Global-to-Local Social Advertising Technology Made Available for 5 Million Bars, Restaurants and Retailers Worldwide

Tiger Pistol, the only social advertising platform that delivers local activation at global scale, has partnered with Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev) to support the brand’s worldwide network of local retailers, bars, and restaurants that have been affected by COVID-19.

“We all have our go-to local establishments, whether it’s the neighborhood pub for happy hour, our favorite dinner spot, or our chosen venue for celebrating milestones,” said Paul Elliott, CEO, Tiger Pistol. “Very few companies have a global footprint like AB InBev, and they support their worldwide community and make sure their establishments have everything they need to weather the storm today and succeed in a new normal future.”

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Restaurants and bars are among the hardest hit industries across the globe. According to Statista, the year-over-year decline of seated patrons in restaurants worldwide dropped day by day February to May reaching a staggering 100% decline by early May A study by Deloitte states that while global at-home consumption has increased, it will unlikely cover the cost of lost sales even once the situation begins to normalize. In a survey by Technomic, 32% of consumers say they plan to eat at restaurants less often out of COVID-19 concerns. With layoffs and hour cuts prevalent across the industry, restaurants and bars need help to survive the crisis. In a Datassential survey, 33% of operators cited they needed help communicating their establishment’s status, and 25% of local operators cited the need for collaboration to promote traffic.

Tiger Pistol provides the ability to reach deeply into local communities all throughout the world, empowering individual restaurants and bars with locally relevant ads that use powerful messaging alongside globally-recognized brand creative. The ads are flexibly deployed from the local business’ Facebook Page, with objectives in line with state, regional, or city-level government restrictions. This social strategy gives these small retailers, most of whom are suffering during this time, an advertising option to help them continue to drive business and recall the essential role restaurants and bars play in fostering memories and connections in the lives of consumers.

“Tiger Pistol’s global-to-local approach marries two strategies together to ensure AB InBev’s success,” said Elliott.  “First, it brings their brands directly to consumers for immediate identification. Second, the local establishments can drive a personal connection with the consumer. By providing enterprise-strength tools to the local market, the consumer ends up with a highly relevant, localized ad.”

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With each region affected differently, AB InBev and Tiger Pistol are working closely with the brand’s global markets to create social media marketing plans to support small businesses during this crisis and to help them recover. AB InBev uses the Tiger Pistol Platform to support the following initiatives, among others, worldwide:

• Brazil, with tens of thousands of locations with local Facebook and Instagram campaigns that promote new e-commerce options, including through Ze Delivery, a delivery app that ABI Brazil created to promote online ordering and delivery services available from their favorite local spots, and with planned campaigns to help businesses connect with consumers in the post-crisis environment.
• Belgium and the UK, with campaigns to promote their “Cafe Courage” and “Save Pub Life” initiatives that allow patrons to purchase gift cards or make donations to support their favorite hang outs, and with planned campaigns to help businesses promote their new operating hours and safety protocols to consumers as they begin to re-open.
• Canada, with campaigns that support local on- and off-premise establishments in promoting take-out and online ordering and delivery options.

These efforts are part of a long-term partnership to provide AB InBev’s worldwide network of restaurants, bars, and retailers with an industry-leading platform for publishing high performance, local Facebook and Instagram ads.

AB InBev first engaged Tiger Pistol for a Facebook advertising pilot in 2019. Tiger Pistol developed a simple, effective way for local establishments to automatically publish on-brand, best-practice Facebook ads straight from the local establishment’s Facebook Business Page. The campaigns produced a 60% lower cost of advertising among other remarkable results. AB InBev continued to expand the program throughout the year, culminating in a global multi-year partnership.

“We are partnering with Tiger Pistol to develop new tools that evolve how we market our brands and build relationships with our network of establishments – both in a time of crisis and in ordinary times,” said Gabriel Mello, Global Vice President of Category Management and Trade Solutions, AB InBev. “Their technology and knowledge of social advertising have made Tiger Pistol the right partner to collaboratively develop a scaled social advertising solution.”

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