media. If they know you, they’ll want to support you.” (Association, 2021)
A great social media presence creates a connective tissue to the business and brand that is long-lasting and loyal. With great social media content, the company and community can make a sticky relationship.
According to Marry Willing of Startup Professionals Musings in the article “7 Ways Your Marketing Needs To Meet Today’s Customers,” these seven ideas help you create long-lasting customer relationships.
“Inbound-marketing Every business I know is intimately familiar with outbound marketing or pushing your message out to customers through email, newspaper, and television advertising. Only a few understand the process and value of inbound marketing, for pulling customers to your brand. In my experience, it’s the fastest way to create trust and authenticity in this age of the consumer. Inbound (pull) marketing is all about convincing potential customers that they found you and have a relationship with you, rather than being accosted by your message at every turn. It works best through effective use of social media, mobile apps, societal initiatives, becoming an influencer, and providing a modern easily-found website with credible customer-focused content.
According to the classic book, “Surfing the Black Wave: Brand Leadership in a Digital Age,” by Emmy Award-winning advertising executive, Daniel Cobb, we are seeing the first of several waves of change in the new world of digital marketing, where consumers are in charge, and they are immune to most marketing influences, except the ones they initiate. It’s a tsunami of change.
In fact, brand leadership in this digital age is far more than just inbound marketing, but both Cobb and I believe it starts there, and sets the tone for the new way to structure your business and set your long-term strategy. Here is our list of key reasons to use inbound marketing as a focus for the next generation of your business and your customers:
Modern customers trust only self-service marketing. Consumers are doing their own research and don’t want to engage a pushy salesperson or message. That means they want to do their own value comparisons, and ideally see confirmation from friends and other customers. Your challenge is to provide credible content, sources, and assistance.
Optimize your content for search engines to get attention. According to relevant reports, 93 percent of online experiences start with a search engine. If you have a consistent and valuable presence on your site and your social media channels, you have a better chance of a higher ranking on search engine result pages.
Participate in the top social media sites for maximum impact. By producing great content for search engines, you also give your social media manager consistent, valuable social fodder. The top social media channels for participation these days include Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter. Don’t just monitor – engage customers. Pull marketing is less expensive than push marketing. Pull marketing costs money, for content creation, website, and social media management. But these costs tend to be lower, start earlier, and can be spread evenly over time. They get conversations started, and initiate word-of-mouth referrals, which are the cheapest by far, and self-perpetuating.
Pull marketing is more effective with consumers. Push marketing effectiveness has dropped sharply with the explosion of technology over the past decade. The problem is simply that consumers now demand to make their own choices, with interactivity and input from friends, about the type of data they receive. That trend is growing every day.
Mobile devices and apps enhance social interactivity. As U.S. smartphone penetration now exceeds 85 percent, and mobile activity averages are well over five hours per day, the advantages of inbound marketing continue to increase. If you are not yet using this channel natively, your brand will be lost from view to key constituents.
Inbound marketing data is more easily measured for ROI. Inbound data, including site page visits, blog reads, and actual orders linked to content are much more relatable to return-on-investment than email blasts, sound-bites delivered, and TV show ratings. More and more automated tools and apps are being delivered to assist in this process.
In fact, I believe inbound marketing, along with social media marketing, are just two of many waves of innovation that we will soon see in this age of the consumer. Your challenge, if you want to be a leader in your business domain, is to stay alert and open to change, rather than a laggard in capitalizing on the next wave. Don’t wait for the tsunami of business change to wash over you.” (Willing, 2021)
Lastly, we need to understand that social media is not the cure-all for the ills that the company deals with. If the company has a bad product or a negatively rated product, that must be fixed first before the social media content plan will take hold and strengthen the relationship between the company and its customers. According to Successful Blog Magazine, some key marketing trends need to be adhered to.
The blog called “6 Important Marketing Trends: data Privacy, Real Time Marketing and More.” When something can become a trending topic in a matter of seconds, it is important for social media marketers to always stay up-to-date on the marketing trends affecting social media.
How to succeed in social media? Monitor and adjust your strategy to these trends:
1. Real-Time Marketing is Redefined
Historically, Real-Time Marketing (RTM) has been described as having a clever response to a trending topic at a moment’s notice. But these days the description is shifting to having “the right content to share with the right audience at the right time.”
This means you have to know your audience, what kind of content gets them engaged, and which posts will get their attention. We have given a lot of advice about RTM – how to "newsjack" upcoming events, and how to prepare content in advance to really adhere to this shifting trend.
2. Privacy is Your Priority
After all privacy and data security scandals, it’s no wonder privacy regulation has become a huge trend over the years.
Hari Ravichandran, the founder of Aura, names data protection one of the biggest business opportunities these days: If you can figure the balance between data protection and data analytics, you will win your niche.
3. Social Media Ad Spending Increases
It’s no secret that Facebook posts have seen organic reach decline in the last year with an updated algorithm. It especially has caused frustration across small businesses due to the limited budget these companies have to work with.
The trick is to provide less sales-related and more industry-related content as organic posts to enhance brand awareness and save your sales and promotional content for the ads. This way you can balance your Facebook checkbook and keep your content in front of your fans. (Utilizing targeting tools to the social audience that you know will engage can help keep these costs down and return on your investment (ROI) high!)
4. Content Marketing Continues to Grow
While content sharing continues to increase, social media marketers continue to struggle with measuring the ROI of such efforts. The ROI of social media or content marketing is notoriously in murky waters. But remember, there isn’t one formula for all; ROI will be calculated differently for every organization. It all depends on the goals of your content. Should the result be the download of a whitepaper or a visit to your website? Establishing these goals before you release the content will help you visualize your results with quantifying value.
5. Video Isn’t Just About YouTube Anymore
Facebook topped YouTube in U.S. desktop views by 1 billion views back in August 2014. And the rumor is that Facebook is giving more value to Facebook videos over YouTube videos in organic reach. According to JSH&A, Vine and Tumblr are also incrementally seeing more video views, suggesting that video is no longer a one-size-fits-all solution across platforms.
6. Facebook is No Longer King of Engagement
Let’s clarify. The point JSH&A wants to point out here is that “A Facebook-first or Facebook-only approach may no longer make sense for some brands.”
This doesn’t mean that ALL brands should abandon sharing to Facebook and start an account on EVERY platform. You have to make informed decisions about where your audience is engaging with the brands they love, and post effective, visual, and valuable content to those platforms.
While the infographic points out that Pinterest, Tumblr, and Instagram have gained more than 10MM visitors last year, it is likely that those users are already present on Facebook.
So what is the moral of the story? Stay visual, stay engaged, stay informed, and you will be able to provide valuable content to the audience you have established a loyal relationship with on social media.” (Troy, 2021)
Social media content marketing is the best way to connect with customers and create an engaging community.
References
Association, R. (2021, September 30). Cuernavaca's grill owner finds her voice on social media. National Restaurant Association. (n.d.). Retrieved October 31, 2021, from https://restaurant.org/articles/news/cuernavacas-grill-owner-finds-social-media-voice.
Troy, J. (2021, September 23). 6 important marketing trends: Data Privacy, real time marketing and more - successful blog -. Successful Blog. Retrieved October 31, 2021, from https://www.successful-blog.com/1/6-important-marketing-trends-data-privacy-real-time-marketing-and-more/.
Zwilling, M. (2021, August 1). Startup professionals musings. Startup Professionals Musings. Retrieved October 31, 2021, from https://blog.startupprofessionals.com/2021/08/.
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