Best Tips For Restaurant Reputation Management

When running a restaurant, you have to manage a lot of different things and amidst all that chaos, it’s easy to forget a crucial piece of the puzzle - restaurant reputation management. 

In the restaurant industry, reputation is everything and can make a difference between booked tables and a dining room that looks more like a ghost town. 

Proper reputation management can help you affect the discourse around your restaurant online, grow your reputation, and evade crises with unhappy customers. In other words, it’s a way to turn positive into more positive and lessen the effect of the negative.

Scroll down to get the most powerful tips for restaurant reputation management, which might help you flip the tables (figuratively speaking) and turn your establishment into a smashing success.

1. Ask customers for reviews

If you already have an SEO strategy in place, you’ll appreciate the fact that restaurant reputation management can help you increase your organic traffic. 

How can you do that?

Quite simply - ask your customers to leave reviews.

Not only is generating positive feedback going to help your local SEO (the SEO that matters for a restaurant), but you’re also going to get more feet through the door. 

Increasing your rating and having overwhelmingly positive feedback on your Google listing and platforms like Yelp will do wonders for your bottom line. According to studies, 91% of customers trust online reviews as much as they trust recommendations from their friends and family. The numbers are also similar for people who go online to find recommendations for local services.

The only challenge here is how to do it efficiently. 

While sending out review requests manually would take a lot of time, you also have to get the timing right. If a customer receives a review request ten days after they were dining at your restaurant, do you really think they’re going to do it? Would you? Probably not.

You can circumvent both of these issues by using a tool such as ReviewArm which allows you to automatically send out review requests through email or text after closing the sale, so to speak. You can also send out these requests in bulk.

Thus, you can capitalize on the positive mood of the customer and the perfect timing, ensuring you get your good review and in turn, increase your local ranking.

2. Monitoring online feedback

Online reviews aren’t just a way for you to increase your ranking and get new customers - they also offer valuable insight. This goes for both positive, as well as dreaded negative reviews.

The feedback that applauds your restaurant can help you spot what works best. Hence, you can easily highlight those aspects in your marketing messages. Negative feedback, while it can hurt, usually provides a better idea of where you can improve, especially if there are any common complaints.

Since there are many review platforms these days, the most popular being Google, Facebook, Yelp, and TripAdvisor, you’ve got your work cut out for you. Monitoring every review on each site can be a full-time job in itself.

ReviewArm also has a solution for that, as you can monitor reviews on all of these platforms (and more) within a single dashboard. You can also set up custom notifications to ensure you never miss a new review.

This last function is very useful for the next part, which is:

3. Respond to reviews

Responding to reviews is one of the main aspects of restaurant reputation management. Customers appreciate it if you respond to their feedback as it shows you care about delivering the best experience possible. 

Just put yourself in the shoes of the average customer. You're checking out a restaurant's review page, and you notice that the business hasn't responded to anything. You would probably just assume they're one of those businesses that only care about their customer’s money.

This is particularly true for negative reviews.

Our recommendation is to avoid using stock copy-paste responses when tackling customer complaints. The best thing to do is to address criticism head-on. Apologize and try to provide an explanation for their negative comments. 

By taking the higher road, you show the ‘’critic’’ and all the new customers who land on that review that you truly do care. Additionally, a well-crafted, genuine response can help minimize any damage from unfavorable responses. Who knows, it might even convince the reviewer to give you a second chance too.

4. Monitor your competition 

When you start doing restaurant reputation management, you need someone else to compare your efforts to. That means you need to keep a close eye on what your competition is doing.

New trends are constantly arising and many restaurants are implementing changes in an effort to attract new customers.

By doing a comprehensive competitor analysis, you can not only keep your customer base but also expand your business.

Since we’re on the topic of restaurant reputation management, you can simply analyze how your restaurant stacks up against your main competitors. Things like how many platforms they are available on, their average rating, and the number of their reviews can offer valuableinsight into how you can improve. 

A tool that can come in handy is GMB Everywhere, which allows you to pull up information on any business automatically, including the number of reviews your competitors have on their business listings.

5. Keep your business listing updated

Since ‘’near me’’ searches have become the main method of looking for businesses, local SEO has become the main focus of many brands. One of the main drivers of local SEO is your Google business listing.

The role of a Google Business Profile is both to attract new customers and to inform them of any operational changes within your restaurant. Keeping the listing up-to-date is crucial since info on your listing shows up on search results and Google Maps.

Your listings should always contain relevant information on working hours, reservation options, menus, and so on, which is a great way to inform your customers' purchase decisions. In turn, it allows you to further strengthen the trust of your customers.

Restaurant reputation management 

Keeping your reputation spotless is one of the most important ways to ensure the success of your restaurant. Make no mistake -it’s always going to be an uphill battle, but by using some of these tips, you’ll have a solid foundation for your future reputation management efforts.

Naturally, this is not something you do once and kick up your heels as keeping your reputation in check is a constant effort. This is why using tools such as ReviewArm that help you standardize your approach and automate the processes are a must.

If you’re interested in completely overhauling and simplifying your restaurant reputation management, fill out our contact form to sign up. Invest in your future and receive more reviews, attract more customers, and ultimately, increase your revenue!