{"id":5185,"date":"2018-02-12T07:39:24","date_gmt":"2018-02-12T12:39:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/?p=5185"},"modified":"2019-04-16T16:09:07","modified_gmt":"2019-04-16T20:09:07","slug":"menu-descriptions-matter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/","title":{"rendered":"Functional versus emotional descriptions in restaurant menus"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We all know the power of storytelling in marketing, especially when it comes to adding personality, emotion, and memorability to your brand message.&nbsp; Since we do work with restaurant clients, and we got to thinking&#8211; should we add storytelling into menu item descriptions?&nbsp; We realized that this was bit of a radical idea, since we had only seen a couple of instances of stories being told in menu items.&nbsp; So, we decided to proceed with caution and get quantitative data on the potential impact.<\/p>\n<p>We picked 3 menu items, Street Tacos, Classic Margarita, and Cajeta (a dessert) to describe in two formats: 1) functional and 2) as a story.&nbsp; We purposefully kept the length of copy for each option as similar as possible. Here&#8217;s the copy we used for each:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-5186\" src=\"http:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Screen-Shot-2018-02-08-at-1.30.00-PM-1024x903.png\" alt=\"Menu description copy \" width=\"803\" height=\"709\" srcset=\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Screen-Shot-2018-02-08-at-1.30.00-PM-1024x903.png 1024w, https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Screen-Shot-2018-02-08-at-1.30.00-PM-300x264.png 300w, https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Screen-Shot-2018-02-08-at-1.30.00-PM-768x677.png 768w, https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Screen-Shot-2018-02-08-at-1.30.00-PM.png 1132w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 803px) 100vw, 803px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>What we learned:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Across the board the <strong>functional descriptions<\/strong>:\n<ul>\n<li>Were <strong>preferred<\/strong> by a very wide margin (70%+).&nbsp; &nbsp;Driving the respondents preference were comments like, &#8220;I want to know the ingredients used and how it&#8217;s prepared.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Drove the perception that the menu item is <strong>high quality<\/strong> (70%+)<\/li>\n<li>Had higher <strong>purchase intent<\/strong> (60%+)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>storytelling descriptions<\/strong> had a strong impact on <strong>uniqueness<\/strong>.&nbsp; Respondents felt that the storytelling versions made them think that the menu item is unique to the restaurant (40%+).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Implications:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Be descriptive in menu copy within the space you have.&nbsp; Let guests know if ingredients are locally sourced, hand picked, fresh, made from scratch, etc., as opposed to just listing them.&nbsp; Also, describing how the dishes are prepared helps them visualize the item and guides them in their ordering choices.<\/li>\n<li>Utilize storytelling to help convey the brand on the menu, on your website, in social. And you can use it sparingly for unique or signature menu items if they have a compelling backstory.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If you&#8217;d like to know more about our research or our work in restaurant marketing, please <a href=\"https:\/\/response.agency\/contact\">reach out<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We all know the power of storytelling in marketing, especially when it comes to adding personality, emotion, and memorability to your brand message.&nbsp; Since we&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":5187,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,118,679],"tags":[637,649],"class_list":["post-5185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advertising","category-response-marketing-category","category-food-and-beverage","tag-restaurant-marketing","tag-storytelling","post-grid"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/chicken-tacos.jpg","yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v15.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Storytelling on restaurant menus? We explore what works and what doesn&#039;t in our research.\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Functional versus emotional descriptions in menus\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Storytelling on restaurant menus? We explore what works and what doesn&#039;t in our research.\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Response Marketing\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-02-12T12:39:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-04-16T20:09:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/chicken-tacos.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"980\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"490\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Carolyn Walker\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/\",\"name\":\"Response Marketing\",\"description\":\"We Help Ambitious Brands Punch Above Their Weight\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/#primaryimage\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/chicken-tacos.jpg\",\"width\":980,\"height\":490,\"caption\":\"chicken tacos\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/\",\"name\":\"Functional versus emotional descriptions in menus\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/2018\/02\/menu-descriptions-matter\/#primaryimage\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-02-12T12:39:24+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-04-16T20:09:07+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/responseblog.wpengine.com\/#\/schema\/person\/f45f40bd7090d850b8c293abdd55780d\"},\"description\":\"Storytelling on restaurant menus? 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