August 4, 2025 • 43 mins
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Restaurant owners, are you struggling to maintain steady growth despite your marketing efforts?
The answer might be simpler than you think. In this eye-opening episode, Ewan Thompson, Chief Performance Optimizer for Hospitality Benchmark Services, reveals the startling truth about guest retention that could be costing you six figures in revenue.
Did you know that returning restaurant guests spend 20% more per visit than first-timers and bring in 10-15% more people with them? Yet the hard data shows that 90-95% of restaurant guests never return after their first visit. This isn't just a statistic—it's a massive growth opportunity hiding in plain sight.
Ewan breaks down his proven guest retention playbook, explaining why five-star reviews and excellent food simply aren't enough anymore. "We've got to be emotionally connecting with our audience, and we've got to be doing it consistently," he explains, detailing his "emotional advantage" framework that transforms ordinary service into memorable hospitality through four key touchpoints: welcome, guide, personalize, and appreciate.
What makes this conversation particularly valuable is how it challenges conventional restaurant wisdom. Rather than pouring resources into costly guest acquisition or discounting (which Ewan warns creates "loyalty to the discount, not loyalty to your business"), he advocates for a systematic approach to retention that elevates every aspect of your operation.
The most successful restaurants create genuine emotional connections and make it remarkably easy for guests to return.
Ready to stop leaving money on the table? Download Ewan's guest retention playbook and emotional advantage framework from the show notes and start transforming your approach to hospitality today. Your guests—and your bottom line—will thank you.
Resources:
The Guest Retention Playbook – the exact framework we use with operators to drive 6 figure growth through guest retention - Get your free copy of the Guest Retention Playbook
The Emotional Advantage – 4 touchpoints to elevate your Order of Service with emotional intelligence - Download your free guide to deepen guest connections and drive loyalty.
P.S. Ready to take your restaurant to the next level? Here are 3 ways I can support you:
- One-on-One Coaching - Work directly with me to tackle your biggest leadership challenges and scale your operations with confidence. Learn more at christinmarvin.com
- Multi-Unit Mastery Book - Get the complete Independent Restaurant Framework that's helped countless owners build thriving multi-location brands. Grab your copy at https://www.IRFbook.com
- Group Coaching & Leadership Workshops - Join other passionate restaurant leaders in transformative group sessions designed to elevate your entire team. Details at christinmarvin.com
Podcast Production: https://www.lconnorvoice.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Do you know that guests that come back to your
restaurant a second time spend20% more than their first visit
and they bring in 10 to 15% moreguests?
Today I'm talking to EwanThompson, the Chief Performance
Optimizer for HospitalityBenchmark Services.
Ewan helps restaurants smashreturn guest frequency without
(00:31):
discounts or paid marketing.
He believes that nearly everyrestaurant is sitting on a
six-figure growth opportunity.
They just don't realize it'sburied in poor guest retention.
Today Ewan is unveiling hisguest retention playbook the
exact framework he uses withoperators to drive six-figure
(00:52):
growth through guest retention.
We're also talking about theemotional advantage, the four
touch points to elevate yourorder of service with emotional
intelligence, your order ofservice with emotional
intelligence, and we're going todeep dive into how to train
your staff to lead with aretention mindset with every
single guest, you and I.
(01:13):
Has offered two incredibleresources that can be downloaded
in the show notes of thisepisode, so make sure you don't
miss out.
Let's get started.
Welcome to the RestaurantLeadership Podcast, the show
where restaurant leaders learntools, tactics and habits from
the world's greatest operators.
(01:34):
I'm your host, Kristen Marvin,with Solutions by Kristen.
I've spent the last two decadesin the restaurant industry and
now partner with restaurantowners to develop their leaders
and scale their businessesthrough powerful one-on-one
coaching, group coaching andleadership workshops.
This show is complete withepisodes around coaching,
(01:58):
leadership development andinterviews with powerful
industry leaders.
