Give an Ovation: The Restaurant Guest Experience Podcast with Zack Oates
Give an Ovation: The Restaurant Guest Experience Podcast is your backstage pass to the minds of hospitality leaders, innovators, and operators who are redefining what it means to serve. Hosted by Zack Oates, founder of Ovation, each episode dives into real-world tactics and inspiring stories from restaurant pros who know how to create five-star guest experiences—both in-store and off-premise.
From fast casual to fine dining, catering to curbside, learn how to drive loyalty, empower your staff, and deliver hospitality that hits home. Whether you're a restaurant owner, operator, marketer, or tech partner, this podcast will leave you with practical insights and plenty of reasons to celebrate and Give an Ovation.
Give an Ovation: The Restaurant Guest Experience Podcast with Zack Oates
Cereal, Content, and Creativity with Chris Burns
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Unlock the secrets of social media stardom with Cereal Killerz Kitchen Owner, Chris Burns. Chris dishes out the recipe for creating content that not only tickles the taste buds but also captures the hearts of over a million followers. Step into the vibrant hustle of Las Vegas Strip marketing, where Chris Burns navigates the transient tides of customers with a shrewd social media strategy.
On this episode you'll learn from Chris about:
- Authenticity and relatability
- Advertising in budget
- Correcting content misconceptions
- Social media tactics
- More!
Thanks, Chris!
Create Engaging Social Media Content
Speaker 1Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation , the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast , where I talk to industry experts to get their strategies and tactics you can use to create a five-star guest experience . This podcast is sponsored by Ovation , a two-question SMS-based real-time guest feedback platform that helps restaurants measure and improve their guest experience . Learn more at ovationupcom . And today we've got Chris Burns , the owner of Serial Killers Kitchen , which boasts over one million followers on TikTok . They're crushing the social media game . They've got some awesome collabs . There is Serial Kitchen that has over 100 different types of cereal from all around the world . Every day is a Saturday morning there at Serial Killers . And we actually met at Restaurantology , which is a great conference put on by the Savory Fund Go next year and super . I was really impressed , chris , with you on stage , so I wanted to have you here on the podcast . So welcome to Give an Ovation , my man .
Speaker 2Thank you . Thank you Appreciate it . Thanks for having me .
Speaker 1So first of all , tell me about one million followers on TikTok Like what ?
Speaker 2Man , it was a mission . I thought like Confetti was going to come down and I was going to get celebrate and all this cool stuff was going to happen , chasing that number per se . But it's definitely . It was definitely great chasing after it . Nothing really cool happened . Besides , I can say that I'm one of the only restaurants that has a million followers , so that was definitely the coolness of it . And just to be able to do something that no one else has done for the most part . So , yeah , there's really nothing . Yeah , we kept working towards it and stay consistent , stay consistent , post it two to three times a day until we were able to hit that .
Speaker 1Whoa two to three times a day .
Speaker 2Yes , easy , yeah , but like a lot of it , like I tell people a lot like , after you're consistently making content for months and months , you have so much content to repurpose . So don't be afraid to repurpose your content , because most of your followers aren't going to see in any way the way the weird TikTok algorithm works . So just don't be afraid to repost , reuse , do a different voiceover , a lot of different things you can do to get to those levels where you're not like . Could you imagine creating 21 pieces of content in a week , every week ? So yeah , it's pretty hard to always have something new , so you can always just rework some old stuff in .
Speaker 1Yeah .
Speaker 2Take clips from longer form content and throw that in there also .
Speaker 1And do you find that , you know , when you're throwing something back up there with like new music that's trending and stuff like that , does that actually work ?
Speaker 2Yeah , it does . I said that's that's another thing to do . You use different sounds with video you already have , so it's a new video for the most part . I think like TikTok wise , like , if you're not doing all the weird dances , some of the backup music doesn't really work because a lot of those have to do with dances and stuff . But but yeah , you can throw a lot of use , a lot of funny audio , like right now it's Halloween , so of course we use a lot of spooky , spooky sounds that we're kind of going viral , getting used a little lot , so a bunch of different things like that .
Speaker 1Now , chris you're talking to . You know our listeners here restaurant owners , not social media experts , right ? So what do I do ? Do I hire my nace or nephew to come in here and run my TikTok for me ? Or like , how do I do this if I'm not a social media expert ?
Speaker 2Well , pretty soon you'll be able to actually hire me to come do it all . But I would I don't know . I would say , if you have the budget , definitely , definitely hire one of these . Influencers are different , you know food consultants , stuff like that , that actually our agencies . I would definitely do that , like if I had the budget . That's what I , that's what I would have done because I could be doing other things , but I didn't have the budget , you know .
