In 2014, McDonald’s decided to lean toward Indian culture and shook up their menu to be on level with the Indian taste. They removed all burgers made with beef or pork and created visible and separate sections for veg and non-veg burgers. They introduced Mc Aloo Tikki burger, Paneer burger, etc., added with Indian masalas and sauces to become a fan favourite.
Amazing, right? While this is public knowledge to most people, there’s something else that McDonald’s Digital Marketing Strategies have completely changed to appeal to an Indian audience – their marketing strategies!
McDonald’s campaigns run in India are ideated and executed according to the Indian audience and what they would like. Naturally, this can be of great help to marketers in creating their digital marketing strategies.
Hence, we have written this blog to discuss their digital marketing strategies and help marketers like you and me learn from their mistakes and take inspiration from their success.
Let’s jump right in!
About McDonald’s
McDonald’s defines itself in three phases – Good food, good people, and good neighbours.
They have sworn to provide good food served by good people and ensure that their business does not affect the community or their neighbours.
Hardcastle Restaurants Pvt. Ltd. (HRPL) owns and operates McDonald’s restaurants throughout West and South India. It has been the brand’s guardian since its creation in 1996 and has a Master Franchisee connection with McDonald’s Corporation USA.
HRPL is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Westlife Development Limited (WDL), a Bombay Stock Exchange-listed firm. In West and South India, it operates over 300 McDonald’s outlets in 42 cities and 11 states.
By unveiling the unique, digitally-enabled ‘Experience of the Future (EOTF) Restaurants in 2017, McDonald’s India changed the game for Quick Service Restaurants in India. With self-ordering kiosks, digital menu boards, gaming tabs, air chargers, and table service, these modern and contemporary eateries raise the bar on the customer experience.
They already have more than 50 EOTF eateries in more than five cities. Our customers adore the new format, and we’re working hard to expand it across our market.
What Can Marketers Learn From McDonald’s Digital Marketing Strategies?
1. Posting Regularly/Scheduling Posts
McDonald’s social media accounts are always updated. They post often and keep their audience engaged at all times. You’ll find one McDonald’s post for every occasion—a festival, a national event, or a boring Monday—and McDonald’s always finds a way to make it look fun and unique!
2. Posting Information that is relevant to their Target Audience
From introducing a separate menu for their Indian customers to having a separate social media page for them (even for different parts of India—West and South, East and North), McDonald’s always ensures that their information is relevant to their target audience. They know when to post what and how to communicate it. This is one of the most important aspects that marketers should learn from.
Here is the one of the great example from McDonald’s Instagram Post on April Fool’s day!
3. Customers & Followers are Engaged in Both Fun and Customer Service Manner
If you hop on to McDonald’s Instagram account, you’ll find all kinds of posts that engage the audience and give them a laugh and the ones that sell their product and advertise their services. It is important always to have the perfect balance of these kinds of posts.
4. They Incorporate Current and Seasonal Events
A personal favourite element of McDonald’s strategy is its creative takes on different events and festivals. The number of ways the McD logo has been utilised to convey different things is unreal. Let’s take a look at some of their MANY creatives:
…and we could go on, but you got the point right.
5. Using a Warm, Amusing, and Helpful Tone of Voice for the Brand
The primary aim of social media is to talk to your audience and interact with them. McDonald’s uses a warm tone that makes the readers feel like they’re one among them when talking to their audience. Here are some of McDonald’s captions as examples:
- We’re wondering how she got the #PerfectTiming to bowl her father out into ordering her favourite McSpicy Fried Chicken.😳
- Tag the brave ones in your gang who can dare to pick the last fry in the pack.
- Big Festivities. Big Families. Big Meals. Of course, with room for more.
- Ramzan Mubarak!
6. Taking Advantage of Each Platform’s Unique Characteristics and Customising Content Across Channels
Most brands we have studied generally post the same images and videos on all social media platforms. However, McDonald’s ensures the use of different types of content on each platform. They have realised that each platform is different and has a different set of audiences, so the posts, too, should be different.
McDonald’s Digital Marketing Strategies
1. McDonald’s Social Media Marketing Strategies
McDonald’s has ensured that its marketing strategies involve a strong presence on social media platforms. All of its recent campaigns strongly consider social media platforms and include the preferences of their respective target audiences.
Social media platforms are discussion forums for McDonald’s. They allow them to engage in quick and short-term conversations with visitors, fans, and critics. Furthermore, eye-level communication that is transparent, approachable, and “unobtainable”-whether by chat, post, tweet, or other means—pays off in terms of positive brand perception.
According to the findings, practically any company issue may be successfully posted on the channels as long as it is sufficiently relevant, suitable for the channel, and prepared for the target group; the only difference in channel handling is in this preparation.
McDonald’s Instagram Marketing Strategies:
Instagram has become increasingly important for McDonald’s in reaching out to a younger demographic since the end of 2017.
McDonald’s has two Instagram pages;
- One – Official Instagram account of McDonald’s India (West and South) and
- Two – Official Instagram account of McDonald’s India (North & East) 🍟
As visible from the above screenshots of McDonald’s Instagram Accounts,
McDonald’s followers in the West and South Instagram accounts are more (213k followers) than in North and East Instagram Accounts (45.8k followers). The follower base of McDonald’s is growing fast.
