You heard that right and it still holds bearing to this day. It is the bitter pill that some restaurants have difficulty swallowing. Proper Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can turn your website into a powerhouse for your business. Your site can rank on the first page of a search engine results pages, attract tons of potential customers, and establish your brand as a trustworthy source of information. SEO is important because it helps your business tap into a vast trove of potential customers. Google estimates that there is an average of 2.8 million Google searches every second. There are hundreds of thousands of people searching for products and services every second. Solely being present on the internet isn’t enough to tap into that market. Less than 10% of people click past the first page of search results, so if you don’t show up on the coveted first page, your website is woefully underperforming.

Still not convinced? Here are more benefits why you shouldn’t scrimp on SEO for your restaurant.

INCREASE YOUR TAKE OUT ORDERS

Fifty seven percent (57%) of customers order their food online. It can be via a third party app or the most convenient of all, Google. If your website has an online delivery system in it, you can take advantage of SEO to further increase your sales. If your restaurant doesn’t have one, this could be the opportunity to have one as you can tap into younger and tech-savvy customers who might want to try your offerings.

GAINING TRUST AND POPULARITY

Eighty four percent (84%) of people online read other people’s comments and reviews before trying things out or making a purchase. And restaurants are no exceptions. Google rewards the coveted first-page spot to those who get the raring customer reviews and this would increase your website’s visibility especially for first-time diners.

TOP OF THE RESULTS

Blame our culture’s extreme inclination with Google because 85% of consumers search for local businesses online. And what is sad is most of the people searching don’t get the results they want because some or most of the small business have no or poor SEO. And for restaurants, that is bad news because you just lost a huge sum of your potential customers. SEO keeps you afloat and helps you be seen at times when people want to discover you, especially with people new around your city specifically tourist who might want to try the local cuisine but have no idea where to start. With SEO, the search engines can easily point them to your business.