The Social Network

Friends of Branded!

Happy Saturday and I hope you had a great week.

Across Branded’s various podcasts and digital series, we’ve recorded more than 500 episodes, had more laughs than I could possibly count, and one time we had to stop a recording b/c a guest needed an emergency bathroom break.

Over the past few months, in addition to our core podcast offering, the Hospitality Hangout, we’ve being having a blast with our newest miniseries, The FoodFluencers.

The FoodFluencers puts a spotlight on some of the hottest social media food influencers in the market and the power they’ve amassed when it comes to driving guest engagement and behavior.

As someone who is admittedly not a social media maven and has been called a “boomer” more times than I’d like to admit by my wife and daughter, especially when I mix up the name of a music artist that hasn’t been recording for at least 3 or more decades, my learning curve has been wonderfully steep when it comes to our spending time with these influencers.

I grew up with a reliance on Zagat, New York Magazine and the New York Times for restaurant reviews and recommendations, and it’s clear that the times they are (have been) a changing.

For years, restaurant influence has lived on Instagram and TikTok where pretty plates, viral trends and creators drive guest traffic. Food influencers are incredibly important to the restaurant industry and nothing I’m about to write should suggest otherwise.

However, and despite the importance and I dare say criticality of both Instagram and TikTok for restaurants (so much so, that Schatzy and I have a good time on our podcasts watching influencers squirm when we ask them which one they’d give up if they were forced to only keep one of these social media platforms), it’s the old school, job-hunting, and far more corporate leaning LinkedIn that’s making a run and having its moment in the sun when it comes to restaurant influence.

I’m not prepared to tell Instagram and TikTok to move over or hold LinkedIn’s beer, but for years, restaurant “influence” lived with the cool kids where the photos were the prettiest. Yes, Instagram drives discovery, TikTok drives virality and creators drive foot traffic. Respect.

Do these things still matter? Yes, 1,000%!!!

But something has shifted, it’s important and it’s been happening quietly, steadily and in plain sight. The most consequential influence in the restaurant industry is increasingly happening on LinkedIn and it’s NOT happening with sexy pictures of food, dance trends, or discount codes. It’s happening with ideas, credibility, and decision-makers.

For operators, maybe this is our Reece’s Peanut Butter Cup moment, and the forever question of which is more important, the chocolate, or the peanut butter? But now we’re asking which is more important, Guest Influence or Business Influence? And the answer, is “yes.” 😊

Consumer Influence addresses questions such as: (i) Where a guest should eat? (ii) What’s trending? or (iii) Or what’s viral?

Business Influence addresses questions such as: (i) What technology should I buy; (ii) Which concept scales? (iii) Where should capital flow? and “Who should I hire? (please note there’s an unofficial rule that when writing about LinkedIn, if you don’t mention its human capital and job search prowess, you run the risk of being kicked off the platform, just saying).

Instagram and TikTok are exceptional at Consumer Influence while LinkedIn is winning in the category of Business Influence. And at the risk of angering many, for operators, founders, franchise leaders, suppliers and investors, Business Influence is where real leverage lives.

LinkedIn has quietly become the home to a new kind of influencer and it’s not celebrities, food bloggers, or lifestyle creators. This is where operators share real war stories. Where founders break down growth lessons. Where investors explain what actually matters. Where advisors translate complexity into clarity.

Spoiler alert, these Business Influencers don’t have millions of followers, but they also don’t need to b/c this is where quality matters more than quantity. On LinkedIn, having 10,000 of the right followers beats having 1,000,000 of the wrong ones (and in full disclosure, this “creative math” was done by someone with exactly 10,969 LinkedIn followers as of the writing of this week’s Top of the Fold).

On LinkedIn, audiences include multi-unit operators, franchisees, tech buyers, and capital allocators. In other words, the people who make decisions, not just reservations (was that comment a little too cheeky?).

Of course, restaurants are emotional brands and that’s why food influencers with meaningful followers on Instagram and TikTok are so important for discovery and driving traffic. But restaurants are also ruthlessly operational intensive businesses, and this is where LinkedIn thrives! On LinkedIn, insights matter more than aesthetics, a point of view matters more than a promotion and experience is valued over polish. LinkedIn affords its users the opportunity to build credibility with partners and vendors, attract franchisees and investors and shape industry narrative as opposed to chasing likes.

