If you’ve ever considered using restaurant customer surveys to find out more about how you can satisfy your clients, read on.

What do you know about your customers? Do you know why they come to your restaurant? Do you know what they tell others about you? Do you know their opinion on what you might improve on? If not, then it’s time to craft a restaurant customer survey and use that highly valuable customer feedback to turn the fortunes of your restaurant on its head.

Restaurant customer surveys can be very beneficial and helpful, just as long as they are created in a way that will deliver insightful and practical answers. Let’s look at how to create your restaurant customer surveys so that you have information that you can work with:

Creating the Survey

Before you get started, it’s important to be aware of who you are going to be giving this survey to. Is it for new customers or those who are currently in situ?

According to some marketing agencies, it’s incredibly expensive to acquire new customers as opposed to upselling to existing ones. It’s these existing ones that will be delivering 80% of your profits too.

Once you decide who to give it to, your next decision is how you want to operate the survey. Will you use technology and make it an online only survey, or will you hand out a pen and a paper in the more traditional approach.

Now you’ll also need to get clear on what it is that you want to know from your customers. Are you looking for feedback on your latest menu design, your latest culinary creations or whether your staff are friendly, knowledgeable and easy to order from? This survey can also give you the opportunity to ask questions about cleanliness, reputation and your marketing. It really is a golden opportunity to make the best of.

Finally, you’ll need to decide how long you want the survey to run for. Is it an ongoing campaign or one that is just for a few days?

Using Restaurant Customer Surveys for Valuable Feedback

Survey questions should be short and easy

Don’t get flowery in your writing style, nor use technical terms that only restauranters might understand. Get straight to the point and make your questions easy to read and understand.

Your survey should also be short in length. The longer it goes on, the more likely the quality of answer will suffer as people tire and stop adding value just so that they can finish the survey. We recommend that you ask questions and provide a rating scale for the answers, for example from very unhappy to very happy.

When it comes to getting customers to respond, many owners use incentives such as discounts or even a free drink or appetiser. By providing something of value to your customer, they are more likely to respond authentically and completely to the survey.

With regards to the medium that you use to distribute your restaurant customer surveys, we know that SurveyMonkey and SurveyTown are good. You can distribute the link to those who have eaten at your restaurant and booked through the app. Otherwise, get your survey printed and ask customers to complete it right at the table where they’ve just had their meal.

In summary you need to:

  • Ask what you need to know
  • Keep it short
  • Give enough time to complete it
  • Keep questions on one topic.

Once you have received your completed surveys, go through them and make notes of what actions need to be taken. Also bring them to the attention of wait staff or chefs, depending on which areas you focused your survey on. If you have received negative comments, you can respond to them if you have their contact information.

Now that you have some insights from your restaurant customer surveys, into how your customers see you, you can change a few things that you know will make all the difference.