People these days crave entertainment. It’s no longer enough to serve them a scrumptious plate of food and rest assured that what will follow will be a happy – and repeat – customer and a glowing review. Instead, you must jump through hoops and pull out all the stops if you’re going to guarantee the success of your business.
Enter board game cafes – the perfect medley of food and entertainment that’s just what’s needed to retain customers and rise to the top of the food industry. But with competition fast-growing and people being increasingly hard to satisfy, your cafe is going to need some serious promotion.
And what better avenue for cafe marketing than Instagram? Being one of the largest image-sharing apps out there, it caters perfectly to businesses that thrive on visuals – and everyone knows we eat with our eyes before our mouths – helping them gain the appeal needed to succeed.
So, without further ado, here’s how to promote your board game cafe on Instagram – tried and tested:
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Bring the aesthetics
Instagram is all about the looks, and when you’re a cafe you have an even greater responsibility to make your viewers drool just by looking at pictures of your food. Combine that with a great interior that’s cozy and chic all in one, and you’ll have an Instagram feed that’s wanting customers to walk right in!
Make sure your account gives off an accurate sense of what your board game cafe looks like so customers know what to expect. And don’t be afraid to invest in a good photographer, some lighting, and a graphic designer to really make your account pop!
Or you can always take the easier road by designing your cafe’s posts yourself! Don’t be scared, it’s a breeze to do with tools such as PosterMyWall which has tons of stunning customizable templates for Instagram that you can use to show off your menu, your cafe’s interior, or even to promote new board games and tournaments that you’re hosting. The tool gives you complete freedom when it comes to posting, sizing and customization – a great deal especially given the low price that it comes for!
Pick an Influencer – or two!
Influencers have changed the Instagram landscape for good. They’ve curated an almost cult-like following which has given them the power to determine which brands fail and which come out on top, and if you want your board game cafe to succeed then some Instagram influencer promotion is a must in the books!
As a cafe operating in a niche that’s bound to be popular with various demographics, you have certain leverage when it comes to selecting influencers to work with. Some good tips for you might be to go for influencers popular to your locality, as this will help drive traffic to your account that consists of people who could actually come on down to the cafe for a game and a bite.
As for the nature of your partnership with the influencer, it could range from anything such as hosting a giveaway to holding a joint Instagram live to an exclusive takeover of each other’s accounts – basically anything that will help push up the numbers on your board game cafe’s account.
Game night!
What’s a board game cafe without a legendary game night? Sure to bring in crowds, game nights are a great way to promote your board game cafe. But you must be wondering what Instagram has to do with all this, right? Well, where else to advertise your game nights other than your Instagram account?
Once you’re through with all the logistics and finalized the details it’s time to put the word out. In other words, it’s time to get creative on PosterMyWall as you make use of their social media marketing tools to create stunning visuals ranging from game night posters to Instagram posts advertising your latest games and tournaments. Make sure to choose designs that pop and portray your fun-filled zest through the screen, and once you see how budget-friendly it is you’ll be designing in peace anyways!
Create a story
One of the best things about Instagram is how versatile it is, and you should be making use of all that it has to offer! Did you know that Instagram stories have a much greater audience reach than posts? Use this to your advantage by posting daily stories shifting between showing live content from your board game cafe to sharing menu updates, game tournaments, and even engaging with your followers through polls and questions.
Study your user analytics and try to post stories at times when online traffic is high – you can even take care of this by scheduling stories in advance or making a calendar for yourself as a reminder. All that matters is that your stories should be seen, and you can always give them the little occasional sponsored boost if needed.
And what you have now are some tested Instagram marketing strategies designed to promote your board game cafe until it comes out on top. Of course, while these serve as a great starting point, there’s much more to marketing and promotion and you shouldn’t be afraid to take the leap!
