SEO for Restaurants | James Dooley Interviews Andrea Abbondanza on Restaurant Marketing

James Dooley: SEO for restaurants. Today I am joined with Andrea Abbondanza, who is the worldwide expert in search engine optimisation for different restaurants in different countries. So my first question to you, Andrea Abbondanza, is why did you decide, obviously as an all-round quality SEO, to focus specifically on restaurants?

Andrea Abbondanza: I am Italian. I love food and food is my culture. So I love restaurants and restaurant marketing, and I specialise in SEO. That is why I chose to go into the SEO for restaurants niche, and SEO for restaurants is definitely my brand. I created that five years ago and I started with Australia. So, most of my restaurant clients are in Melbourne, but also in Italy, and we are expanding to the United States now. So, it is a passion for marketing for restaurants, and that is why I chose the niche.

James Dooley: So, with regards to if a restaurant wants to try and get more clients coming in to sell food to and things like that, what would you say is different about doing SEO for restaurants than, let us say, other industries like plumbers or roofers?

Andrea Abbondanza: First of all, restaurants need more bookings, so the main focus is to generate more bookings, more bums on seats, as I say in Australia. So the whole focus, especially local SEO, is to generate more bookings for restaurants. That means more phone calls and more actual bookings, and if they have function rooms, booking more functions. The difference between a restaurant Google Business Profile, let us say, and other businesses is that you have real interactions. So you do not need to fake interactions. You have got real calls and real directions. Usually those Google business profiles do not have to be pushed as much as other small businesses. For example, reviews are natural, directions are natural, and all the signals and local signals are pretty much natural. That is the main difference. Then, of course, the conversation with them is kind of like art sometimes because they do not understand the technical side behind SEO. So the best way to get more bookings for restaurants is local SEO, Google Business optimisation, and then Google Ads. And of course, if they have a good presence on social media, it is also good to actually spend some money and allocate some money to paid social campaigns. If all these elements are there, I guarantee a 40% increase in bookings in 12 months on average for the restaurants that work with me.

James Dooley: Yes. So obviously that is great. So it is normally a split. Let us say there is a big restaurant that comes in. You have got Meta ads, you have got PPC, you have got trying to rank the website, and then you have got the Google Business Profile optimisation. What kind of split would you say is normally being spent with regards to the website, the Google Business Profile, paid ads and then social media ads?

Andrea Abbondanza: Yes. So 80% of the traffic on average comes from Google Business Profile. Then, of course, you need to optimise the website. So schema markup, not just for normal local SEO but also for LLMs, because we also rank restaurants on Gemini, AI Overviews, Anthropic and Perplexity. So 80% of the traffic comes from Google Business Profile, but then, as you know, the website must be optimised to support the Google Business Profile. So advanced schema works really well, inserting keywords, making sure that all the metadata, so title tags and all the descriptions and mentions within the website, are done. I still use keywords in the schema optimisation, and this is the first pillar because when I explain the service to restaurants, I say the entree, so the first dish, is optimising your website and the Google Business Profile. The main dish is Google Ads. So Google Ads is really powerful because it gets you number one straight away, but you need to explain to them that if you stop spending money, then you are not going to rank number one. The third pillar, of course, is social media optimisation because the restaurant industry is really visual. So you need to have a presence. Then the next pillar, of course, is newsletter marketing and then leveraging the audience they have. Newsletters are free and then we leverage the audience. It depends on the size of the restaurant. If they have 30 seats, it is different from them having 200 seats. The restaurant with 200 seats needs to fill the restaurant every day, so you must allocate enough budget. It can be $1,000 a month on Google Ads plus SEO plus all the other elements. But in general, yes, Google Business number one, website, Google Ads, and then support it with TikTok or Meta Ads.

James Dooley: Yes, that makes sense. I mean, obviously for myself, if I am going to book a restaurant as a client, the main two things I am looking at are reviews, but then also images. Do you do any sort of photography or videography for the clients?

Andrea Abbondanza: Yes. If they are local, especially most of my restaurant clients are in Melbourne, so I have got a photographer and a videographer. I am actually looking for partners in different cities. That is probably the hardest partnership to find. But in general, yes, we provide that. If we cannot, we find local influencers or local photographers or videographers that can help us create the visual content for the restaurants. So I always invite restaurant owners to think about the search. So I ask them, what would you do if you go to Sydney, if you go to New York, if you go to Milan and you are looking for a restaurant? What would you do, James Dooley?

James Dooley: I would search for best steakhouse in Melbourne, let us say, if I was in Melbourne.

Andrea Abbondanza: Yes, correct. So the first step is, what platform do you use? And 90% will come to you and say I use Google Maps. So you need to be number one on Google Maps. Then explain to them this is so important, that you get that real estate and you get number one on Google Maps. Then I ask them what are the next elements that you are going to look at. And as you said, reviews, pictures, menu, and eventually pricing. Good reviews are great. Answering bad reviews is also amazing because you cannot have 100% good reviews. So, you need to reply to bad reviews in a way that is compliant, in a way that makes sense for other people to trust you because it is all about trust. First position plus good reviews plus good pictures means you have a much higher chance of being chosen by potential customers.

James Dooley: Yes, that makes sense. Do you do anything with regards to videography, like trying to rank videos in YouTube, or is that not really needed for restaurants?

Andrea Abbondanza: We did. As you know, when you run paid campaigns on Google Ads, you need to upload videos to YouTube. Sometimes those videos also go viral or get some extra traction, but I would not say that YouTube will be the main channel. I would say, especially in Australia and Italy, it is more Instagram. But the point is, for the past few years, all the social media agencies have been selling social media presence as the must-have. But that is not the case because the real bookings come from Google. But when you have a really strong Google presence and Google Ads plus a good social presence, as mentioned, you are going to create more than a 40% increase in bookings in 12 months, guaranteed.

James Dooley: Yes. So if a restaurant is looking now and they want to try and get more bookings, and they might be looking for digital marketing or SEO or it could be PPC, what is the best way of reaching out to someone like yourself who specialises specifically in SEO for restaurants?

Andrea Abbondanza: Yes, if you search for SEO for restaurants on Google, you are going to find me number one. And you can see that we guarantee a 40% increase on average in bookings.

James Dooley: Sounds great. So, anyone who is watching this, if you are a restaurant owner, make sure you reach out to Andrea Abbondanza, click through to the website, and hopefully try to get that 40% increase in bookings. Andrea Abbondanza, it has been an absolute pleasure, and speak to you again soon.