John Keith McLellan

Director, Digital & Strategy Whataburger

Keith McLellan is the Director of Digital and Strategy for Whataburger. He is the strategic advisor for the Chief Marketing Officer and the Strategy Leadership Team. He accountable for digital sales forecasting, sponsoring the digital innovation portfolio, building marketing campaigns that drive loyalty and for optimizing all digital ordering platforms for growth. He manages the loyalty & CRM team, user experience research and design, on demand and 3rd party delivery and digital product teams. He possesses 16 years of experience directing large-scale innovations, customer experience initiatives, gathering consumer insights and standing up new capabilities across the restaurant, retail, and technology industries. Adept at developing, launching, and growing data driven marketing programs and digital products that directly improve the customer experience, business profitability and employee satisfaction.

In 2014 his journey into data driven marketing campaigns were recognized by Nation Restaurant News for being the #1 brand in engagement for all restaurant companies on social media. He went on to launch Whataburger’s loyalty program, mobile app, e-commerce platforms, on demand delivery and digital experience practice that had 5 years of double digital growth. Whataburger has recognized him with a Make It Happen award in 2016 and a Game Changer Award in 2019. In July 2022, QSR Magazine recognized his team’s work for the fastest growing app downloads in July beating out industry giants like McDonald’s, Starbucks and Panda Express.

He is passionate about creating simplicity from complexity and is known for being a strong team builder, mentor, and developer of talent. In his spare time, he loves to fish, read, exercise at orange theory and hang out with his wife Elizabeth and their 3 kids Ruthie, Molly and Duncan.