Two types of promotion events by restaurants

Restaurants need the social media for greater coverage. An SEO powered blog with sizeable number of followers is like a gold mine. It is easy publicity and direct access to potential customers. Two basic techniques used by restaurants for publicity with  food bloggers.

Bloggers Event or Bloggers Table

This type is basically an event organized by a restaurant where many bloggers are invited. This event is mostly managed by another firm who specializes in organizing such events. There is a lot of emailing and calling up to be done to get the bloggers together. And many of the restaurants might not have the expertise or the resources to do so. Such events are costly in nature. Hence restaurants have to check the benefits accrued. Also when such events are held, the restaurant needs extra space so as not to disturb the other customers. A few other restaurants organize such events during off hours. This way the kitchen and staff can only focus on the bloggers.

Direct Invitation to reviewers

Restaurant owners or agency working on their behalf will directly contact bloggers or reviewers and invite the blogger for a meal. Bloggers or reviewers who are interested in accepting invitations prominently display their contact options on their blog. In rare cases the terms and conditions of the reviewers are also penned down on the Contact Us page. Here are a couple of examples.

How do bloggers or reviewers approach restaurants

A full time blogger invests lot of time in writing an article. The event has to be attended. Covered in minute detail. Nothing can be missed. It is a kind of responsibility towards the readers. Covering the social media or social network is a task in itself. Finishing an article can sometimes take days. So what does a blogger get in return for all that time invested. Primary method is blog monetization. The other way of compensation is by the goodies or freebies offered by the hosts. Gift hampers, take aways, coupons or vouchers and so on. Also if a reviewer informs the restaurant in advance, there is an opportunity for the restaurant to present more info about the restaurant which the blogger can cover in the article.

But looking at the other end of the spectrum, many bloggers or reviewers simply do not accept these options. Here is one such example.

As I began my blogging journey, I was impressed by what was written on the About page of this website. Similar site policy has been followed by The Time Lock. We actually go one step ahead and have no contact details on the website. 100 plus reviews and two years later, we can proudly say that not a single review is sponsored. We still visit a restaurant without intimating them in advanced. And even after paying the bill, we do not tell anyone that this visit is going to be followed up with a review.

Another reason for this approach is that maybe the restaurant owner does not want to sponsor out meal wholeheartedly, but just because of the review, he or she might do it reluctantly. And all this while the owner will be extremely friendly, but in actuality we are meeting for the first time. (and probably the last!)

A blogger getting all the attention will eventually be the center of attraction. Not a good proposition when the nearby tables are occupied by other customers.

The Time Lock has reached to top of leader board in Delhi NCR.

Restaurant review invitations are pouring in. But The Time Lock has maintained a strict site policy all this while. And I find no reason for it to change now.

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What is the issue of site title with spaces

A domain name for the Website called ‘The Verge’ reads http://www.theverge.com

The site title for this website is ‘The Verge’ but the domain name is without spaces.

The problem is not there for single word websites like our sister website http://soonev.com, again single word. So that single word becomes the site title and the SEO title too.

The problem cropped up when we had domain which was not figuring in the search results. The website in question is

https://thetimelock.photos

If Google search was keyed as ‘thetimelock’ without spaces, then the website used to be visible on the top of google search results. The meta tags of the website were as follows.

So if you note in the above picture, the site title is being reflected as ‘thetimelock’ without spaces. Same was picked up by Google Crawlers.

This was done because of the following settings for the General Settings in WordPress and the General Settings in Yoast SEO plugin.

But because the site name was without spaces, Google was only picking up the single word as ‘thetimelock’.

If Google Search was being made for terms like ‘timelock’ or ‘ the time lock’ or even ‘the time lock’ this website was not featuring in search results.

The solution for site name with and without spaces

Whatever site name is given in the General Settings is picked up an honored by Google Crawlers. So within no time there was a change in Google search results. Here is what settings were changed.

Step One : Changing General Settings in WordPress

The site title has been changed to ‘The Time Lock’

Step 2 : Changing General Setting in Yoast

Yoast setting are flexible that there can be an alternate name which Google will consider. There is alternate name we have fixed is ‘thetimelock’ without spaces. Here you can even tinker with the Website Name to confuse Google. But in turn you can even cover spelling mistakes inadvertently keyed in by users. Behavior of such setting however is not known and is not predictable too.

Once these two settings are changed, here is what we meta tags search yields.

Here is what is shown in Google Search Results for various combos.

For ‘The Time Lock’ Google is very clear. It will take time for Google, but eventually it has honored the change and the confirmation that there is another well known product in the market earlier.

For Google Search results for the word ‘thetimelock’ again Google is very accurate and the website result is right on the top of the page.

Even the image results are right at the top.

Lastly for various terms like ‘time lock’ or ‘timelock’, google is coming quite close. Results will improve after some time.

With regards to spelling mistakes inadvertently keyed by visitors to Google. That point has to be studied separately.

Which type of blog name do you have. It is with or without spaces. Does it figure in Google results properly. What about the other blogging platform, Blogger by Google.

Do put in your experience in comments.

Also note the website used for the settings is as shown below.

https://thetimelock.photos/

Save

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