You may be unfamiliar with social media, but being both available and reachable for customers online is critical for your business. The internet is highly influential, so as a restaurant or bar owner it is better to accept your position and be a part of it.
Your most recent reviews or comments are seen as a reflection of the current status of your service. There are a wide range of businesses out there that consumers can choose from. Thus, they are more willing to go with the company that is attentive and giving them the best service.
It is critical to stay updated on consumers to provide helpful responses while trying to maintain response time within the hour. Also, by resolving the majority of complaints within the day, you will be on the right side of your consumers.
If a customer makes a post about your bar, should you respond?
First ask yourself: “Would you ignore a customer sitting at the bar commenting about your service?” Hopefully not. You should treat online responses in the same way. Expressing gratitude is relatively easy to do, and it is the equivalent of your host thanking customers on their way out the door.
Encourage your employees to ask customers to post and write a review when they know they have provided good service. Your happy customers present social proof to potential customers, which convinces people to spend their money and time at your establishment. On the other hand, poor reviews provide a chance to change the narrative and show your excellent customer service.
No matter the type of post, it is important to recognize and respect a customer’s opinion and the time they took to share it with you. However you chose to structure your process of managing online reviews, always make sure you’re responding to your customers’ comments. It is what keeps them coming back!
Responding to Customers
Make your customers feel heard by ensuring active responses or comments. By ignoring comments, you may lose out on returning customers.
Responding to positive comments builds rapport while establishing a relationship with your customers. Responding to negative reviews – you must always respond to a negative concern – lets you do damage control. Although negative reviewers may not always be polite, the fact of the matter is that they still took the time to give your business feedback. It is beneficial to alter interactions based on the customer and their desire to ensure they feel important and supported. As a business, when you go out of your way to make things right, you are showing them how deeply you care about their experience.
How to Respond:
- Start with a thank you and/or appreciation.
- Show acknowledgment of their needs.
- Be positive and professional.
- End courteous or invite them back.
Example of an appropriate way to respond to your customer:
“So glad to hear you enjoyed your dinner here, (name). Thanks for checking us out and taking the time to share. Hope to see you again if you’re ever back in town!”
Whether positive or negative feedback, this is an opportunity to show off your location in a favorable light. Also, improving your company’s customer responsiveness online and offline will help influence customers to visit your establishment again and again.
Sources:
https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/7578-social-media-customer-service.html
https://dixa.com/blog/how-to-respond-to-customers-on-social-media/
