Social
Social media management for restaurants
Good restaurant social media management does one job: it turns a scroll into a booking. We run your Instagram, TikTok and Facebook with content that looks like your actual room and ends in a reservation, not posts for the algorithm and likes that never paid a wage. It is part of Packed Out, and we report it in covers, not followers.
Posting is easy. Filling tables isn't.
Almost every venue has an Instagram. Most of them are a graveyard. A flurry of posts when the place opened, then nothing for three weeks, then a panicked menu photo at 11pm. The owner knows it matters but it is the first thing to drop when service is on, and the agencies who offer to fix it usually hand it to a junior who has never plated a dish and posts the same beige carousel every venue gets.
The result is content that talks to no one. Stock-looking food shots, captions written to please an algorithm, and zero connection to the people three suburbs away who would actually book if they saw the room on a Friday night. Followers tick up slowly and not one of them turns into a cover.
Social is one of the few free channels where a single reel can put your venue in front of thousands of nearby diners. Run badly it is a chore that returns nothing. Run properly it fills the nights you choose.
We don't post to keep the account alive. We post to put a specific person at a specific table on a specific night.
The whole account, run for you.
Monthly content plan
A plan built around your trade: the nights you want busier, your new menu, the events worth posting, and the Australian moments that move bookings, from long weekends to footy finals to the festive rush.
Reels & short video
The format that actually reaches new locals now. We turn quick phone clips from your prep and service into edited reels and TikToks that show the room, the food and the people, captioned and on-brand.
Feed posts & stories
A consistent feed that looks like your venue, plus stories that drive action: today's specials, last-minute tables, function spots, behind-the-pass. The stuff that gets a tap to book.
Captions, hashtags & community
Captions written for your suburb and cuisine, local and discovery hashtags that actually surface you, and replies to comments and DMs so an interested diner gets an answer, not silence.
Platform setup & bio
Profiles optimised so a new visitor knows what you are, where you are and how to book within two seconds: clear bio, booking link, location tag, highlights and pinned content sorted.
Reporting in bookings
Each month: profile visits, link taps, saves, shares and the DMs and bookings social drove. We tell you what worked and what we are changing. Followers are a footnote.
A venue that posts to a plan, not to a panic.
The dead accounts all have the same problem: no plan, so every post is a last-minute scramble. We run your content off a handful of pillars that rotate, so the feed always has something to say and it always ladders back to a booking.
The food. The signature plates, the new menu, the dish people screenshot and send to a mate. Shot well and shot often, because food is the reason most people follow a venue in the first place.
The room and the vibe. A Friday night full and loud, the courtyard in summer, the candles at 8pm. This is what sells the experience and tells a local what a night at your place actually feels like.
The people. The chef, the bartender, the regulars, the team. People follow people, and a face behind the pass builds the kind of connection a plated dish never will on its own.
The offer. The reason to book this week: the quiet-night deal, the function spots, the long table for a group, the last-minute Thursday tables. The post that asks for the action.
The moment. The Australian calendar, the long weekend, the footy final, the Christmas function season from late October. Content timed to when your diners are already thinking about going out.
Pillars mean we are never staring at a blank account wondering what to post. The plan tells us, and every post earns its place by moving a booking closer.
The right platforms, not all of them.
You do not need to be everywhere. You need to be where your diners are, posting the format each platform actually rewards. Here is how we choose.
Instagram: the core
Almost every venue lives here. It is where locals check you out before booking, so the feed has to look like your room and the bio has to make booking obvious. Reels reach new locals, stories drive same-day action, and the grid is your shopfront. For most venues this is where the bulk of the work goes.
TikTok: the reach play
TikTok rewards food content heavily in Australia and can put a single dish in front of tens of thousands of locals fast. It is gold for a venue with a signature plate or a strong room, but it needs a steady supply of short video. We push it when you can sustain that, and skip it when you cannot rather than letting it rot.
Facebook: the locals & functions
Still where an older local audience, events and function enquiries live, and where community groups and recommendations happen. We cross-post the right content, run your events, and keep it active for the diners and the function bookers who genuinely use it. We do not pretend it is dead when for many venues it still books tables.
Short video is how new locals find you now.
Reels and TikToks are the format that reaches people who do not yet follow you, which is exactly the audience that fills new tables. A static carousel mostly reaches your existing followers. A good reel can land in front of thousands of locals who have never heard of you. So short video is where we put the effort, and we have a system that makes it sustainable rather than a weekly grind.
It starts with a shot list. Your team does not need to be filmmakers. They need ten seconds here and there on a phone, and a list telling them exactly what to grab. A typical week looks like this:
- The pass during service: a plate going up, the steam, the final wipe of the rim.
- A pour: wine to the line, a cocktail build, a coffee being pulled.
- The room filling up at the start of service, shot wide.
- A prep moment: dough, knife work, the morning bake, the mise en place.
- One quick piece to camera from the chef or owner about a dish or the week's special.