You can now engage with me onthe show and share topics you'd
like to hear about leadership,lessons you want to learn and
any feedback you have.
Simply click the link at thetop of the show notes and I will
give you a shout out on afuture episode.
Thanks so much for listeningand I look forward to connecting
(02:21):
.
And I look forward toconnecting.
Ewan, you talk a lot aboutguest retention.
That's what you focus on withyour clients and that's what
your zone of genius and skillsetis in.
Can we start, though, by justreally basically defining what
does retention mean to you whenyou talk about that?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Okay, so I talk a lot about it because it's the best
bit, really christian, um, uh,and what retention is?
So, um, what's the kind of thetechnical term is is how many
guests are coming back.
Let's, let's, let's break itdown to that over a period of
time, so you might take one yearcompared to one year, or six
(03:04):
months compared to six months,and in that time, how many of
your guests actually came back?
And that, in a nutshell, isretention.
And then, when we talk aboutfrequency guest frequency it's
like how many times they'recoming back, you know, um, in
that particular cycle.
So one, two, three, five plustimes.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Okay, so you have the opinion that, or come from the
perspective that it makes moresense for restaurant owners to
focus on retention versusbuilding first-time guests and
driving traffic.
Would you talk a little bitabout that?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
No, oh well, yes, I will talk about that, but they
need to do both.
What I'm not saying is what'shappening at the moment is we
are requiring and everyrestaurant's doing this and I
look at a lot of numbers and alot of reservation platforms and
we are acquiring guests.
(04:00):
That's what we do and that isthe primary focus of everybody
running a restaurant.
What I'm saying is we need tojust look at how we're retaining
these guys, because when youlook at the numbers I rarely see
when I first look at uhplatform data 90 to 95 percent
(04:20):
of guests do not come back, andwhat I'm saying is we need to
shift the dial and have a lookat why these guys aren't coming
back into our restaurants andwhat we can do to influence that
performance, because it's huge90 to 95.
Don't come back don't come backwithin within the time period,
(04:41):
so that's generally a year, soyear on year, and you're not
seeing 90 to 95 percent of that,so put that into perspective I
looked at a reservation datalast week um there are two, two
and a half million turnover siteum, so that equates to about 10
000 bookings a year.
(05:02):
Out of those 10 000 bookings,500 came back um, so it's a big,
big, big opportunity wow, andit's it's more cost effective to
focus on retention versus goingafter.
Yeah, correct, yeah there's somuch that it brings in terms of,
(05:25):
you know, all these KPIs thatwe go after as restaurant
managers and restaurantoperators, and guest acquisition
is expensive in itself.
Advertising, perhaps.
I mean five, perhaps even fiveto seven times cheaper to retain
a guest than is to acquire anew one.
(05:46):
But also, new guests spend less.
So a retained guest and I pickthis up in, you know the United
States all the time they'respending 15 to 25 percent more
organically.
So they're more comfortablewith your restaurant they're,
you know they've been perhapsonce or twice and um, they, you
(06:07):
know they're, they become alittle bit more relaxed to order
rather than going to theirgo-to, perhaps their go-to
dishes.
So yeah, it's.
And what else do they bringback?
More covers.
So retain guests organicallybrings back more people as well.
So so we're always focused onthese kpis and they spend per
(06:28):
head and our margins and ourlabor percentages, and you know,
rightly so we are.
But but when we ignore guestretention, which is something
that that covers all these otherkpis, you know, at your peril
do that.
That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Yeah, I mean it makes sense, right, that a guest that
comes back a second time orthird time or fourth time is
going to spend more money, right?
They're more comfortable inyour environment.
Like you said, they know themenu, they know the qualities
there.
They're probably going to bethere.
You've earned their trust,right.