Speaker 2You know because they they range , like you can get a beginner , you know , for $1,000 a month . Maybe you know they might post twice , twice a week on your page , or you can . You know you could pretty much customize it however you want to , and with unlimited budget , for per se , depends on you know who you're getting . But we had no choice . So I had to do it and then started got it , started getting kind of good at it and yeah , now it's hard to get rid of it because everything , most of our content , involved my voice . So I guess , yeah , so that's there's that , but . But yeah , so I would definitely , if you can hire somebody , definitely do it . I wouldn't just get my niece off the streets who is on Tik Tok all day , because she's probably not going to know all the steps it takes to make a good video and a good , high quality content .
Speaker 1So what would you define as a good video ? As you're looking at the video content out there and this is all getting to the guest experience because when they see you on social media , that's one of their first interactions with your brand and that's where expectations are set and expectations yield experience . So what would you say is what would you define as good content , if you were to kind of write up your your strategy doc on that ?
Speaker 2Definitely like say , things have changed like I think a lot of I don't want to pick on , I'm say more seasoned restaurant owners , you know they think that you have to have all these expensive cameras , bring it in a whole photo shoot , lighting boxes everywhere . With social media that's not really the case . You literally can do everything with your phone at this point , as long as you have really a little $30 light that you can kind of make your lighting a little better and I know that definitely worked .
Speaker 1A lot of people aren't going to be able to see this because it's not on video , but I bought this loom cube right . It's a little light , it's the size of the palm of my hand and this light and combine this with an iPhone on portrait mode and you get the most bomb photos you can get . And video is so good with just a little bit of lighting .
Speaker 2Just the light . You need to spend all that money on all this equipment for social media . So the best like , say , as long as you get , like if you're doing food content , if you get your little light off Amazon $20 , $30 , your iPhone at least like at least the pro models you know the bigger ones that have the three cameras on the back , because they definitely pick up content a lot better . But so a good video . I always say the hook is the most important thing . So you get three to five seconds to catch someone's attention . What I like to do ? I like to like either , like ask questions , I like to challenge people . And when I say challenge people , it's like let's just say if I have 50 pair of shoes behind me , like hey , I bet you never seen 50 pair of shoes , or you've never seen 50 pair of shoes . So I like to kind of challenge them to get them engaged . So just kind of like you need to get them to stop scrolling . That's the most important thing in any video , because I think subconsciously , like we're just sitting there scrolling up and down , up and down . Something has to stop you . You're not watching every single video , so that's the first thing . You definitely you need your hook what's going to gather everybody's attention . And then after that , like your content has to be engaging . You need to ask questions Because , like , once you ask questions like I'm trying to use like real world examples so I always ask like , hey , what's your favorite cereal ? Something along those lines , leave it in the comment and now that pushes that . That will let Instagram and Facebook know to push your content out to more people . Because you need that engagement . At least the like , like that doesn't really work as much , but you definitely need people to engage with your post .
Speaker 2From what I've read , I don't know what the real truth is . It's like they'll send it out to 10 or 20% of your followers If they don't engage with it . They're not going to send it to more people . So you have to get your core people to actually engage with your posts first before it goes out to the masses . So , but yeah , good video , like I said , good , good , decent . I'm not going to say super quality , but like , as long as you long , as it's clear , clear on your camera , that's good . Your sound is good , your , your lighting , that's . That's pretty much the basics , but I always start with the hook you know , something engaged , engaging , and probably end it with a call to action . You know something you want them to do if you want them to stop by your store , buy a t-shirt , just yeah .
Speaker 1that's pretty much the what I go through when I'm talking about this , though , because because , chris , I , let's say I spend all this time doing three , you're saying posts two to three times a day .
Speaker 2If you want to better , if you want to grow faster , yeah , three , okay , like Everybody's in a race . So you have Facebook , was that ? You have Facebook and Instagram reels . You have YouTube shorts , you have tiktok everybody . They're all fighting for consistent user engagement and Content they need . If they don't have content , they can't sell to advertisers . If they don't have people scrolling all day , they have no one to sell the advertisers to . You know stuff like that ? So everybody wants the content .
