Performance marketing for restaurants & F&B in the UAE
UAE F&B has the lowest paid-search CPCs (AED 3–10) but the noisiest attribution. Most diners decide via Talabat, Deliveroo, Instagram, or Maps — not Google Search. We build cross-channel funnels with daypart bidding, Maps domination, aggregator-aware strategy, and EN+AR creative tuned to the UAE F&B market.
What is included for F&B clients
Daypart-tuned campaigns
Lunch + dinner bid windows, daypart-specific creative.
Maps + GMB optimisation
Top-3 Map Pack target. Photo refresh, review velocity, posts.
Aggregator-listing audits
Talabat + Deliveroo + Careem listing quality, photo, copy review.
Catering + corporate funnel
Separate B2B campaigns for higher-margin catering orders.
WhatsApp ordering + reservations
WA Business API for direct-to-restaurant orders bypassing aggregator margin.
Cover/order offline conversions
Aggregator and direct-order revenue uploaded to Google Ads weekly.
How we onboard a UAE restaurant
Setup in 14 days. First 30 days are diagnosis; from month 2 we scale on cover and order data.
Intake
Concept, locations, average ticket, aggregator vs direct mix, current marketing channels.
Build
Daypart campaigns, GMB tuning, aggregator listing audit, WA ordering setup, catering funnel.
Launch + 30-day learning
Daily search-term review, photo and review velocity, daypart bid tuning.
Scale on margin
Reallocate budget to covers and direct orders. Aggregators stay in the mix as awareness, not primary.
Dubai 3-location casual dining: AED 18 → AED 7 cost per cover (direct + walk-in)
A Dubai casual-dining concept with 3 locations was spending AED 22k/month on Google Ads with 70% of revenue going through Talabat (lower margin). We rebuilt the account around daypart bidding (lunch + dinner only), launched WA Business ordering (direct-to-restaurant bypassing aggregator), tuned GMB photos and ran a 90-day review velocity playbook (47 → 280 reviews at 4.9 average), and ran a separate catering funnel for corporate orders. Month 4: cost per cover down 61%, direct-order share up 148%, all 3 locations top-3 in Map Pack for primary cuisine searches.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. How much do Google Ads cost for restaurants in the UAE?
CPCs run AED 3–10 averaging AED 5. Casual dining sits at AED 3–6; high-end and specialty cuisines AED 5–9; catering and corporate at AED 7–14. Most UAE restaurants should budget AED 5,000 to AED 15,000 per month for meaningful direct-order growth.
Q. How do I balance Talabat/Deliveroo with direct orders?
Aggregators give you awareness and discovery; direct gives you margin. Most successful UAE concepts run 50–60% aggregator / 40–50% direct as their target mix. We use Google Ads, Maps, and WA ordering to push direct without abandoning aggregator visibility.
Q. Should I bid all day or only lunch and dinner?
Lunch (12–2pm) and dinner (7–10pm) drive 80%+ of orders for most UAE concepts. Daypart bid 2–3x higher in those windows; conservative the rest. Pure flat-budget all-day campaigns waste 30–40%.
Q. How important is Google Maps for restaurants?
Critical — 50–70% of UAE restaurant discovery happens via Maps. Top-3 Map Pack for "{cuisine} near me" captures 40–60% of all map clicks. GMB optimisation, photos, and reviews are the highest-leverage channel.
Q. Should I run Arabic ads for my restaurant?
For traditional Arabic cuisine, halal-focused brands, family-friendly concepts, Northern Emirates, and Sharjah/Ajman targeting — yes. For high-end Dubai expat-targeted fine dining, English-only is usually right.
Q. What about catering and corporate orders?
Corporate/catering orders are 5–10x the ticket size of single covers and well worth separate campaigns. We run B2B-targeted ads on Google + LinkedIn + WhatsApp Business outreach to office managers and HR teams. Standard for any concept doing AED 8M+ revenue.
Q. How do you handle aggregator order attribution?
Talabat Restaurant Manager + Deliveroo dashboard exports + Careem reports — all integrated weekly into a unified revenue view. Without this, agencies optimise to direct-channel ROAS only and miss 60% of actual revenue impact from awareness campaigns.
Q. How important are reviews and photos for UAE restaurants?
Critical. Top-rated UAE restaurants typically have 200+ Google reviews above 4.5 stars, plus 50+ high-quality food photos refreshed quarterly. The gap between 4.3 and 4.7 stars is worth more than any ad spend lift in the same budget.