Maybe they've had a greatexperience with the team, they
love the menu items and so theyare willing to lean in and get a
(07:05):
little bit more adventurous andtry some other things that they
wouldn't necessarily try, orlean on the staff a little bit
more to make somerecommendations, right, with
some food and wine pairings orsomething like that.
Have you noticed that in thedata that you're pulling, are
the guests that are coming backa third time and a fourth time?
(07:27):
Are they spending more eachtime they come, or is it pretty
consistent across the board?
Speaker 2 (07:34):
um, so it depends on the restaurant.
Yeah, I was literally lookingat the data this morning for
somebody and every level had aspend increase.
So second and third and fourthtime had a spend increase, but I
don't always see that.
I certainly do see a goodincrease compared to a first
(07:55):
time and one time, you know onetime diner.
So, and it's significant, andit's significant, you know it's
more than you could do if youwere just focusing this from a
spend-per-head perspective andtrying to get your team to
upsell and sell more.
You know it outweighs thatgenerally most of the time.
(08:16):
So, yeah, they are spending more, but you know, one of the
things about guest retention isit doesn't happen by accident
and what we believe you knowfive star reviews um, you know
that kind of good well, goodservice, good food.
(08:37):
We believe that is enough andit's the wrong thing to think
about because it isn't.
And I see and speak torestaurant owners all the time.
We look at reviews and they golook, you know, and rightly so
they're proud of theirperformances and their guest
retention numbers could be, youknow, pretty low 5%, 5%, 10%.
So it's not enough anymore justto have good food and good
(09:03):
service.
We've got to be emotionallyconnecting with've got to.
We've got to be emotionallyconnecting with our audience and
we've got to be doing itconsistently.
Um, and we've got to give thema reason to remember, um, and
what so many aren't doing isgiving them that reason to
remember yeah, how do you, youand how do you help them close
that gap?
um, so well it's.
(09:27):
It's.
It's really starts with like areal inward look at yourself and
your business and what's goingon on the guest journey.
I frame it into a um, what Icall no grow echo, so three kind
of stage process.
Um, but I encourage restaurants, you know, and restaurants seem
to do this themselves.
(09:47):
It's the same kind of platformthat I do with our clients as
well.
So, but that first bit is no,it's really understand you and
your business and where thingsare.
You know, perhaps dropping off,perhaps that's your team.
It's getting into the numbers,it's looking at your onboarding,
(10:09):
your training, you knowanything, get people excited
around guest retention and whatit means and how it can impact
your managers and what theirroles are going to be to play in
it.
But then into the guest numbersthemselves.
The guest journey.
You know where does that guestjourney start?
And it certainly isn't comingthrough your front door and
leaving.
It's well before that.
(10:29):
It's when they looked at yourwebsite.
It's how they found you, it'severything they went through to
make that booking.
Um, and you've only got to, like, walk in their shoes a little
bit, you know, with a bit offresh eyes, and realize
sometimes we put some amazinghurdles up for people trying to
book our, trying to do us afavor and booking our
restaurants.
(10:49):
Yeah, and some of the, some ofthe things you've got to do
sometimes to to leave your carddetails, or to you know to
change your booking, or to youknow to request something, or
you know, or just anything youknow.
Sometimes it's just you knowthe list of terms and conditions
that you need.
You know to request something,or you know, or just anything
you know.
Sometimes it's just you knowthe list of terms and conditions
that you need you know half aday to read, and it's you know.
(11:12):
So it's just you know.
That's.
That's what I mean.
It's just we've got to make thisalmost, almost look at it like
amazon how easy it is to orderon amazon and you know sometimes
how you know you can.
Almost.
Also, you've already ordered itby mistake and it's coming, and
you don't how you know you can.
Almost.
Also, you've already ordered itby mistake and it's coming and
you don't realize you've done it.
And that's how we've got tothink about our restaurants in
terms of how do we make it this,this journey?
(11:32):
You know it's easy and seamlessand, as you know, as good as
possible.
So, and then, right the waythrough to after people have
left, how is that connection?