Speaker 2So if you're pushing more content on a platform , they're gonna reward you by being more consistent . Like , say , a case in point like I took a mental break at the beginning of the year after I hit all these invisible numbers I thought were so cool that that three month break came out to be like seven months . So it's just like got so overwhelmed with other things . But now I'm trying to get back into it and it's like okay , like why are my numbers down ? Like why am I only getting 30,000 views , which ? So some people , that's a lot . But when I was really going at it , I was averaging 150,000 views . A post . Like the bad posts were only getting a hundred thousand views Interesting . But the minute I took a step back and I stopped being consistent . They don't reward it anymore . You lose your audience , you lose your engagement and 20 what are we in ? So in 2022 , end of 2021 and that year span , I had over 250 million views on my post , organically not paid for just everything for the year .
Speaker 2So , yeah , so it's just really . It's about consistency . Yeah , that's really . I say , two to three times a day is a good start . Once you get audience , you can scale it back a little bit . But you know , and the cool thing is , like all those Platforms , all the four I mentioned they're all pretty much set up exactly the same . So , whatever platform you like the best , I like Instagram's editing and everything , so I use not Instagram , sorry . I like a tick tocks editing , so I use tick tock . I post the video there , I do all the editing there , I post it . I Use another separate app . It's like share , talk or something like that . I take the video from Insta , I mean from tick tock . It removes the watermark and then I share it on Facebook , instagram and YouTube . So it's literally the same video getting shared four times . That . You multiply that by three times a day . I'm sharing at least 12 pieces of content a day .
Speaker 1Wow what I mean . So , and it's just so many opportunities . It is this resulting in sales . Like do you feel like this has helped the ?
Speaker 2actual business . I have proof now , right Like from when I was hitting those numbers to now . I can tell you it at least impacted our business , at least between our stores , total at least $200,000 . Wow , and difference from our numbers
Social Media Following With Authentic Content
Speaker 2year to year . Just because I , like I said , just so much stuff in life was happening . I couldn't physically or anything post or I didn't have the time . But I definitely can tell , like look at it separate months and what was different . There was only one our products been the same , everything has been the same , but my consistency and posting . So , yeah , definitely , yeah , I can definitely tell it , definitely I didn't know , I didn't know , you don't know until you know .
Speaker 2You just think your place is the greatest thing ever , but something has to drive these people there . It might not be right away , like especially because we have a store on the Las Vegas Strip , so that's not a consistent customer base . It's literally always new people . So , yeah , I can definitely tell , and that's what makes our business a little harder than anybody else's per se , because if you're a mom and pop shop in a neighborhood , you can get a loyal following . We have with our store on the Strip . We have to build a nationwide following to visit us when they finally make it in town . Granted , we're in like one of the most popular tourist destinations , but so , yeah , we just had to get creative and take talk at Instagram the kind of exposure that we got on there from posting two to three times a day , I couldn't pay for it really , like McDonald's can probably pay for it , but that would cost them millions of dollars to get that many organic views , stuff like that . Or well , I guess it wouldn't be organic if they're paying for it .
Speaker 1Yeah , well , what about ? How did you schedule your time ? Like , did you just have , hey , from nine to 12 ? Every single day ? I'm coming up with ideas that I'm gonna post out , like how did you schedule when you're gonna do the videos ?
Speaker 2I would mostly go into our store and spend five or six hours and I would just shoot a lot of content . I would kinda plan it out I would spend one day shooting for the week per se and then I'd spend like another day editing everything .
Speaker 2So I would edit everything , put it in the drafts and then just post it on that day and I would kinda keep like a system . So I know I would do one ice cream and milkshake post of us making the milkshakes , one making a crazy bowl of cereal , and then another one like our cereal challenge , so it pretty much be the same type of thing , but every day . So I have to go in there and post . I have to go make seven milkshake videos , seven cereal bowl videos and then , if I think of anything else , there's a lot of filler content that we got kinda good at like let's the top five cereals , then you can do the top five chocolate cereals , the top five cinnamon cereals . You can do worse cereals , the worst five .
Speaker 2So it's just so many little things that don't take much time that you can do what I think a lot of people make mistakes on . They think that their content has to be great , it has to be perfect . But anytime that I spend like let's just say like real time on trying to create content , it bombs every time . I don't know why . It just seems like really , what's that word ? Really produced content doesn't really work for a lot of people Interesting . Yeah , like , like . If you could look at , like , look at the top people in the space , like I'm not going to say the people I actually love , let's just say look at McDonald's , burger King , any of the . Look at their content , you can tell that it's high quality , great cameras , somebody . They set out a board meeting for a week and came up with these ideas . Uh-huh , if you think about how much money they're spending on these professionals and like and look at , look at , look at their likes and their engagement compared to like their followers as they are McDonald's and stuff like that , it just it doesn't add up .
Speaker 1Yeah .
