Ah, customers. Do you ever wish you could see into their brains? There are actually plenty of ways to learn what they’re thinking.

Posts & Tweets

Perhaps the first thing that pops into your mind is Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites you may be using. One expert cautions that these sites are valuable, but they don’t necessarily garner deep insight into what you should or should not be doing (fastcasual.com, 1/4/10).

A good way to get the kind of information you want from social media is to ask specific questions: “What type of item do you feel is missing from our menu?” Or, “We offer three entrées with 500 calories or less; do we need more, and if so, how many?” You could also direct customers to an online survey, such as those offered by SurveyMonkey or Zoomerang.

Why Survey?

Of course, the satisfaction survey is the king of feedback tools. What’s more, it reinforces your image as someone who cares about customers, and helps build long-term relationships.

A carefully designed survey can help you uncover perceptions about food quality and value, wait times, décor and location. You can also find out how servers are doing: Think professionalism, promptness and menu knowledge. Want to know more about where people have noticed your marketing efforts, or whether folks realize that you serve breakfast all day? Just ask.

The Questions

In designing a survey, there are several types of questions you can use. Think of the surveys you yourself have taken, and you’ll probably recall yes/no, multiple choice, and ranking, among others. Questions can also rate items on a continuum (e.g. excellent to poor); these are often useful in determining attitudes. Then there are lifestyle questions; these can help you make improvements in things such as hours of operation and takeaway options.

Whatever you decide to ask, avoid being intrusive. Questions about income, for example, may not be appropriate. If you ask open-ended questions—“What information would you like to see included on our website?—limit them to two or three.

Choosing Words

Some easy tips can assist you in designing a helpful questionnaire. First, order your questions as a “funnel”: Start with broad, general questions, then move to specific questions, and finish by asking for demographic info, e.g. age, kids yes/no and home area. Don’t forget to include a section for comments at the end. As one expert asserts, this could bring up issues that weren’t even on your radar.

Keep questions—and the surveys themselves—as short as possible to help ensure completion. Multiple-choice categories should be clearly distinct, with no overlap. Consider adding an “Other” answer to this type of question, for people to fill in an answer you may have overlooked.

Comment Cards

Short, sweet—and savvy. An attractive, even fun-to-fill-out comment card is always useful. Cards should be professionally printed, or look that way. Place them in a prominent location, perhaps delivered to the table along with the check. Or the hostess could hand them out tableside for extra emphasis. The card should take no more than a minute or two to complete. You could even change up the cards each month to solicit different types of information, or use the card to gauge response to a major change in your menu, décor or procedures.

Roll a Log

Here’s a great idea for tracking verbal comments made by customers. Encourage employees and managers to contribute to a binder or notebook kept in the back of the house. Write in praise, complaints, suggestions and more. Have them include a brief description of any unusual “situatiions” that arose, along with how they were handled. This could be a go-to document for staff meetings and training.

Need Incentive?

Most customers are thrilled to give feedback. But you can also motivate them through discounts and coupons. Contests are another way to get people commenting; offer a free menu item, meal, catered cake or other perk from a random drawing of submissions.

Listen & Act

A columnist for the Detroit Free Press recently requested “top gripes” from her readers (5/13/10) and got an interesting list of seemingly small annoyances: everything from “music too loud” to “wiping tables with the same dirty rag.” Not much to do with food or service, are they? Yet those things, too, help patrons decide whether they’ll return. Who knew? You would—if you made the effort.

Ideally, when feedback reveals something that needs changing, it will be done soon after the feedback is received. What a powerful customer-loyalty tool!

And the Survey Says . . .

There are several companies that can help you design a survey if you desire. Here is a list of seven steps adapted from surveysystem.com.

1. Establish goals.
2. Determine whom to interview.
3. Choose your interview method (or a combination): paper, online, email, website, etc.
4. Create your questionnaire.
5. Pretest your questionnaire if practical.
6. Launch your questionnaire and compile responses.
7. Analyze responses and create reports.

Quick & Easy Survey/Comment Card:

Below is a sample of a basic feedback format following the useful principles outlined in the article.


How are we doing?

Is this your first time here? __ Y __N Today’s date __________ breakfast  lunch  dinner

How likely are you to recommend Mean Gene’s Grill to a friend or colleague?

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
not likely neutral absolutely

How could we increase our score?
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

Thank you for being our guest.



Join our email list and receive info about events and specials.
We will never share or sell your information.

Name _________________________________ Email__________________________________