How have we built up someemotional equity?
How have we, um, how are weable to personalize perhaps a
response or, you know, reallykind of, you know, connect with
(11:53):
our audience after they've goneas well?
so, it's yeah, it's a lot, it'sa lot to think about, but, um,
but yeah, and it really wouldlook at what you do all.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
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From the conversation that youand I had last week in
preparation for this episode, Itook one of those nuggets that
(13:05):
we talked about and I want tohear your perspective on loyalty
programs.
But I was talking to arestaurant operator here in town
who's been they've been opensince 1965.
And he said and I've gotanother client that's asking me
too, like I want to start aloyalty program, what do I do?
And we were talking and he saidyou know, since we've been open
(13:28):
since 1965 and our clienteleare very tech adverse.
He's like we're trying tofigure out ways that we can do
things on pen and paper or workwith our staffs to take notes so
that when people come back weremember their drink order.
You know, and I'm thinking backin the old days where we used
to have log books behind the barand the bartenders would write
down notes about guests.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
And I told him the little nugget that you had
mentioned about setting up aseparate phone line so that if
guests want to book areservation a VIP guest or
repeat guest wants to book areservation rather than calling
the restaurant or trying to booksomething online this line
right, which is the owner'sseparate phone number and just
(14:07):
hey, call me and I'll make thereservation for you, yeah, so so
this is, this is, you know,when we talk about, um, kind of
this, uh, hook, you know the endof, perhaps the end of a meal,
you know this, but what toolkitdo we have to get people to come
back in?
And then, pretty much in mostother businesses it's like do
(14:28):
you want to rebook?
You know, get going yourhaircut, when do you want to
book it in again?
When do you want to come?
When do you want to?
You know, when do you want tocome back in it?
And in restaurants we don't lookat it like that too much,
because we think it's like it'sawkward and it's an awkward
thing to say and the guest isgoing to go, I don't know when
they want to come back, yeah,and you know, and that's that's,
you know, that's that's theright way to look at it, because
you don't want to be, you knowit's such a ridiculous.
(14:49):
You don't want to leave thattaste in their mouth if you got
it wrong, as the last thing theyremember is like someone trying
to force them to book again.
But you can do things, you know.
You know, and this, thistoolkit, that, that, that
perhaps you, that, that we about, or I talk about in terms of
giving our teams, you know, theability to be able to kind of
like say, oh okay, we've got anevent coming up or the menu
(15:11):
change, or there's, you know,book, book.
You know this is my number, bookwith me.
You know, send me a message andyou know I'll take care of it
all and it's, you know, itdoesn't have to be, you know,
you think that doesn't even haveto be your own number, that
could just be your restaurant'sa restaurant, perhaps cell phone
, that's separate.
I mean, some of the platformsthese days actually do have a
(15:32):
number and it converts to amessage and you're able to do
that if you do have that sort oftechnology.
But there's, I think, theblocker.
What happens in everything thatwe do in a restaurant
environment is somebody blocksit out in their head and it just
doesn't get past the next stageand it's good.
(15:52):
Oh, we can't say that to aguest.
Well, actually there's 20, 30things you could do and it all
comes out with sitting down andkind of looking at what you're
doing and looking at the guestjourney and realizing the value
in slight, perhaps even smalllittle changes.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Um, you know, we'll have on guest retention yeah,
and I think you knowunderstanding the cues, uh, are
really really important theverbal cues and non-verbal cues.
I was actually I was in chicago, um, for the national
restaurant association show andI had a, took myself out to
dinner, had an extraordinarytime and I was just so
(16:31):
overwhelmed with just thehospitality and the touch points
and how engaging the staff wasthat I made it a point on the
way out the door to say to theteam working the door thank you
so much.
This was so lovely, I said.
I looked while I was dining.
I noticed you guys havedifferent restaurants in your
group.
Next time I come to the city,you know, I'd love to check out.