Speaker 2Um , I , that's the part that kind of like makes me laugh . Like when these big companies are like , yeah , we don't have a budget for , for partnerships or anything , and I'm like you pay so many marketing people for social media marketing to come up with all these great ideas that I can get you for free . Like you know , I mean for for a lot less . You know what I mean . So that's just . That's just the way I see things . You know content is different .
Speaker 1Totally , and I think that the authenticity is so important nowadays . Like , why do people like you know , I I watched Mr Beast videos Like why do people like Mr Beast ?
Speaker 2Because he just seems like such an ordinary guy and , like Mr Beast , probably had like no friends in real life , like he's just like . Oh , I'm just like , he just seems like he's not really alone here , but just yeah , he just hey , that's my , that's the friend I , my friend , I grew up with , like yeah right , exactly . He seems like a big personality or anything .
Speaker 1And that's the beauty of it . You don't need to be super cool , you don't need to have an amazing personality . I love what you're saying . Just be consistent and and like try a bunch of things and see what's hidden and then just keep doing it . And I like how you . You got into your rhythm of of milkshake cereal challenge and just doing that every single day and building that content up .
Speaker 2Yeah , that's what I love like about not being a big corporation . The only thing I like about not being a big we can do whatever we want . Like we want to throw something at the wall and see if it sticks , you know , you just you're allowed to keep trying to , you know , redefine yourself or find something that works , without it being a big deal , or happen to throw millions of dollars in marketing budgets behind it . Because I tell you like I just like , like knowing people who's worked at these big companies are like all the money it takes for them just to launch something . I'm like why , like I can do that for about $5,000 , not a million dollars in R&D . Like , if I want to do a new milkshake , I don't have to , I don't have to do a test group , I can just put it out , make good content around it . People try it , they like it , we keep it , they don't we get rid of it .
Speaker 1Life's a lot simpler right , I love that and , chris , I know we haven't even talked a ton about the guest experience , but in effect , as I mentioned in the beginning , all of this is creating the expectations of the experience , which is just as important as the experience itself . So I love this conversation , but I do want to ask you who deserves an ovation in the restaurant industry ? Who's someone that ? Or in the social media industry , who's someone that we should be following ?
Speaker 2Oh man , so I have I can answer both the questions . So I know it's ha ha . You know we all just came from the savory convention . So definitely them Like they're like how I got in contact with them pretty much is because I wanted to do a drive-through for our concept and then I started doing research and I came across Swig and I'm just like , wow , like they're really selling sodas and like like at an alarming , at a crazy , alarming rate .
Speaker 2And then so I'm like , well , we can just be that for the ice cream and dessert industry . So I just started following them and then I finally met them at a restaurantology a couple years ago and like they're just amazing people Like not even like let's take like anybody like outside of , they have obviously money to invest in different organizations just getting to know them on a different level . So Andrew and Alfonso and Taylor , all that whole group , like they've all just been great , like I think the most important thing that I can ask them questions , that I can get an answer Like , so definitely that whole group , yeah , has been amazing . And on the social media thing , I think , like everybody , everybody kind of knows about Keith Lee now he's a he pretty much goes around testing restaurants . He's in a little bit . Not he's not in trouble right now , but he made Atlanta look really bad this week , so it's a whole . I know he got put on the box going on .
Speaker 1He got put on blast Atlanta .
Speaker 2Well , he was not really him , it's just Atlanta is . Yeah , they're looking real bad right now just because of his content . But yeah , but like say , when I say that , like kind of like what we were talking about Mr Beast , he's a awkward , regular , day to day person that grew a crazy following of , you know , 15 million followers per se . So he's definitely leading in the food category when it comes to restaurants .
Speaker 1Yeah , absolutely . I think he's doing some cool stuff there and really interesting . So , chris , this has been a fascinating conversation . Where can we go to see this all live in action ?
Speaker 2Who do so you can . Well , you can go on our Instagram and our TikTok pages at the serial killers kitchen , or you can visit one of our stores . We have a two in Las Vegas , one in Goodyear , arizona , which is the west side of Phoenix , out on the suburbs , and also in downtown Salt Lake City , at the gateway inside of Hall Pass .
Speaker 1Well , chris , for making my childhood dreams come true . Today's ovation goes to you . Thank you so much for joining us on . Give an Ovation . My man Appreciate it . Thanks for joining us today . If you liked this episode , leave us a review on Apple podcasts or your favorite place to listen . We're all about feedback here . Again , this episode was sponsored by Ovation . A two question SMS based actionable guest feedback platform , built for multi unit restaurants . If you'd like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience , visit us at ovation upcom .