Decoration and table setting in a restaurant plays a major role in the gastronomy industry and sets the tone for an extraordinary customer experience.
Most restaurant owners tend to give more emphasis on the quality of food served as well as to the way service personnel treats their guests. However only a few of them have gone the extra mile by giving more emphasis to the small details that transform the customer experience from ordinary to extraordinary.
This is because every time you set a table, you are not just serving another guest, but
you are creating an experience for this person and whether the experience is positive or
negative, it always remains in the customer’s attention and therefore it affects his
decision to visit your place again or not. So how can you provide your guests the most remarkable experience that makes it worthwhile to keep visiting you over again?
Emotional Connection
Experiences are usually connected to feelings, so the first thing you have to do is to create an emotional connection with them. Train your staff to actively listen to your guests, to be empathetic, patient and knowledgeable enough so that they provide the best solution possible for your guests.
Serving a customer is not all about food, but it is about the connection and the relationship you tend to have with your guests, leaving them astonished and willing to not only visit you again, but suggest your place to their friends and family.
Positive Attitude
The second thing you can do to create a unique experience for your guests is maintain a positive attitude regardless of the guests’ behavior.
Sometimes huge workload, stress or a family or health problem that a customer may be going through could lead him to behave more aggressively towards your service personnel. The secret is to teach the service personnel to remain calm and polite and treat guests with respect and kindness because they don’t know what that person may be going through at that particular time.
Be responsive to feedback
Another thing you can do for your guests is to be willing to go the extra mile and deliver more than expected. Always ask your guests for feedback and whether this is positive or negative, be responsive to it by reviewing and analyzing it and take the necessary actions as soon as possible.
Be consistent
Consistent actions lead to consistent results. For this reason, it is of crucial importance to keep being updated and investing on new technological and other methods in order to address customers’ needs in the best possible way while keeping them satisfied and fulfilled.
Be authentic
In the modern tech-savvy gastronomy environment, a customer is smart enough to be able to recognize whether the service as well as the general customer experience offered is authentic or not. Being transparent and genuine while remaining consistent and true to your mission and values earns respect from your clients, thus creating a unique customer relationship based on trust and reverence. True authenticity always shines and comes with a sense of freedom and liberation.
In conclusion, customer experience is a journey linked to various feelings, emotions and actions. However, being able to go the extra mile and get into the shoes of your clients by offering them a unique and personalized customer experience is something not to be dismissed and makes clients keep visiting you over and over again.