I look forward to checking outmore and more of the restaurants
(16:53):
in your group and the I don'tknow if she was a host or
manager, it didn't matter.
She said thank you so much forsaying that I would love to send
you my phone number and haveyou book with us next time you
come into town.
And so that was lovely.
It didn't feel forced, itdidn't feel salesy and I did not
get an automated text messageresponse right after I gave her
(17:15):
my number, which felt reallygood, because I think that piece
of tech of thanks for diningwith us next time.
You know that feels sales.
Yeah, yeah, gross and I I lovedthat she didn't.
She didn't send me a text atall, it was just this like
really nice exchange.
Uh, that felt very, verygenuine.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
So yeah, what, what was um?
So what was the kind of thething that stuck out to you
there?
Then it was the emotionalconnection that this team kind
of put onto you.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah it just.
The overall experience waslovely.
It was a french restaurant.
The vibe was just gorgeous anddark.
They had a ton of fake flowerscovering the entire ceiling,
like hanging from the ceiling.
It was just this very like warm, inviting experience and the
staff embodied that too.
It really was just I mean, youtalk about the little lamps
(18:11):
lighting your menus at the barjust very intimate and cozy and
they were gracious.
It just all matched.
It was just very much on brandand the experience just flowed
all the way through, which wasgreat.
And this restaurant you had toenter in and then go up two
flights of stairs to actuallyget to the front door of the
restaurant, so you kind of hadto go on a journey before you
(18:33):
even got to step foot in thefront entryway.
But it was just uh, it wasmemorable.
I've never had somebody say letme give you my personal phone
number.
Um, we would love to.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
I've never had anybody do that before.
Yeah, we were.
We were talking about that, youknow, that's the thing.
So, yeah, yeah, I mean, there'sso much you can do and it's
free and it's.
You know, imagine, before youarrived, you got a message from
her saying hi, kristen, I've gotthe most amazing table for you,
(19:07):
looking forward to seeing youtomorrow.
From, you know, from Ewan, andI'm there that day when you
arrive, and you know, we'venever met before your first time
in the restaurant.
I mean imagine that compared towhat I mean, you thought that
was great at the end.
Imagine, before you've evencome in and you go oh my god,
that you know that is free, youknow there's, you know, know
there's so much you can do whenyou, you know, when you kind of
(19:29):
have a plan.
And I think what stops uscertainly perhaps the big oh,
it's too big, oh, we can'tcontact everybody.
We can't.
You know we've got 100 bookingsor 300 covers in tonight.
We can't contact everybody.
And the point of guestretention is you're not going
after everybody.
You don't need to like this.
(19:51):
Five percent, ten percent ifyou're at 95 percent return you
know you're 95 percent, yourguests aren't coming back if you
get up to 90 or 85, a five orten percent, that is huge to
your, to your revenue, like huge.
And that's a one revisit, nevermind two, three, four and five.
So so this misconception wherewe've got to boil the ocean and
(20:13):
go for everybody and, um, youknow, and you end up not doing
anything, really uh is you knowit's completely wrong.
And so you can do thesepersonal touches.
You can, you know, you cancapture personal and
personalization from yourexperience and use that in a
message to you yeah and the morewe use, you know, for the tech,
(20:34):
the less tech minded which, bythe way, I don't sit in that
camp that massive like tech.
You know, I'm not that person,but I do work with it and I do
utilize it and I, you know, lookat it quite a bit.
But I know, like, with AIcoming, that anything that you
now put into Capture's guestdata that can be able to be
scraped and pulled out andpersonalised into a message to
(20:55):
you so we can make that perhapsmore scalable to a lot of people
.
But we've got to get theinformation in there in the
first place.
But it's I don't know me thetext.
