Customer surveys are a good way to find out more about guest preferences straight from the source. This gives you a better starting point when it comes to marketing ideas and creating promotions. Here’s everything you need to know about making a smarter restaurant survey.
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Tools for Success
What Kind of Questions Should You Ask?
What you’re asking customers matters just as much as how you ask it. Remember, you already provided the service that guests are paying for so they’re completing this questionnaire on their own time. Keep it short, sweet and to the point to prevent people from clicking away before they finish. The ideal restaurant survey has fewer than five questions that take no more than ten minutes to complete.
Mix open-ended with multiple choice so they don’t feel overwhelmed and you still get a bit of detail.
Ask one question at a time. For example, split up, “What did you like best about your meal? What did you like the least about it?” into two separate questions or simplify it to say, “How was your meal?”
Instead of asking why guests liked or disliked something about the service, ask what they experienced. This helps you avoid leading questions and eliminates bias from the survey.
Mostly, just remember simplicity is best. You don’t have to use every question that comes to mind. Keep the survey short and quick. You can even rotate questions throughout the year to aggregate more data without overwhelming customers.
Is Your Survey Ready for Launch?
Once you’ve built a survey that you’re sure will give you the most necessary data, it’s time to have others give it a second look. Test your survey on different devices to make sure it’s equally optimized for mobile, desktop, and tablets. Also, have your staff test it out to double-check that the questions make sense, are easy to answer, and that they would actually follow through with the whole survey if they were a customer.
Response rates are higher when you run your questionnaire through employees first. You should also swap out your survey questions semi-regularly so your best customers have room to change their opinions. This also gives you a chance to learn about various aspects of the business, not just answers to those same five recycled questions.
Survey Question Examples
Coming up with relevant queries can be difficult, but here are a few ideas to get you started with brainstorming.
How likely are you to recommend us to a friend?
Was the service quick enough today?
What do you want to see on the menu that isn’t currently there?
How often do you visit us?
What did you like most about your experience?
What did you like least about your experience?
How was your service today?
Rate our cleanliness on a scale of 1-10.
Would you eat here again? Why or why not?
Remember that these are only suggestions. Use them as a jumping-off point to generate ideas that apply specifically to your service and your customers.
A good restaurant survey identifies weak and strong points of the business so you can do better in the future. Critiques are necessary and asking your best customers to point out what you’re doing wrong will help you grow. It’s all about becoming a better business so you can make every sit-down meal a positive experience. Sometimes restaurants just need a smarter Point of Sale to manage their employees and customers more effectively while streamlining operations too.