In light of the Corona pandemic, concerns connected to safety and cleanliness can be noticed on McDonald’s Instagram page. They have included their concepts and measures in conversations with users.
Furthermore, they routinely and consistently communicate their contactless touchpoints (McDrive, McDelivery, ordering, and payment through an app) on Instagram. Their audience has enjoyed and appreciated these regular reminders and trust-building contacts.
McDonald’s Facebook Marketing Strategies:
McDonald’s Facebook network continues to be larger and more active than the average. Hence, they treat it equally while framing their strategies. Despite its decreasing relevance, Facebook remains the most popular communication channel for McDonald’s. This is due, in part, to the technical commenting options.
McDonald’s Facebook page for West and South and North and East, respectively.
McDonald’s Twitter Marketing Strategies:
McDonald’s maintains its friendly and warm tone even on Twitter. They still market their products and do so very subtly and in a friendly way. McDonald’s also has two Twitter accounts – one for West and South India and another one for North and East India;
McDonald’s YouTube Marketing Strategies:
McDonald’s has used YouTube to achieve many short-term and long-term goals to increase their sales and brand awareness. Here are the results McDonald’s could get out of YouTube:
- In the short term, YouTube helped McDonald’s drive up to 37% more sales than web TV.
- In terms of long-term impact, an average YouTube campaign generated a brand impact of 138%.
McDonald’s also has two YouTube accounts – one for West and South India and another one for North and East India;
2. McDonald’s SEO Strategies
Website Overview:
McDonald’s website has a “great” domain authority of 54.
The website allows you to pick an option based on your location and guides you accordingly.
McDonald’s website pages have only one section with a red and yellow theme. Hence, whatever information you need can be found on that one screen itself – no scrolling. Their website ensures complete user-friendliness and is easy to navigate. With subtle colours, clear fonts, and even the order online, work for them or just get more information about the brand.
Keywords:
McDonald’s website has over 38,457 organic keywords and brings 5,02,994 monthly traffic to its website. These numbers are beyond average and are rated as “good” and “amazing”, respectively, by Ubersuggest.
SEMRush revealed the top five organic keywords of McDonald’s:
- McDonald’s India
- McDonald’s India menu
- McDonald’s India
- India McDonald’s menu
- McDonald’s India menu
Google Business Profile Page
When you look at what McDonald’s does, you’ll notice that they do an excellent job at setting up Google Business Profiles for each of their locations, while some businesses never do. It takes a lot of effort initially, but as you can see, it pays off in the end.
Google Business Profile Reviews
Reviews are crucial when it comes to local searches. As much as we’d like it to be, simply generating a listing isn’t enough. You must consider it from the standpoint of the search engine.
Businesses with more reviews (especially those with excellent ratings) will rank higher (as seen below) since it provides search engines with more data points and shows that people are saying positive things about them, implying that it must be worthwhile.
After becoming listed, one of the most difficult aspects of local optimisation is acquiring building reviews. It’s not simple to garner positive feedback, but you can do just as well as McDonald’s if you put on your marketing hat and apply your ingenuity.
McDonald’s Top Digital Marketing Campaigns
1. #MatchedByYou
McDonald’s introduced a campaign pivoting around a love story stuck in a triangle, with the power of decision-making vested in customers themselves. They introduced a new offer where one could add either coke or fries along with their burger at Rs. 49/-
They released their ideas in the form of a video on Youtube:
This is a unique campaign where people show their love for the sides they prefer and complete the burger’s love story after picking their desired combination.
2. #TheRealDeal Campaign
McDonald’s India launched a new digital campaign called ‘#TheRealDeal’ to promote the introduction of its brand App (for iOS or Android devices). Customers can use the McDonald’s mobile app to get special deals and offers at dine-in, takeout, or drive-through.
The #TheRealDeal campaign includes four digital films based on a social experiment that captures different consumers’ responses as they learn about the McDonald’s app and their amazement when they take advantage of the incredible bargains.
3. EatQual Campaign
McDonald’s India launched a new campaign that emphasises the importance of EatQual, their inclusion platform, in creating a welcoming environment at McDonald’s. According to an official release, the company hopes to expand the EatQual platform to introduce relevant activities to encourage inclusivity across genders, languages, and impairments.
DDB Mudra’s ad film demonstrates how little innovations may go a long way toward making the world more equal for everyone.
The campaign film tells the narrative of a child’s desire to see the world through the eyes of others. Later on, it illustrates how the EatQual packaging makes it easier for the child’s friend to eat the burger with restricted upper-limb motion.
Conclusion
As you can see, McDonald’s has entered the digital sphere to promote its products and brand. Do you want to create your own strategy? Join the best online digital marketing course to improve your company’s digital marketing methods. This course is for anyone who wants to understand everything about digital marketing and how to apply it to their own business.
Now, after reading McDonald’s Digital Marketing Strategies, you want to order something right from McDonald’s. Just order it ;). Have fun learning from McDonald’s digital marketing strategies, and start thinking and planning how you can implement them in your business.
Are you prepared to improve your company’s image? The best way to start is to enrol in the advanced digital marketing course.
What do you enjoy most about McDonald’s campaigns? Let us know in the comments section below!
