It's Fatal To Leave Your Restaurant Customer Service To Chance

It's Fatal To Leave Your Restaurant Customer Service To Chance

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Great food, a great restaurant and great customer service. When all these 3 elements come together, you are truly providing great value for money. Everything else depends on your marketing.

Getting your customer service right can help overcome some shortcomings in the other parts. Your food will taste better with excellent customer service levels and your restaurant will be more cheerful with a smile. So even if your restaurant (decor) and your food are running at 80%, brilliant customer service can help make up the shortfall.

So what makes great customer service? Put quite simply, it's exceeding your customers' expectation.

As a restaurateur you have responsibility to provide training for your staff. You are responsibility for providing great customer service because:-

a) your customers, even if they don't demand it, they deserve the best you can provide, b) yourself, you must be proud of your restaurant and your accomplishments, c) your staff, they need ongoing training for their personal development to keep them interested and motivated. It is also in their best interests to excel, by providing high quality service it will boost their earning power with increased tips.

A happy customer tips more, spends more and visits more often. Furthermore he will be more fulfilled and will be overjoyed with his decision to visit your restaurant. Just in case you are dubious, I can assure you that the power of great customer service cannot be overestimated.

Where do you start. Well there are organisations that specialize in training for our industry, but the initial move should come from you, the owner. You should have a clear idea of what your business goal is. Ensure your whole staff, right down to your KP's, know what your business vision is and work at achieving it. When your whole team operate as a team, everyone gains, customers included.

Everyone should be happy in their role, if they aren't, it's your fault. WOW, that's a powerful statement, but the truth of the matter is 'it is your responsibility to ensure your staff are engaged, enthusiastic and driven to getting job satisfaction'. If they are unhappy you need to find out why, and correct it.

Start by having open sessions with your staff, so that they can make suggestions. Creating an 'open door policy', meaning people aren't afraid to make a comment or voice an opinion, will clear the air. You will also gain by your staff making suggestions. Remember they are on the front line, they will recognise areas that could work better.

Once you have this agreement with your team members, it's time to bring in a specialist restaurant customer service trainer. Talk to all potential candidates for this role, because I suggest you want one who will encourage individuality in your team. Not one who will turn them into 'Stepford Wives', "Hi, my name is Barbie and I will be your waitress this evening".

I am not suggesting that an introduction is wrong, but there is nothing worse than using a script that everyone has to follow word for word. When it comes to a situation that's not in the script, they can easily get lost, simply because you have taken away their personality.

Many large chains use a scripted customer service manual, some highly successfully others not so. The plus here is that they give regular training, the minus, they tend to create robots. That's fine if you are running an inter-galactic restaurant!

For you to gain the advantage, offer great training that allows individuality and you're onto a winner.

Start now and you will see changes in your customers' satisfaction levels, your results and your bottom line, in no time at all.


Copyright (c) 2011 Baz Rothwell

About the Author:
The very best resources are available for customer service tips, marketing your restaurant with social media and other strategies http://restaurantmarketingguy.com If your would like to get a free introductory course on establishing a social media presence go to http://bit.ly/hzeZUo Baz Rothwell specialises in business development and marketing.



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