more covers from search
How a restaurant group went from invisible to the top of Google Maps
Paying more. Getting less.
The Ember Collection owned eight restaurants across the Midlands, each with a strong local following built on word of mouth. But when the founders looked at where new customers were actually coming from, organic search barely registered. Their previous agency had spent eighteen months optimising for broad keywords like 'best restaurant' and 'fine dining near me' — terms dominated by national chains and review aggregators.
The real problem was local visibility. When someone searched for 'Italian restaurant Nottingham' or 'Sunday lunch Birmingham', Ember's locations didn't appear in the Map Pack. They were losing covers to competitors with worse food but better search presence. The agency's monthly reports showed 'impressions' going up, but tables stayed empty on weekday evenings.
Reviews were another blind spot. Across eight locations, only 15% of Google reviews received a response. Some locations had unanswered one-star reviews sitting at the top of their profile for months. The management team knew this was damaging, but with two hundred staff across eight sites, nobody owned the digital presence. The agency certainly hadn't flagged it.
What Korvex found in 48 hours.
Korvex's first analysis revealed that Ember's Google Business Profiles were inconsistent and incomplete. Three locations had wrong opening hours. Two had outdated menus. None had posts or updates in over six months. The platform generated a prioritised fix list for each location, and the operations manager worked through the critical items in a single afternoon.
The keyword analysis shifted focus entirely. Instead of chasing generic national terms, Korvex identified 147 location-specific search phrases with genuine booking intent — things like 'private dining room Leicester' and 'bottomless brunch Coventry'. Each location received tailored content recommendations designed to match the exact way local customers searched.
Korvex automated review monitoring across all eight locations. The platform flagged new reviews instantly, suggested response templates based on sentiment, and tracked response rates as a KPI. Within three weeks, every location was responding to reviews within 24 hours. The team also began systematically encouraging satisfied diners to leave reviews, guided by Korvex's prompts.
Before and after.
Map Pack appearances
Monthly covers from search
Review response rate
Local keywords in top 3
Monthly SEO spend
Cost per acquisition
Within four months, Ember's locations appeared in the Google Map Pack for seven of their eight target areas, up from just two. Monthly covers attributed to organic search increased from 340 to 568 — a 67% increase that translated directly to revenue. Weekday evening bookings, historically their weakest period, saw the largest improvement.
The cost structure transformed. The previous agency had charged six thousand pounds a month across the group. Korvex replaced that entirely at a fraction of the cost, while delivering measurable results the agency never had. The cost per customer acquisition dropped from forty-two pounds to twelve — and these were customers who came back.
The review strategy alone was worth the switch. Response rates went from 15% to 95%, and the average Google rating across all locations climbed from 4.1 to 4.4 stars within six months. The operations director now checks Korvex's dashboard every morning alongside the booking system — it's become as essential as knowing how many covers are on the books.
“Our old agency kept telling us SEO takes time. Korvex showed us results in weeks. We're now the first thing people see when they search for restaurants in our areas, and we're filling tables that used to sit empty.”
Laura Chen
Operations Director, The Ember Collection
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