How to ensure excellent service; monitor it and measure it
The hospitality industry needs its workforce to give outstanding service if it wants to maximise the sale of its products and services. High-quality service will help bring in extra profit and grow the business.
So how do you go about ensuring service excellence? You need to start by looking at all the factors that can affect service and how each person in the team has a part to play.
In turn, customers that are happy with the level of service will be more likely to return to your business and recommend it to their friends.
We can view this process as a chain, where each link affects the next:
Leadership > the employee experience > employee satisfaction > employee motivation and loyalty > employee behaviour > the customer experience > customer loyalty > profit and growth
So now you know how the process works, what can you do to achieve service excellence? Here are some tips:
Review every link in the service chain above and make sure each member of staff is providing a memorable service.
Remember that good service is about the entire customer experience over time. It's not just about looking after them while they are your guests - it's about before and afterwards too.
Remember that customers want service that is tailored to them - they want to feel special.
Recruit people for attitude, not just for skills.
Train your employees in service excellence and keep them motivated.
Welcome customer feedback and make use of it.
Communicate with your team about issues affecting customers and ask for their input and ideas for improvement.
Devise ways to monitor and measure what you do. For example, look out for returning visitors and if they defect, find out why. Also measure employee loyalty and productivity.
Make sure you do what your adverts say you do. For example, if you are offering a free glass of wine with a main meal, make sure everyone gets one.
Decide what type of customer you are targeting and put together a plan for obtaining their loyalty.
Produced by Caterer-online in association with learnpurple