Case Study: Chef Tony Marciante boosts dine‑in traffic and earns $7,000+ from one email with ActiveCampaign

How Chef Tony Gets People Through the Door with Automation

Chef Tony Marciante runs Chef Tony’s, a seafood restaurant in Bethesda, MD, that opened in 2007 and has faced the usual restaurant challenges: tight margins, a limited marketing budget, declining dining-out frequency, and low initial visibility. Tony needed a cost-effective, measurable way to get people through the door and build ongoing relationships beyond the dining room.

He implemented marketing automation to capture guests (free cookbook + $10 gift card, table surveys collecting contact info) and send personalized sequences—welcome videos, targeted offers, birthday entitlements, and service-specific funnels for classes, catering, and more. The approach produced clear, trackable results (a snowstorm email generated $7,000 in one night), helped sustain business for 12+ years, kept Chef Tony’s highly rated on TripAdvisor, and turned one-time diners into a loyal community.

Chef Tony Marciante

Tony Marciante

Chef