Why Simple Food Content Still Works
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By Sean Beckingham
I’ve been doing food marketing for a long time, and one thing keeps proving itself: food content doesn’t have to look like an ad to sell the brand.
We recently had a cheesy breakfast casserole Reel generate 1,300 engagements, 354 shares and a 12.7% engagement rate.
Why did it work?
It was useful.
The recipe was something people could actually see themselves making. It was easy, approachable and solved a real need: what can I make for breakfast that everyone will eat and that I can prepare ahead of time?
It also looked natural. The creator didn’t feel like they were reading from a brand brief. The food was the hero, the product fit naturally into the recipe, and the whole thing felt like something you might get from a friend who knows their way around the kitchen.
The 354 shares are probably the number I like most.
A like says, “That looks good.”
A share says, “Someone else needs to see this.”
For food brands, I think there’s an important lesson here. We can spend a lot of time trying to make social content bigger, slicker and more branded. Sometimes the better answer is to make it more useful.
Give people an idea for dinner. Solve breakfast. Show them something they can make this weekend.
Put the product in the right place and let the food do the marketing.
After all these years, simple still works.