The Recipe for Social Media Success: An Interview With a Local Ontario Restaurant Group and How They Use Social Media
For local businesses, social media has become one of the most powerful tools to connect with customers, showcase what makes them unique, and build relationships within their communities. However, using social media for a business isn’t the same as a personal account. It’s not about posting whatever, whenever - it takes strategy, consistency, and an understanding of what content truly connects with an audience.
In this interview, Jaida Williamson, Business Manager with Common Hospitality Group, shares how their Ontarian restaurant group uses social media to support its growing portfolio of brands, including The Common Stove, picnic cantina, The Hog & Penny, and LUCA. From intentional content planning to differentiating each restaurant’s unique identity, Jaida provides insight into how Ontario small businesses can use social media to strengthen their brand, build community, and create meaningful connections with customers and ultimately support their business goals.
Common Hospitality Group and their restaurants: Common Stove, picnic cantina, The Hog & Penny, and LUCA
Q: Jaida, tell us about the Common Hospitality restaurant group and your role.
JW: At Common Hospitality, our goal is to create memorable dining experiences that bring people together. Based in Orillia Ontario with an additional restaurant location in Barrie, Ontario, we've built a collection of unique restaurant concepts, each with its own personality, while sharing the same commitment to exceptional hospitality, quality food, and genuine service. Our portfolio includes The Common Stove (wood-fired steakhouse), PICNIC Cantina (Mexican), The Hog & Penny (English pub), and LUCA (Italian), giving guests a variety of experiences from casual gatherings to elevated dining. As we continue to grow, our focus remains on supporting our local community, investing in our team, and creating spaces where guests feel welcome every time they visit.
As the business manager across a multi-brand restaurant group I oversee a lot of the operational and administrative functions that keep multiple locations running efficiently. I lead our HR initiatives and act as the central point of communication between ownership and restaurant managers and frontline, as well as operational support such as vendor coordination, financial administration and marketing efforts. This also included launching and managing our group’s social media presence (primarily on Instagram), helping showcase each restaurant’s unique identity, share menu offerings, promoting events, and connecting with guests online.
In 2025 Jaida and Common Hospitality won the Orillia Chamber of Commerce Business Achievement Awards Employer of the Year.
Q: How does social media fit into your overall marketing strategy across your restaurant group?
JW: Social media is a really important part of how we connect with our guests and tell the stories behind each of our restaurants. Since Common Hospitality Group has multiple concepts and therefore separate accounts (The Common Stove, picnic cantina, The Hog & Penny, and LUCA), each restaurant has its own personality, atmosphere, and audience. Social media allows us to showcase those differences while still sharing the values that connect all of our brands: great food, hospitality, and creating memorable experiences.
For us, social media is more than just promoting menu items or upcoming events - it’s a way to give people a look behind the scenes, introduce them to our teams, highlight the care that goes into our food and service, and create a sense of community before guests even walk through the door. We want our social media to reflect the same quality that guests experience when they walk through our doors. That means creating photos and content that accurately capture our food, our spaces, and the energy of each restaurant, so people can get a true sense of the experience before they arrive.
Whether we’re sharing a new seasonal dish, showcasing a special event, or celebrating our team, we’re able to create content that feels authentic to each restaurant. The goal is always to make people feel connected to our brands and give them a reason to visit, return, and share their experience with others.
Example posts from Common Stove: patio season, a new menu item, a staff feature.
Q: Has social media’s role changed over the past few years?
JW: Our social media accounts and strategy have definitely evolved. When we first started using it, it was primarily a quick and easy way to share updates, promote menu items, and let guests know about events. Now, it plays a much larger and strategic role in our marketing and branding.
As Common Hospitality Group has grown with the addition of The Hog & Penny and LUCA, social media has become even more important in helping us differentiate each restaurant. Each concept has its own personality, atmosphere, menu, and guest experience, so our content needs to reflect what makes each location unique.
While there are shared values across all of our restaurants: quality food, genuine hospitality, and creating memorable experiences, we want guests to understand that visiting The Common Stove is a different experience than visiting The Hog & Penny, PICNIC Cantina, or LUCA. Social media gives us the opportunity to highlight those individual identities, whether that’s through the style of photography, the tone of our messaging, or the experiences we showcase.
