While hard lockdown feels like a distant memory for some as the country re-opens, it is anything but for many, particularly those in the travel, tourism, and service industry.
The Restaurant Association of SA (RASA) estimates that restrictions on eateries resulted in 1,100 restaurants shutting down during the third wave of the Covid-19 pandemic alone. Simultaneously, the pandemic brought the entertainment industry to its knees, with performers trying their best to use digital platforms to survive.
At SearchKings™ Africa, we saw some of this decimation of industry first hand as our customers in these verticals tried their best to adapt their models – of which many did, like Bottega owner, Saverio Cardillo, who embraced digital.
“Helping our loyal customers survive during the pandemic was a humbling and collaborative experience,” says SearchKings™ Africa owner and founder Brett Perlstein, “now we have the opportunity to use our skills to help new hospitality customers to come back, bigger and bolder than before.”
Local community eatery Arbour Cafe & Courtyard came on board towards the end of last year, needing to refresh their website and use it to drive event bookings and inquiries aggressively.
Having survived the pandemic through creative curb-side deliveries and the creation of a ramen dark kitchen, owners Joshua Simon and Larry Hodes wanted to revisit their online presence to kick the new year into high gear. They refreshed their website to showcase their fresh bottomless mimosa and brunch weekends and launched a Google Ads campaign to catch people planning special functions in their moment of intent. “The results have been incredible,” says Simon. “We are packed every weekend for the next two months with functions, and our brunches are booked out weekend after weekend. We can feel how invested the team at SearchKings™ Africa are in helping us re-build and grow, and that is the best kind of strategic partner to have.”
One of South Africa’s biggest, most iconic, and much-missed festivals during the pandemic, the Corona Sunsets Festival, is also coming back with a bang. Working closely with the organisers, Anything Goes, the team at SearchKings™ Africa is helping them leverage audiences at scale across Google and YouTube. “Of course critical to their success is attendance at their festivals, which is why we have deployed a strong and strategic approach to targeting very particular geographical audiences to help them sell tickets for all their upcoming events,” says Brett
Founder & CEO of Anything Goes, Sean Duwe, shares: “DJ culture and party music has always been the life blood of what I do. I have always believed the dancefloor is the ultimate equaliser. It’s a place where all inhibitions are lost and equality is not even a question. It is the standard.”
Watching our customers come back and dominate online is a testament to our fundamental value of “we win when you win”.
We are so proud to be involved in this exciting comeback across the hospitality industry.