- A happy table or a reaction to a dish landing, with permission to use it.
You drop those clips into a shared folder. We do the rest: edit to the format and length each platform wants, cut to trending audio that is right for your venue, write the caption and the hook, add the captions on screen, and schedule it. Filming takes your team minutes a day. The polished output looks like a venue that has its act together, because it does.
Phone clips that look real beat polished stock every time. Diners can smell a stock photo, and they scroll straight past it.
Your diners make your best content.
A diner filming your room and posting it is more convincing than anything you can stage, because it is real and it comes with their stamp on it. We build user generated content into the plan: we watch your tags and mentions, reshare the good stuff with credit, and run a simple system that encourages diners to tag you so the supply keeps coming.
We do it properly on rights. We always get permission before resharing, we always credit the creator, and we never lift a photo or a clip without the okay. That keeps you compliant and it keeps regulars happy to keep tagging you, because they know you will treat their content well. When it makes sense to go further and partner with local food accounts, that crosses over into influencer marketing, which we run as a separate service.
Then there is the inbox, which is where a lot of social actually turns into money now. Most enquiries about tables, functions and hours come through DMs and comments, and a slow reply is a lost booking. We monitor it through the week, answer booking and function questions promptly in your voice, hand anything we cannot answer straight to you, and keep comments acknowledged. An active, responsive account also signals a busy, cared-for venue, which is its own quiet ranking and trust signal.
A real month, not a vague promise.
"We will manage your social" means nothing without specifics. Here is roughly what a month on the Managed service looks like for a typical venue.
- A monthly content plan you approve once, built around your trade and the calendar.
- Three to five feed posts or reels a week, weighted toward short video for reach.
- Stories most days: specials, last-minute tables, function spots, behind the pass.
- Captions written for your suburb and cuisine, with hooks that earn the watch and a clear call to book.
- Local and discovery hashtags that actually surface you, refreshed as they tire.
- Reshared UGC with permission and credit, so your regulars become your reach.
- Comments and DMs monitored and answered through the week, in your voice.
- Profiles kept sharp: bio, booking link, location tag, highlights and pinned content.
Consistency beats volume every time. We would rather post four strong reels a week than seven weak ones, and the exact cadence is set in your plan based on your platforms and how much raw footage we can capture from your floor.
A Brunswick café, from quiet feed to booked brunches.
"We were posting once a fortnight and getting nothing back. Three months in, the reels were doing the talking and the weekend waitlist was real for the first time. People walk in saying they saw us on Instagram."
Owner, café off Sydney Road, Brunswick (figures illustrative)
The cafe had a beautiful room and a hero dish and a feed that did neither justice. We set the content pillars, gave the team a shot list for prep and service, and shifted the weight to reels. One reel of the signature dish being built landed 118k views, mostly from locals, and brought a run of new weekend bookings. We ran the DMs so function enquiries stopped going cold, reshared UGC from regulars, and reported it all in profile visits, link taps and the covers the owner could trace back to social. The point was never the view count. It was the waitlist.
Capture once, post all month.
Find your angle
We work out what makes your venue worth following: the signature dish, the room, the regulars, the story. Then we set a voice and a look that stays consistent across every post.
Make filming easy
You get a simple shot list so your team grabs ten seconds of footage during prep and service. No production crew, no extra job. Phone clips that look real beat polished stock every time.
We edit & schedule
We turn that raw footage into a month of reels, posts and stories, written, captioned and scheduled. You approve a plan once and it runs while you work the floor.
Engage & report
We handle comments and DMs, watch what each post does, and report monthly on the bookings and link taps it drove. The plan adjusts to whatever is working.
An account that earns, off your plate.
You stop dreading the posting and start seeing it show up in the book.
- A consistent, on-brand feed without you touching the app during service.
- Reels that reach new locals and put them on the path to a booking.
- A clear booking path from every profile, post and story.
- Comments and DMs answered, so an interested diner does not go cold.
- Monthly proof of what social drove, measured in taps and covers.
- A dead account that makes your venue look closed.
- Generic carousels that could belong to any venue in the country.
- A report full of follower counts that never paid a supplier.
The first 30, 60 and 90 days.
Social compounds, so the early weeks are about building the engine before the reach kicks in. Here is roughly how it runs on our Managed service.
First 30 days: set up
We find your angle, set the voice and look, optimise the profiles and bio, and build the first content plan. Your team gets the shot list and we start capturing. The feed gets consistent immediately, even before reach builds, so a visitor no longer lands on a dead account.
Days 30 to 60: momentum
Reels are running at cadence, the pillars are rotating, UGC is being reshared, and the DMs and comments are handled. Reach starts climbing as short video lands with new locals, and you see the first lift in profile visits and link taps.
Days 60 to 90: it shows in the book
The account looks alive and busy, reach is well up, and the bookings start tracing back to social: function enquiries in the DMs, "saw you on Instagram" at the door, fuller nights you can see in the report. We double down on whatever format is pulling.
