Rice University has published a Facebook study on Dessert Gallery (DG), a popular Houston-based bakery and café chain to assess “How effective Facebook marketing is on customer loyalty”.

Researchers in the Rice study claim that Facebook Fan Page membership changed customer behaviour for the better.

Facebook fans:

• Made 36 percent more visits to DG’s stores each month;
• Spent 45 percent more of their eating-out dollars at DG;
• Spent 33 percent more at DG’s stores;
• were more likely to recommend DG to friends;
• had greater emotional attachment to the company.

The research, conducted by Utpal Dholakia, associate professor of management at Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business, and Emily Durham, a Jones School alumna involved surveys of more than 1,700 respondents over a three-month period.

So, is Facebook an Effective Marketing tool for restaurants?

Although the study does not definitively assign causality between Facebook and customer behaviour, the link is intriguing and begins to answer the question for tourism businesses.  ”Why should I have a Facebook Fan Page?”

According to Dholakia, the results indicate that Facebook fan pages offer an effective and low-cost way of social-media marketing.

Links:

• Harvard Business Review article on Rice University Facebook study