Is Instagram’s Reservations Feature Good Business for Restaurants? Jury’s Still Out

Remember last year when Instagram announced the ability to book appointments and reservations on its platform and coverage breathlessly claimed that Instagram was taking on OpenTable and others? That’s not actually how it worked out. Instagram is potentially taking on the powerful networks that reservations companies have built by offering restaurants the ability to market themselves via social media marketing and advertising directly to diners looking for a table. But whether the diner makes the reservation via a link from a restaurant’s Instagram profile or via the restaurant’s own website, it’s still using its contracted reservations service to book the reservation. That is, if a restaurant is on the Resy platform, a reservation made from the restaurant’s website or from Instagram still goes through Resy, not through some magic Instagram reservations service. In that case, Instagram's reserve button isn't so much a threat as it is another perk that third-