Denny’s Connects Digital Presence to Foot Traffic With Yelp

Need to Know

• Denny’s is starting to measure how much online activity helps drive customers to its restaurants with Yelp’s new first-party attribution tool. 
• Yelp Store Visits (YSV) uses opt-in location information at scale in addition to other signals that users provide when engaging with the business discovery app to determine how much traffic is driven to a business from Yelp ads. 
• YSV determines the cost-per-visit attributable to Yelp ads and enables clients to better calculate their return on ad spend with the platform. 
• In Q3, Yelp seated 2.6 million dinners a month in 4.8 million local businesses actively using Yelp’s services.

Analysis

With the growing popularity of digital ordering and food delivery services, generating foot traffic is critical for dine-in restaurants like Denny’s. Yelp’s new attribution tool, Yelp Store Visits (YSV) aims to make it easier for brands to evaluate how advertising on the platform helps generate foot traffic. 

Denny’s has been working with the platform since 2015 but saw YSV as an opportunity to strengthen its digital approach, better understand ad spend and increase foot traffic. 

“We are always looking for new ways to reach our consumers and, given Yelp’s dominance in the industry, we sought a partnership to help us drive more customers to our restaurants,” said Erik Jensen, VP of brand engagement at Denny’s.

“We’ve been working with Yelp since 2015, but decided we wanted to take things to the next level when we learned about Yelp Store Visits. YSV has helped us to truly understand the impact of our ad dollars and ensure we’re leveraging the right strategy.”

Using opt-in location information at scale, and other signals that users provide when engaging with Yelp, Denny’s will be able to determine which Yelp ads are driving Yelpers to its tables. In addition to the YSV Yelp also rolled out Showcase Ads, a video-focused ad showcase allowing businesses to promote special or limited-time offers to high-intent consumers on Yelp. 

“These new products represent our commitment to building advertising solutions that generate real results for our brand partners,” said Tom Foran, Yelp’s senior VP of national sales. “By utilizing Showcase Ads and measuring the results with Store Visits, brands are able to target their new or seasonal product offerings to a hyper-local audience and know the impact of their marketing campaigns on driving consumers into stores.”

In an earnings report released this week, Denny’s announced that same-store sales grew 2% in 2019 from a year earlier. Expanding on its Yelp partnership with YSV by leveraging the correct marketing strategies with potential customers should only help that number increase.