Measured in covers, not in likes.
Likes do not pay a supplier. So we report the things that lead to covers, and we tell you plainly what worked, what we are doubling down on and what we are cutting.
- Accounts reached and profile visits, the top of the path to a booking.
- Taps on your booking link and your address, the clearest signs of intent.
- Saves and shares, which signal content that actually resonated and spreads.
- DMs about reservations, functions and group bookings, and how we handled them.
- The reels and posts that pulled, so we make more of what works.
- Where we can attribute it, the bookings and covers social drove.
Follower count gets a line at the bottom because owners like to see it, but it is a side effect, not the goal. A venue with 4,000 engaged locals who book beats one with 40,000 followers in another country every single night.
Tuned to how Australians eat out.
Australian food social has its own rhythm. The calendar drives bookings: the long weekend brunch surge, Melbourne Cup lunches, footy finals, Christmas functions from late October, and the long quiet stretch in February that good content can soften. We post to the moments that actually shift trade in your city, not a US holiday calendar.
Local discovery matters more than reach. A reel that does numbers nationally is nice, but a reel that reaches a few thousand people within driving distance of your door is what fills tables. We tag your location, lean on suburb and city hashtags, and chase the local food accounts and pages that send real bookings, not vanity views.
We also keep it honest and compliant. Any post tied to alcohol respects the responsible-service rules, giveaways follow the platform and state requirements, and we never fake reviews or buy followers. The trust you build with locals is the whole point.
Want the method? Module 7 of the Playbook covers content and social for venues end to end, from shot lists to the posting cadence.
Run it yourself, or hand it over.
The Playbook (DIY)
Social is one part of the full Packed Out system, written down with templates, shot lists and a content calendar. Module 7 shows you how to run it yourself between services. A one-off $499.
Done for you
Our team runs your social ongoing, from plan to posting to DMs, alongside the rest of the system if you want it. You approve, we run it.
Social is one channel. Here are the others.
Owners ask us this about social.
What does restaurant social media management include?
We plan and run your venue's organic social: a monthly content plan, regular posts and reels on Instagram and Facebook, short-form video for TikTok where it fits, stories that drive bookings, captions and hashtags written for your suburb and cuisine, replies to comments and DMs, and a monthly report on what drove profile visits, link clicks and bookings. Paid ads are a separate service we can run alongside it.
Do I have to film the content myself?
No, but the best results come from a mix. We give your floor and kitchen a simple shot list so you can grab quick clips during prep and service on a phone, which always looks more real than stock. We then edit, caption and schedule everything. For venues that want it, we can arrange a periodic shoot day. The point is to make filming take minutes, not become another job.
How often will you post?
Consistency beats volume. For most venues we run three to five feed posts or reels a week plus stories, which is enough to stay in front of locals without burning out the content. We would rather post four strong reels a week than seven weak ones. The exact cadence is set in your plan based on your platforms and how much raw footage we can capture.
Should my restaurant be on TikTok?
Often yes, but not always. TikTok rewards food content heavily in Australia and can put a single dish in front of tens of thousands of locals, which is gold for a venue with a signature plate or a strong room. It does need a steady supply of short video, so we will only push it if your venue can sustain that. If it is not a fit, we put that energy into Instagram reels instead.
How do you measure whether social is working?
Not by likes. We track the things that lead to covers: profile visits, taps on your booking or address link, saves and shares, DMs about reservations and functions, and where we can attribute it, actual bookings. Each month you get a plain report on what moved, what we are doubling down on and what we are cutting. Followers are a side effect, not the goal.
Can I use customer photos and videos in my posts?
Yes, and user generated content is some of the best content a venue has, because a diner filming your room is more convincing than anything you can stage. The rule is you need permission. We get it the right way: replying to ask, using their tagged post with credit, or running a simple system where diners agree to let you reshare when they tag you. We never lift a photo without the okay, and we always credit the original creator. It keeps you compliant and it keeps regulars happy to keep tagging you.
How quickly do you reply to DMs and comments?
Fast, because a slow reply is a lost booking. Most enquiries about tables, functions and opening hours come through DMs and comments now, and a diner who does not hear back picks the venue that answered. We monitor the inbox through the week, reply to booking and function questions promptly, hand anything we cannot answer straight to you, and keep the tone yours. Comments get acknowledged too, because an active, responsive account signals a busy, cared-for venue.
We are a brand new venue with no content. Where do you start?
We start before you open. The lead-up is some of the most valuable content you will ever post: the fit-out, the menu development, the first staff, the countdown to opening night. It builds an audience that is ready to book the week you launch. We set up the profiles properly, lock in the voice and look, give your team the shot list, and run a pre-open content plan so you do not open to silence. From there it is the normal monthly system.
The guides behind this service.
Want to understand the how before you hand it over? These free guides break it down, with real Australian numbers.
Let's make your social earn its keep.
A 15-minute call, no pitch. We'll look at your account and tell you straight whether social can move covers for your venue, and how.