This week the marketing of restaurants changed forever.

By now you will have heard about Domino’s, the “disgusting employee” viral video and the way that Twitter played a crucial part in the rapid spread of the message. If not visit R & I’s story at www.chainleader.com
 

 
One initial reaction you might have would be to ask “what were they (the employees) thinking?” After that, you might start to ask “how did Domino’s handle this?” Then, the hard question, “what would I do in this same situation?”
 

 
These are all good and valuable questions that every operator should be asking themselves today. But the importance of the event wasn’t the content of the video, as disturbing as that is, but in the impact it had on the dialog between restaurant companies and their customers.
 
True Viral Marketing
 
Before it was removed for “copyright” issues by one of the shamed employees, the YouTube site had been visited by more than 1 million viewers. That took about 48 hours. It was free.
The folks on the website Consumerist.com were actually the ones who created the first response to the YouTube posting, identifying the restaurant as being in North Carolina and alerting Domino’s corporate VP of Communications, Tim McIntyre, to the posting. (visit consumerist.com ). This on-line team of consumer guardians did their detective work with no cost to Domino’s.
 

 
Patrick Doyle, President of Domino’s USA, posted a video response on YouTube  , and in the hour since I started writing this piece on Thursday night, more than 50,000 additional viewers have watched him talk about the event (viewership went from 131,000 to 184,000). Based on the spontaneous look and production style of this video, the cost of making this piece was at most a few dollars.
 
The Lessons to be Learned
 
As far back as November, 2007 I started suggesting that all restaurant companies would need to learn about the new Web 2.0 communication models. Twitter didn’t make that list, because it wasn’t known. It certainly is now. So is YouTube, and Facebook, and Yelp, and dozens of other sites.
 
So, what does this experience really mean? It means that all restaurant companies, from the simplest single unit to the multi-billion dollar giant, have to begin today to reallocate their marketing resources to include new social media. Domino’s already had a YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter presence, and they still got blindsided by two bored employees with a video camera.
 

 
Let me repeat the message: at zero cost, Domino’s Pizza was at the center of an on-line event which involved millions of potential customers. Even though it was unintentional, it created “buzz” and “good will” and the potential for increased sales—long after the video is lost to cyberspace, the event will live on.
 
If your marketing professionals cannot explain how this relates to your business, you need to find ones who can.
 
Additional sites to visit
 
Two places to look at for ideas on how to learn from these events include Read Write Web and a piece by Bruce Horvitz at USAToday with suggestions that all marketers can learn from the Domino’s experience - click here.