What the tech helps us yeah, ithelps us is not the soul, it's
not the emotional connectionthat has to be delivered by an
(21:19):
ops team, you know, who actuallygive a shit, who actually care
yeah, I agree with you and Ithink now that we're talking
about this, I've got all theseother examples coming up.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
I think that one thing I learned in working in
the brunch restaurant for sevenyears is that people were very
much creatures of habit and wewould see the same people come
in every single day, mondaythrough Friday, to get their
same breakfast order.
And tourists can be that waytoo right.
If if we are going out to eatand we find like for me, I'm the
(21:49):
same way with a breakfastrestaurant.
If if I find something I like,it's going to be my go-to place
to get my meal started, fuel myday.
But when I was in Denver atthis amazing restaurant called
Alma, alma Fonda Fina, they justgot nominated for a James Beard
award.
Um, monday, the 16th of June,and you have you can't make a
reservation.
You can't get in, I think, anyearlier than 60 days Like it's
(22:12):
taken 60 days to get areservation there.
I tried to walk in a couple oftimes as a as a party of one,
totally packed, which is amazing, right, just keeps me wanting
to come back and try to get inmore and more.
I went in for dinner, sat onthe patio and talked to the
manager and said hey, I've triedto come in a couple of times,
so excited to be here.
The weather was shit that nightbut they took amazing care of
(22:33):
me.
It was great.
I was happy to be outside.
And they happen to have acancellation for the next night
for the chef's counter.
And the manager came back outand said I don't know if you're
here tomorrow, if you're in town.
Came back out and said I don'tknow if you're here tomorrow, if
you're in town, but I've got areservation that opened up for
one at four or for two at four30 at the chef's counter.
Do you want it four 30 in theevening for dinner?
Right, he got past theassumption that I didn't want to
(22:56):
come back two nights in a rowand I said, hell, yeah, and yes,
I brought a friend, right.
So I think I think, if we couldget over these assumptions that
, like you're saying, whenpeople are walking out the door,
what if we say, hey, we've gota dinner available?
What if we say, oh, we've got acancellation tomorrow night?
Do you guys want to come?
I, it's a, it's an invitationto bring people back more than a
(23:18):
sales tactic, right, I thinkit's all about the approach and
the language we use.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
Yeah, and it doesn't have to be on the night.
Could be, and the language weuse yeah, and it doesn't have to
be on the night, could be thenext day, it could be a week
later.
Could be a text from themanager who's met you, who knows
you, now you have arelationship with.
Could be a text from the hostperceptionist, whatever you know
, it doesn't you know whoeverwants to get everybody involved.
Could be could be the serverwho's amazing and gives other
connections.
It doesn't matter as long asit's genuine.
And it isn't, and it doesn'tcome across to you like you
(23:44):
mentioned, like taking my number, get a message, an instant
message straight away and allthat goes out the window.
You know it's, it's false.
But when it isn't false andit's backed up with, you know, I
mean I talk about five starreviews aren't enough and food,
good food and good service isn'tenough, but it has to be there.
You know the food and theservice has to be there.
(24:06):
The hospitality comes on top ofthat and that when I talk about
hospitality, not necessarily inthe building, it's you know,
it's this relationship with thisfollow-up, it's.
You know, if you've got thetech to, perhaps the epos
integrations where you can seewhat people have ordered and
what their, what their go-todishes are and you can start
running events inviting them tobased on that.
(24:27):
Right, you know, but that'sstill a space.
Pushy sale pushy doesn't have tobe pushy, but it's very much of
a sales approach.
And when I talk about reactiveservice, which is what everybody
does, it to intentionalhospitality, which is what I'm
talking about with guestretention, um, it's not about
selling.
We're not about selling, we'reabout guiding, we're about
(24:48):
pointing things out, you know.
You know that's.
That's the experience.
That's the experience in-house,you know.
But it's also the experiencewhen we're perhaps reaching out
someone before they came in.
If we've identified them,someone to reach out to, you
know, not trying to do everybody, so that can be a very
personalized thing and that canbe built from guest notes.