What I expect many have overlooked is that most LinkedIn influence in the hospitality industry is not transactional but rather influence without endorsements. For many industry voices, LinkedIn has become their highest ROI platform even without direct monetization mechanics (and that screams real influence).

There are a number of influencer archetypes that are winning on LinkedIn and they include, but aren’t necessarily limited to the following:

You know what’s missing from LinkedIn? Perfect photos, viral videos, and flash.

And as I’ve been known to do, here’s where the rubber meets the road and why I wanted to use the Top of the Fold to highlight the shift that’s taking place when it comes to influence.  There are several forces that are colliding and they include (i) trust fatigue on consumer social media platforms; (ii) AI increasing the value of human judgment; and (iii) restaurants becoming more complex businesses.

Like or not, the restaurant industry is becoming more professionalized and when that happens, influence moves upstream and this takes us from guests to operators and from trends to strategy. This is where LinkedIn lives.

For avoidance of any doubt, LinkedIn is NOT replacing Instagram or TikTok, but it is becoming a place where restaurant ecosystems are influenced, restaurant businesses are shaped and to keep with LinkedIn’s original purpose, where restaurant careers are built (please refer to LinkedIn’s unofficial rule above). 😊

Instagram will still show you the dish, and TikTok will still show you the trend, but LinkedIn will explain the business behind both.

If you’re building a restaurant brand, LinkedIn is no longer optional or just where the “suits” are hanging out. You don’t need to go viral, and you don’t need to post every day, but you do need to show up b/c LinkedIn is where credibility compounds.

The power table hasn’t disappeared; it’s just moved platforms. So, pull up a chair and take your seat (before someone else tells your story for you).

It takes a village.

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Tell us what we should read next →

As the 2025 holiday season has officially come to a close, let me tell you something, gifting isn’t a nice-to-have category, it’s an emotionally anchored one!

Consumers will delay buying something for themselves, but they’re far less willing to skip a birthday, holiday, or a moment that signals care. Gifting is uniquely tied to social obligation and emotional signaling, not just consumption. Even in downturns, people still give and while they may trade down, they rarely opt out. That makes gifting demand surprisingly durable.

The Deal Room this week is about the quiet power category investors and operators should take seriously.

Great gifting businesses don’t need to reinvent demand, as it shows up on the calendar with the same customer, occasion, and recipient, every year. Once trust is established around product quality, delivery reliability, and presentation, reordering becomes frictionless.

Gifting isn’t about impulse buying, it’s about behavioral habit and that drives lifetime value b/c the buyer isn’t the end user, and the emotional payoff outweighs price sensitivity. This creates a powerful dynamic with strong gross margins, upsell opportunities, and less price-based competition.

When gifting, you don’t need to be “luxury,” you just need to feel thoughtful and dependable. And here’s the flywheel most investors miss, the person receiving the gift is often the next buyer. A great gifting experience introduces the brand through delight, bypasses the traditional customer acquisition costs (“CAC”) and turns delivery into marketing. When a product is consumable, shareable, or replenishable, that effect compounds fast.

B2B gifting may not be Instagrammable (see what I did this week with the Top of the Fold and The Deal Room?), but it’s often higher volume, less price sensitive and more predictable. Corporate buyers value reliability, execution over novelty and once you’re in the system, switching costs rise quickly. This is how gifting businesses smooth seasonality, increase average revenue per user (“ARPU”) and builds durable revenues. At scale, gifting businesses benefit from standardized stock keeping units (“SKUs”), centralized fulfillment, predictable volume spikes, and technology-enabled personalization. Once logistics are dialed in, incremental orders can be highly profitable.

This is where gifting stops being cute and starts being operationally interesting with its predictable demand, sticky customers, and margin resilience.

That’s not a trend. That’s a business.

Branded is proud to announce its partnership with C. Krueger’s (“CKE”), a scalable premium baked goods platform that offers:

C. Krueger’s has established itself in one of the most active M&A segments based on:

Interested in talking about C. Krueger’s? Let’s connect. Click here.

Don’t just scroll—click! Congratulate everyone on making the B List and send some LinkedIn love their way.