Milena Traikovich is a seasoned leader in the world of demand generation, recognized for her ability to transform raw analytics into high-performing local marketing strategies. Currently focused on helping multi-location businesses navigate the complexities of 2026, she specializes in bridging the gap between digital visibility and physical growth. In our conversation, we dive into the fascinating correlation between a brand’s digital pulse and its real-world expansion, exploring how a high Local Visibility Index (LVI) often precedes news of grand openings and robust real estate growth. We also examine the increasingly selective nature of AI-driven discovery, the operational discipline required to maintain a five-star reputation, and the shift from generic corporate social media toward authentic, localized engagement that builds genuine community trust.
Considering the data showing that expanding restaurant chains are recommended by AI platforms like ChatGPT about 20% of the time—nearly seven times more often than those closing locations—what specific digital signals are these AI models prioritizing right now?
The shift we are seeing in 2026 is that AI discovery has moved from being a experimental channel to a highly selective gatekeeper. When you look at the numbers, it is quite startling to see that while roughly 35.9% of brand locations can fight their way into a traditional Google 3-Pack, only about 1% to 11% are getting that coveted nod from AI platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, or Perplexity. These models aren’t just looking for a keyword match; they are looking for a high standard of data accuracy, a reputation for quality, and content that actually feels differentiated. For expanding brands like Culver’s or Texas Roadhouse, the AI is picking up on a wealth of consistent, positive signals that contracting brands simply aren’t generating. This 6-to-7-times gap in recommendations exists because AI models act like a discerning concierge—they only want to suggest a place where they have high confidence the user will have a great experience, and the data suggests that brands with their houses in order are the ones winning that confidence.
The Local Visibility Index shows a stark 14.8-point gap between brands that are flourishing and those that are trimming their footprints; how does this digital performance serve as a real-time indicator of a company’s physical real estate decisions?
It is easy to blame the economy or menu fatigue when you see headlines about Wendy’s or Pizza Hut closing doors, but the LVI data tells a deeper story about operational health. When we see a flourish-oriented brand hitting an average score of 61.4 while a shrinking brand lags at 46.6, we are looking at a digital reflection of how the company is being run from the ground up. This 14.8-point gap isn’t just a marketing metric; it’s a measurable signal that often appears long before the trade press starts reporting on store closures or footprint trimming. If a brand is failing to show up in local search, missing from AI recommendations, and ignoring its social community, those digital “leaks” are usually indicative of broader management struggles that eventually lead to those tough real estate decisions. In 2026, we view digital visibility as a connected system—if the digital infrastructure is crumbling, the physical storefronts aren’t usually far behind.
In the realm of reputation management, expanding brands are responding to nearly 73% of their Google reviews and doing so two to three times faster than their competitors; why has review response speed become such a critical operational discipline?
Reputation is no longer something you just monitor; it is a lever you have to pull daily, and the winners in 2026 treat it with the same discipline as food safety or inventory. We found that expanding brands maintain a high Google rating of 4.39, but more importantly, they are responding to 72.4% of their reviews, which is a massive jump from the 43.6% response rate seen in contracting brands. This speed and coverage matter because it proves to both the customer and the search algorithms that the brand is listening and active. When you see a full star gap on Yelp—3.65 for expanding chains versus 2.49 for shrinking ones—you’re seeing the difference between a brand that engages with its community and one that has gone silent. For a marketing team, this is one of the few areas where you can see a measurable turnaround in weeks rather than years, simply by systematizing how you acknowledge and resolve customer feedback.
There is a massive twenty-six-fold difference in local social engagement between expanding and contracting brands; how are the successful chains moving away from “waterfall posting” to build actual local communities?
The era of “waterfall posting”—where a corporate office pushes the same sterile image to a thousand different location pages—is effectively over for any brand that wants to grow. Expanding brands are currently seeing a 3.45% local social engagement rate, which stands in staggering contrast to the 0.13% engagement rate of those who are struggling. This 26x gap isn’t because the big brands are just posting more; it’s because they are posting better, more relevant content that actually tastes and feels like the local neighborhood. When a brand like Nothing Bundt Cakes creates content that resonates with the specific city it’s in, they end up with five times more local followers on average. It’s about building a real audience that wants to hear from you, rather than just filling a slot on a content calendar with generic corporate imagery that people have learned to tune out.
Do you have any advice for our readers?
My strongest advice for any multi-location marketer in 2026 is to stop treating your digital presence as a series of separate to-do lists and start viewing it as a single, integrated ecosystem. You have to realize that data accuracy isn’t just a one-time cleanup project; it is the vital infrastructure that every AI platform and search engine uses to judge your brand’s credibility. If you haven’t specifically tested how your brand appears in AI queries across ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity, you likely have a massive blind spot that is affecting your local discovery. You need to systematize your review responses to ensure speed and high coverage, and you must empower your local teams to create social content that actually reflects the community they serve. If you can align your search, reputation, social, and AI strategies into one cohesive machine, you aren’t just improving your marketing—you are building the digital resilience necessary to keep your physical locations thriving for years to come.