So when you came in last time,you know you were here for
(25:10):
something you know graduation,or your daughter or whatever,
you know a birthday or somethinglike that, and you know, and if
you then be able to say, oh, itwas great to see you last year
on your daughter's birthday,you're coming back again, I
can't wait to see, and somethinglike that it's, you know, that
just makes it just just amassive point of difference and
um, but you've got to have the,you've got to have the offer
(25:32):
right and the service right, andobviously, well, I say
obviously but I think I need tosay it, um, because it's
important, but it's, but it'snot enough, and this is why I
say this is the fun bit, kristen.
This is, this is why, because itgetting people to come back in
is, isn't that?
Isn't that why you run arestaurant?
(25:52):
Isn't that why we openrestaurants?
Isn't it about getting peopleto come back in?
And isn't that when you're,when you, you know, as an
operator I was for for years andyears and years that's the fun
bit.
That's the kind of like, likesurpassing expectations, like
really, you know, wooing guestsand wowing somebody, and you
(26:14):
know that this is all we'retalking about.
We're just talking about it ona, on a, perhaps a, perhaps
perhaps a bit more of a kind ofscalable thing, but that's all.
Ultimately, that's all we'retalking about.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Yeah and you don't.
We don't need a reservationplatform.
We don't need data in order tobuild great connections and
relationships and make peoplefeel good.
Right, I think I've been taught.
I've been thinking a lot aboutthis since we talked last week
Like, yes, there's been so muchyou know that I've experienced
over the years of buildingculture and putting together
(26:48):
teams that truly care aboutpeople and that really care
about the experience, but Idon't think I've ever said or
led with a mindset, a retentionmindset.
When it comes to the team.
I don't, like we've talkedabout, yes, we want repeat
guests, but I am just I can'tget over the comment that you
(27:09):
made last week about liketraining your teams to have to
lead with a retention mindset.
How do you help people do that?
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Yeah, okay.
So now are you now thinking whyhaven't I been doing this?
It's a simple reframe.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
I think maybe have in so many in certain words, but I
but.
But I asked somebody the otherday.
I asked a restaurant owner.
After we get off the phone, Isaid is every single person on
your team understanding thatretention is the goal of the
guest experience?
And they just looked at me likeI had two heads yeah, yeah,
yeah there's a disconnect heresomewhere yeah, there is, there
is, is, and why.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
I don't know why that is, but it's everywhere and
sometimes, you know, sometimesit's like the wood through the
trees, isn't it?
You just can't you.
Just why are we here?
What are we doing?
Yeah, and when we when I, youknow, work with you know a lot
of restaurants, they'll have anorder of service or service
(28:10):
criteria or whatever.
That is a rightly so and theyshould do, and the goal has
always been, you know, make sureit doesn't sound robotic.
You know, starters in fiveminutes, drinks it in two
minutes, blah, blah, blah, blah,blah.
Upsell this, do this, upselldessert, mentioned teas, coffees
, etc.
Etc.
And and that, in a, you know,flippant way I've just put it,
is what your order of service isand and what.
(28:35):
What it doesn't have isemotional, the emotional
connection, which I call, like,the emotional advantage, and so
a lot of the work that I willhave somebody focused on.
All I work with is transformingthis order of service, and I
don't mean transform it, andthis is the beauty of it is, we
were not about rewriting it.
(28:56):
You know, do all the bits youwant to do if you want to get
them in.
You know that is how you do it,but we're about adding in
emotional connections to this.
So this is, this is.
This is the way that goes on inthe building.
So this is, this is, this is thebit that goes on in the
building.
And you have, you know, you'vegot you've got a team of people
in your restaurant who for, ifit's like most restaurants,
(29:18):
perhaps a wanting development, aneed in development feel like
they haven't been trained, feellike somebody else who's just
coming to have more trainingthan they've had.
You know all these things thatgo off when people says that we
probably don't get to the bottomof enough.
