If you are a restaurant owner, you probably understand how important it is to make your customers feel valued and appreciated.
And asking for their opinion is one way of showing appreciation.
And how can you do it?
By running a survey.
Surveys are quick and easy tools that can help you gather feedback and valuable data that you can later use to improve your menu, service, food, or delivery.
And most importantly, show how much effort you put into boosting your customer satisfaction and improving the overall dining experience.
But what should I ask? Where do I start?
Don’t worry; just scroll down to this blog post.
We covered everything that you need to know about customer surveys, asking questions, and doing all these online, worry-free, with no additional costs.
Let’s jump in.
Why you should create a restaurant survey?
You’ve played a guest role in someone else’s restaurant at some point in your life.
And you had certain expectations about the food quality, staff friendliness, and restaurant hygiene.
All of these “factors” influenced the decision whether you will return to the restaurant or not. Right?
But now, when the roles are reversed, you are responsible for meeting your customers’ expectations as a restaurant owner.
How can you do that?
By conducting a survey and asking your guests for feedback.
Their opinion is crucial if you want to boost their satisfaction and deliver better results next time.
Questions you should include in your restaurant survey
Before we jump on the list of questions, I want you to ask yourself this:
What am I trying to find out?
Do you want to know how your guests found out about you? Or are you more interested in whether they liked the food?
Whatever you have in mind, running a survey with specific and well-formulated questions is the first step towards gathering valuable information from your customers.
We know how busy the restaurant business is, so we made a list of important questions you can start using right away.
Also, there are few technicalities you need to be aware of when giving the answer options.
But no worries, we have explained them all in section 3 of this blog post.
The bottom line is that your guests have the answers; you just need good questions to pull those answers and find out if you need to work more on improving their restaurant experience.
Without any further ado, we present you with the list of questions you should ask your guests.
General restaurant feedback questions
- How did you find out about us?
- When did you visit our restaurant for the first time?
- Would you like to revisit this restaurant?
- How often do you dine with us?
- How likely will you recommend this restaurant to your family or friends? (Net Promoter Score question)
- Please rate your visit on value for the money.
The general feedback question is a more broad category referring to your restaurant’s marketing or customers’ demographics.
Why should you ask these questions?
Well, it’s essential to know which media/channels your audience uses the most.
If that is social media, then you should focus your efforts on promoting the restaurant there. Especially these days where food images are a big aesthetics part of many Instagram accounts.
Read more:
Restaurant survey questions about the service
- Who served you today?
- Do you feel the services were welcoming and friendly?
- Did the food arrive on time?
- Did you face any issues with any service at the restaurant?
- Was your table clean when you were seated?
- Was your server knowledgeable and able to answer your questions about the food and beverages?
Since service is a major aspect of the restaurant’s overall experience, you shouldn’t avoid asking these questions. The friendly and welcoming staff is just as important as serving delicious food.
Covering these questions can help you understand if your customers are facing problems with your employees.
This way, you can detect the issues and work on their improvement later.
Restaurant survey questions about the food and drink
- How would you rate the quality of the food at our restaurant?
- How were the drinks and beverages?
- How do you rate the variety of options on the menu?
- Is there anything you’d want to see on the menu that’s missing?
- Are there any drinks you’d like to see on our menu?
- The quality of the food was great
- How would you rate the food service?
Food and drinks are the essence of a restaurant and probably the main reason why people visit you in the first place. Therefore it is crucial to ask your guests for their food preferences to transform them into returning customers one day.
Restaurant survey questions about the facilities
- Was the music too loud?
- How would you rate the cleanliness of the bathrooms and dining rooms?
- Were the seats at the restaurant comfortable?
- Did the Restaurant Have a Family-Friendly Environment?
These categories focus on other factors that contribute to your guests’ overall satisfaction, such as hygiene, music, or restaurant inventory. A pleasant ambience accompanied by decent music volume and comfortable seats is a big plus to the overall satisfaction.
Technical restaurant survey questions
- Did the food arrive at your place quickly?
- How much effort did you make to place an online order?
- Was it easy to navigate through the website?
- Which online ordering provider did you use?
- Did you use any of our discounts or special offers?
- Was the packaging seal still intact when you opened it?
- How long did you wait for the food to arrive?
More and more restaurants have become aware of the power of online ordering.
In such cases, the technical questions about websites or food apps should be part of your online survey.
This way, you will make sure that your customers don’t have a hard time ordering food and that the user experience is smooth and easy.
Getting started
Free online form template
Best practices for restaurant survey questions
The answers you’ll receive will depend on the questions you ask.
Pretty logical, right?
Well, it’s easier said than done.
There are a few technical sides you need to keep in mind.
Say No to Yes/No questions
Yes or no questions are great if you want straightforward answers. However, they don’t give insightful feedback, which you can later use to improve your restaurant.
Example: Did you like that we serve chicken fingers with french fries? Yes or no.
Instead, ask: Which garnish would you like our chicken fingers to have?
This way you can know for sure what your guests prefer. It’s a great way of learning different tasty combinations as well.
Try open-ended questions
Open-ended questions are great for letting your guests speak their minds.
It allows your customers to add additional comments and point out things you may not have included in your survey.
Example: What did you like about our food menu? Or What did you dislike about our food menu?
The point is that you are not offering answers like in multiple-choice questions or rating scales like in net promoter score surveys.
You allow them to answer what they want.
Avoid bias questions
Bias questions mean that you are leading someone to answer the question in a certain way.
Why is this not acceptable?
Because you want the truth.
It would be best if you had honest and correct answers, so you would know exactly what to fix or continue doing.
Example: How great was our food today?
This is a biased question since you lead your customer to say the food was great.
Instead, ask: What did you think about the food today?
Keep your survey short
While running a survey is beneficial for your business and we believe that many people will be happy to answer, keep in mind that the questionnaire should be no longer than 2-3 minutes.
Shorter and simpler surveys have higher response rates; therefore surveys with 5-6 questions give the best results.
Create a restaurant feedback form right now
Online surveys are a handy tool for gathering feedback.
Many businesses use surveys to measure customer’s experience and use the data as actionable knowledge to improve their product or service.
But why do it online?
And should a restaurant use an online survey template?
Yes, absolutely!
The best part is that premade restaurant feedback forms like EmbedForms are already available and created to make your life easier.
You can use our online form to gather information from your guests smoothly and hassle-free.
It’s cheaper than using paper surveys and a lot faster and easier as well.
Our system automatically generates a link that you can send to your guest via email or Facebook.
Every time a respondent submits feedback, it will be automatically transferred to our system, from where you can have an organized and clean overview of the survey responses you’ve received.
There are other benefits, like a higher response rate, real-time responses, and higher accuracy.
The customers can answer whenever they want, and the answers are automatically recorded.
That being said, online forms can significantly help you in gathering customer feedback, especially if you are a busy restaurant owner.
Conclusion
Nobody is experiencing the food service or the overall atmosphere of the restaurant as your customers do.
Their point of view is super important if their satisfaction is your priority and you are thriving to become number one in the restaurant industry.
That’s why you should create an online restaurant feedback form and ask for your customer’s opinion today.
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