Why getting feedback is important for your restaurant

Restaurants are like cars: Newer models can dazzle with flashy looks and marketing hype, but only after you test-drive those does their true performance comes to light. Dining during the weekends, over a six week period, at ten different ‘upscale’ restaurants, four of which were in 5-star hotels with the rest stand-alone operations, only at four restaurants did the waiting staff check about my (guest) satisfaction of the meal. Incidentally, of the four such enquiries made, two occurred whilst dining in the 5-star hotel restaurants, with information sought on my satisfaction level done at the very end, i.e. when settling the bill. Getting back to the six other restaurants that didn’t bother to ask; what does this tell us? That the six other restaurant operators felt that they know all there is to know about their guests and their requirements, and, that they therefore, need not make any effort to ask? Or is it on the premise that ‘If we don’t ask they’re not likely to complain’? If, so. This smug or self-satisfied small term approach needs to be changed, and, changed fast.

Clearly, not many are aware of the ‘3-by-3-by-3’ rule. What it represents is for staff to enquire from the guest; within three sips when it is a beverage or within three bites of a meal – above all, to ask within three minutes whether the guest is satisfied with what he or she had been served. Restaurateurs therefore, not only need to define service standards but include standards that mandate staff to seek proper and timely feedback from diners.  The only way one can truly know how someone experiences something, be it positive or negative, is to consider how the diner feels. No matter how exciting and luxurious any one hospitality environment may be, unless your people – the staff, know how to make   connections to other people-your guests, the resulting experiences may be less meaningful and  have more potential to be less satisfying. Guest loyalty, profitability, positive reviews and referral business all may suffer from those “non-connection” moments. 

It appears the goal of many local restaurant operators is mere customer acquisition, which, sadly is a costly and short-term perspective. Restaurant operations that are successful have shifted their focus from a one-time sale to making repeated sales to the same customer. The name of the modern day game is customer retention which pays dividends by way of: a). Lifetime value of the customer. If the customer remains loyal, naturally the repeated visits represent a cumulative value which is quite substantial compared to any single transaction. b). Reduced costs. As we all know, It costs less – albeit more effort, to retain a repeat customer than to acquire a new one.

The key differentiator between customer retention is customer satisfaction. Getty and Thompson defined satisfaction as a ‘summary psychological state experienced by the consumer when confirmed or disconfirmed expectations exist with respect to a specific service transaction or experience’. Rust and Oliver suggested that ‘customer satisfaction or dissatisfaction - a ‘cognitive or affective reaction’ – emerges as a response to a single or prolonged set of service encounters. Satisfaction is a ‘post consumption’ experience which compares perceived quality with expected quality’. Simply stated, Satisfaction results when the customer feels that the value of a product and or the service received by him or her equals or is higher than the price he or she paid for acquiring the product and or service.

People have an innate need to connect to each other. It's what drives us to be close to our families and friends. For some, this desire includes the businesses with whom they commonly associate. It's likely that your regular customers see your business as a friend and as part of the community. I recall  the halcyon days of the ‘Supper Club’ and the ‘London Grill’ during the time of the Colombo Oberoi’ in the late 1970’s, where there was a huge bank of loyal guests who treated these two restaurants as a second home. These repeat guests are vital for obvious reasons, such as recurring revenue and positive word-of-mouth marketing. Theirs is a devotion that goes further than simple loyalty; it's much more personal than that. Your main job is to keep them happy, which isn't actually that difficult...until you mess up. Made worse, if you don’t find out in real time and if you don’t care to find out, it’s ‘bye bye’ guest.

Another common attitude amongst restaurant staff is their unpreparedness to address the guest expectations. The service staff may be aware of the shortfalls but may be unprepared to address the issue in the mistaken belief that the guest may be tolerant, ignorant or that the lapse is unlikely to lead to loss of guest patronage. When dining out, how often have you had to send back your food, because it was either not what you ordered, or was not how you wanted it prepared. More often than not, the shortcoming could have been proactively detected by the server when picking it up from the kitchen – rather than reactively taking it back to the kitchen after the diner points out the mistake! One of the most often carried out behaviors showing no interest in guests is to look at the next table, the overhead TV screen or just gaze away while placing a plate in front of guests or when taking the orders. Honestly, very few waiters are taught the art of staying connected with guests

“The times are changing”, as Bob Dylan wrote, gives a conclusion that the old road for financial success for business was to seek profit growth through market share and through cost economies. Times have changed, and the new order identifies that both cost reduction and revenue increases through retention and satisfaction, or seeking market share and customer loyalty.

Shafeek Wahab

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