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Part of How to monitor brand mentions for UK restaurants and pubs
How to monitor brand mentions for UK restaurants and pubs
A practical guide to brand monitoring for UK restaurants and pubs: which review platforms matter, how to track local foodie posts and what the law expects.
What to take away
- Brand monitoring for UK restaurants and pubs runs on three streams: review platforms, social posts from local foodies, and regional press.
- The owner or general manager owns review replies; the marketing or social lead checks social posts; and the owner or area manager handles press and licensing alerts. Put names against each role, and use a written weekend rota naming the duty manager and an on-call escalation contact.
- Five checks on the same morning each week beat an always-on dashboard nobody reads.
- Reviewer names, photos and booking records are personal data, so you need a lawful basis and a route for erasure requests.
- Closure rumours and tenure changes travel through local news and Facebook groups before they reach your own channels.
Where mentions appear, and which ones matter
Most UK diners choose a table from a star rating and the last few reviews. The platforms that carry those are the ones worth watching. For a restaurant, that means Google Business Profile, Tripadvisor and, where bookings are taken online, OpenTable. For a wet-led pub, Google and Facebook often outrank everything else.
A local foodie filming a Sunday roast does not always name the pub in the caption, so the geotag and the tagged location become the signals you search for. On Instagram, search the venue name and check tagged posts and its location page.
On TikTok, search the venue name and check relevant videos and location-tagged posts where available. In relevant Facebook groups, search the venue name and common variations, checking posts and comments manually. Save searches where the app allows it; otherwise add the accounts, locations and groups to a recurring weekly check.
Regional press matters too. Local titles report licensing hearings and hygiene inspections, and a closure story can run for weeks.
Tool choice follows that list. If you run two or three sites, brand monitoring tools for a small operator are judged on which of these sources they cover, not on how many mentions they count. Google Alerts can flag indexed web and news mentions; Brand24 and Mention are examples of broader social-listening tools. Check each tool's current source coverage before relying on it, particularly for Instagram, TikTok and Facebook groups.
Where mentions appear
| Source | What it tells you | How often to check |
|---|---|---|
| Google Business Profile | Rating, new review text, questions and photo tags | Daily where footfall is high |
| Tripadvisor | Local ranking, review text, management responses | Twice weekly |
| OpenTable | Post-booking ratings and cancellation comments | Weekly |
| Instagram and TikTok | Tagged posts, geotags, dishes being filmed | Twice weekly |
| Local news and Facebook groups | Closures, licensing, ownership changes | Weekly |
How to run a weekly monitoring routine
Five checks, done on the same morning each week, cover most of it.
- Review Google Business Profile, Tripadvisor and OpenTable for new reviews, questions and recurring complaints; check Facebook reviews where relevant.
- Search Instagram for the venue name and review tagged posts and its location page; search TikTok by venue name and review relevant videos.
- Search relevant Facebook groups for the venue name and common variations, checking new posts and comments.
- Review regional press and Google Alerts, then check the relevant licensing register and notices for closure, ownership or licence changes.
- Log each material mention, assign replies or escalation to the named owner, and flag personal-data requests for lawful handling.
Weekly monitoring routine
- Collect new reviews into one sheet
- Search venue name, town and misspellings
- Check geotagged Instagram and TikTok posts
- Read local paper hospitality coverage
- Assign replies to a named person
Handling closures, tenure changes and regional media
A brewery reviewing its pub estate, or a tenant handing back a lease, produces a spike in mentions that has nothing to do with food. Monitoring should catch it early enough for someone to brief staff and regulars before a Facebook group does.
Create Google Alerts for each venue using searches such as "Venue Name", "Venue Name" closing, "Venue Name" closed and "Venue Name" "new landlord"; route them to an inbox the named owner checks. Alerts catch indexed web and news pages, not every social post, so use platform-native searches too.
In England and Wales, the local council is the licensing authority under the Licensing Act 2003; for example, a Westminster venue can check Westminster City Council's public licensing register. Search the relevant register and notices by venue name or address for licence applications, variations or transfers. In Scotland, search the local Licensing Board's register under the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005; in Northern Ireland, check the county court licensing process under the Licensing (Northern Ireland) Order 1996.
If a site changes hands, check Companies House filings for the operating company. A crisis monitoring routine is worth drafting before you need one, because closure rumours move faster than a weekly report.
Keeping review monitoring lawful
Review text, profile names and booking records are personal data. You need a lawful basis to hold them, and a documented way to answer someone who asks what you hold or wants it erased. The ICO's UK GDPR guidance and resources sets out how to choose and record that basis.
Access and erasure requests must be answered within one month. Deleting a review reply does not always remove the record behind it, so the ICO's guidance on individual rights is worth reading before you promise a customer anything.
Never write, edit or commission a review of your own venue. The Competition and Markets Authority leads on consumer protection rules that cover online reviews, including fake and undisclosed incentivised reviews.
Common questions
Do I need to reply to every review?
No. Reply to reviews that raise a specific complaint, name a member of staff, or sit at the top of the list. A short reply saying what changed is more useful to readers than a template apology.
Can I ask customers to leave a review?
Yes, provided you do not pay for it or offer a discount in return, and you never write reviews yourself. The request is fine; the incentive is what causes the problem.
What should I do about a review I think is fake?
Report it through the platform's own process and keep a record of the report and the outcome. Reply publicly only if the review stays visible, and do not threaten the reviewer.
Do I need consent to keep reviewer names?
Not always. Legitimate interests can cover a reply log, but you must be able to explain the basis you rely on and act on an erasure request.
