Director, Social Media

JOB SUMMARY

The Director, Social Media and Consumer Comms is a creative and strategic leader who will lead Denny’s consumer-facing social and earned communications strategy, helping bring the brand to life in culture and conversation. This role sits at the intersection of brand strategy, social, PR, culture, and consumer engagement. The ideal candidate understands that social is more than a cntent channel and PR is more than media coverage. They are powerful tools for building brand relevance, driving conversation, and ultimately influencing consumer behavior. This candidate is equal parts strategist, storyteller, cultural connector, and team leader who can identify what people will care about, turn the insight into an idea, and rally teams to bring it to life.

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS

Lead Social & Consumer PR Strategy

• Develop and lead Denny’s integrated organic social and paid social strategy, ensuring both work together to build brand relevance, deepen consumer engagement, and drive traffic.
• Own the broader social ecosystem across organic content, paid social, creators/influencers, community management, social listening, and real-time engagement.
• Establish a clear social and consumer PR vision that strengthens Denny’s voice, relevance, and connection with consumers.
• Translate the brand platform and consumer insights into culturally relevant social content, earned storytelling, and consumer-facing moments.
• Partner closely with Media and Creative to ensure paid and organic social strategies are complementary by leveraging organic learnings to inform the paid strategy and paid insights to optimize content and audience engagement.
• Identify opportunities to amplify high-performing organic content through paid media and develop paid-first content designed to drive specific consumer and business objectives with agency partners.
• Build strategies that connect paid, owned, earned and social to create greater impact and consistency across the consumer journey.

Lead Consumer PR & Earned Storytelling

• Develop and execute a proactive consumer PR strategy that builds awareness, relevance and cultural credibility for Denny’s.
• Identify compelling brand, food, people, partnership, and cultural stories that can generate earned attention in partnership with internal Enterprise PR team.
• Develop integrated PR campaigns around key product launches, rewards offers, cultural moments, and national tentpole programs

Drive Integrated Campaigns & Cultural Moments

• Partner with Brand Marketing, Creative, Media, Digital, Partnerships and agencies to develop integrated campaigns that work across channels
• Bring a social-first and earned-first perspective to major brand initiatives from brand strategy through execution.
• Identify opportunities for Denny’s to authentically participate in internet and broader cultural conversations.
• Develop timely, scrappy, and high-impact ideas that can earn attention with relatively no investment
• Ensure social and PR are considered early in the planning process, not simply amplification after a campaign is developed. Own Denny’s Organic and Paid Social Ecosystem
• Lead strategy and day-to-day direction for Denny’s organic social channels, including content strategy, community management, and channel growth.
• Define and evolve Denny’s social voice, content pillars, and platform strategies as consumer behaviors and platforms continue to change.
• Develop a proactive content calendar that balances storytelling content series, cultural moments, real-time trending content, food and product promotions, community and real-time opportunities.
• Ensure Denny’s social presence feels distinctive, human, timely, and culturally connected.
• Oversee social listening, community management, and consumer response strategy, identifying opportunities to turn consumer conversations into brand-building moments.
• Establish measurement frameworks and KPIs to evaluate social performance, audience growth, engagement, relevance, and business impact.
• Work closely with the Media team and agency partners to develop an integrated paid and organic social ecosystem that reaches the right consumers with the right message at the right time.
• Partner with paid media partners to lead creator and influencer approvals that can live across organic, paid, and earned channels.
• Ensure social investment works together across the ecosystem rather than operating as disconnected paid and organic programs.
• Identify opportunities for partnerships, influencer collaborations, or user-generated content.
• Provide leadership and development to direct reports.
• Manage boosting campaigns when needed.

EDUCATION & EXPERIENCE REQUIREMENT

Education:

BA in Advertising, Communications or related fields

Experience:

8 - 15 years’ experience in an agency environment, with specific experience around social media management and copywriting.

Experience in the restaurant industry is a plus.

REQUIRED KNOWLEDGE & SKILLS

• Strong understanding of key social media platforms and tools.
• Excellent writing, editing, and storytelling skills.
• Experience with Adobe Creative Suite, or other design tools is a plus.
• Strong project management and organizational skills.
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively in a fast-paced environment.
• Spanish proficiency a plus.

The typical pay range for this role is:

Please note that this range represents the pay range for all positions in the job grade within which the position falls. This job posting is not a promise of any specific pay for any specific employee as the actual pay will take into account a range of factors, including location and experience.

Denny's, Inc. is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all persons regardless of age, race, creed, color, national origin, citizenship status, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, genetic information, military or veteran's status, criminal background, or any other characteristic protected by Federal, State, or local law.

Applicants requiring reasonable accommodation for any part of the application process should contact 864-597-8000. PLEASE DO NOT CONTACT THIS NUMBER TO CHECK THE STATUS OF YOUR APPLICATION.

Denny’s, Inc. participates in E-Verify. We will provide the Social Security Administration, and if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security, with information from each new employee’s Form I-9 to confirm work authorization. For more information on E-Verify, please contact the DHS at 888-897-7781 or dhs.gov/e-verify. Please note that we do not use this information to pre-screen job applicants.