We’re also definitely more intentional about what we share on social media. Every post represents our restaurants, so we focus on quality control and making sure our content reflects the same level of care and attention to detail that guests experience when they visit us in person. We don’t want to post just for the sake of posting or just do something easy. Investing time and effort in our social media strategy is just as important as investing in other areas of our business. In the restaurant industry, guests often experience our brands for the first time through what they see online, so we want to make sure that first impression accurately reflects the quality of what we offer. That means investing in tools and resources like professional photography, thoughtful content planning, and a consistent brand strategy across our restaurants.
@thecommonstove Instagram feed circa 2020
Q: Speaking of strategy, how do you balance business objectives like promoting menu items and specials, with creating content that builds your brand and community?
JW: It’s important for us to find a balance between promoting what we offer and creating content that gives people a reason to connect with our brands. Of course, social media is a valuable tool for sharing new menu items, seasonal features, events, and promotions, but we don’t want our posts to feel like just an advertisement. We want guests to understand who we are, what makes each restaurant unique, and the experience they can expect when they visit.
At the end of the day, we’re not just marketing a meal or trying to create a one-time dining experience - we’re building a community of people who want to stay connected with our brands. Social media allows us to continue that relationship beyond a guest’s visit by creating a following that feels invested in our restaurants, our team, and the experiences we’re creating and making them want to come back (or try our other restaurants!)
Q: How do you measure whether your social media efforts are actually contributing to business success?
JW: When it comes to measuring success on social media, we look beyond just likes and follower counts. Those numbers can provide insight into engagement, but we can also get insights on whether our content is helping build awareness, strengthen our relationships with guests, and encourage people to visit our restaurants.
We pay attention to how people are interacting with our content - what types of posts generate conversations, what dishes or experiences guests respond to, and what content encourages people to learn more about our restaurants. For example, if we introduce a new menu item and see strong engagement, shares, or guests mentioning that they saw it online when they visit, that gives us valuable feedback that our content is connecting.
Although the business side is always an important goal - with organic social media, it can be challenging to directly connect one specific post to a reservation or a sale. Ultimately, we are a small local business and we want our marketing efforts to support awareness, traffic, and growth. But this value mainly comes from the consistency of showing up, telling our story, and building familiarity with our guests over time. Social media for us is about creating those ongoing touchpoints that keep our restaurants top of mind. When someone is deciding where to dine, they may have already seen our food, our team, or an experience we’ve shared online. That relationship and brand recognition are built over time through following our account - not necessarily an impulse decision off of seeing a single post or promotional item and being able to measure the consequential action and subsequent effect on our frontline.
Q: What advice would you give to Ontario business owners who want to improve their social media presence but have limited time or resources?
JW: My biggest advice would be to focus on consistency and authenticity rather than trying to do everything at once. You don’t need to be on every platform or create highly produced content every single day. Start by understanding where your customers are, choose the platforms that make the most sense for your business, and focus on creating content that genuinely represents your brand.
I would encourage business owners or marketing managers to be intentional about their content. Having a simple plan knowing what you want to share, even with limited resources and staying consistent can make a big difference.
You don’t have to create something completely new every day - not everything needs to be content. Start out with posting once or twice a week and go from there. If you put yourself in the customers shoes - do you need to see social media posts from your favourite restaurant three times a day? Probably not.
I think one of the biggest things for business owners to remember is that social media should be approached thoughtfully and intentionally. It’s easy to fall into the habit of posting just because you feel like you need to be active, but the goal shouldn’t be to simply check a box. Taking the time to plan content like post ideas or getting professional photography done makes a big difference compared to AI-slop generated captions or using unedited Canva templates. Taking the time to create meaningful content that reflects your brand will always have more impact than doing what is quick or easy.
Common Hospitality Group’s approach demonstrates that successful social media is not about posting simply to stay active - it’s about creating content with purpose. By focusing on authentic storytelling, high-quality visuals, and an intention strategy - local Ontario businesses from Ottawa to Orillia can use social media as an extension of both their brand and customer experience to build long-term relationships with their audience.
Jaida’s insights highlight an important takeaway for small businesses: while every social media post may not lead to an immediate sale or reservation, the value comes from consistently showing up, building trust, and staying connected with your community and ultimately your customers.