You know, with.
This is why I love guestretention as a piece of work, as
a there's a not a piece of workas a complete strategy to run
your entire restaurant group on,because it covers all these,
(29:41):
these other things.
It's like this, this onboardingpiece.
If we, if we onboardedeverybody with this retention
mindset and, you know, reallycome to buy into it.
And this is why we're doing itand we're going to train you on
this, to do this, and this iswhat good looks like, and you
know you get off on that thatgreat foot.
And if you've got a managerthere in the business going
right, okay, we're going toincentivize you on guest
(30:03):
retention and this is how we'regoing to get there.
You know this is.
This is professional restaurantmanagement development.
You know it's like.
This is proper, how to lookafter guests, how to you know
everything else has to be inline.
Everything else has to be good.
So so if I'm, if I'mincentivizing you or bonusing
you as a manager on on guestretention, on guest retention
(30:25):
numbers I know those retentionnumbers are going up.
Everything else in thatbusiness has to be pretty good
because that guest is not coming, going to come back for for
shit.
You know it's got to be good,so I am.
So why don't we have that in?
Why don't we have that as ahuge kpi, um and and I know we
(30:46):
don't because I look at a lot ofrestaurant apis and I work with
a lot of management teams andyou know it's it's margins, it's
it's spent per heads, it'slabor percentages, it's never
guest retention, um and uh andit.
It's such a beautiful thingbecause it's, as I say, it's a,
it's a development piece for theentire business.
(31:08):
So, yeah, um, but I was justgoing to say actually before,
just one of the things that youknow.
It was about this emotionalconnection in service I was
talking.
I was talking about notrewriting your um order service,
but adding this emotionalconnection.
Um, and there's four stagesthat I call that.
I won't go into them.
(31:29):
I might send you a copy of this, actually, that people could
perhaps link to because it'scalled the.
Emotional Advantage.
It's just about transformingyour order service with welcome,
guide, personalize andappreciate.
So it's these four, so this bigwelcome from everybody.
It's guiding people through themenu, depending on whether
their first, second, third orfourth time dimes or what have
(31:51):
you.
It's really appreciating, uh,it's really personalizing sorry,
what's you know.
So capture, capturing,personalization, so you can use
it again or recommend, but, um,you know, but certainly be able
to have something in in thatguest profiling and then this
really appreciate and engineerthis emotional landing for when
(32:13):
guests leave.
And it's about building theseemotional connections.
But that's it.
In two seconds I'll send you acopy, kristen, and people can
perhaps download it.
Speaker 1 (32:24):
And then that four-step retention strategy is
gold, it, and then thatfour-step retention strategy is
gold.
I am seeing so many restaurantsmissing all four of those
points, and so much so that whenI do go out and I see the ones
that are nailing it, it likeliterally brings a tear to my
eye, because it is thefoundation of hospitality, right
(32:45):
, and it is something that wehave lost, uh, in the last
couple of years, I think, postpandemic especially and I I know
a lot of operators getfrustrated and they say you know
, these people don't want towork.
Um, they just don't get it.
They're so much harder to train, but I think we've.
We've been so.
Some of us have been so used toworking with people for so long
that have experience in thebusiness that we're forgetting
(33:08):
to train and teach thesefundamentals that are again at
the core of everything arestaurant needs to survive.
Like you said, focusing onguest retention alone increases
everything else in your business, enhances and improves
everything else in your business.
It's, it's not rocket science,but I appreciate you bringing
that top of mind.
Speaker 2 (33:28):
Yeah, yeah, it's rocket science, but but?
But there is a science behindit in some respects, because
we're not looking at it.
And the numbers, you know, ifyou can track the numbers I'm
not saying everybody can, but ifyou can track the numbers, then
that's going to put you at anadvantage because you know
you're making progress or not,and you can also incentivize
that with your team.
(33:49):
So, um, but it.
It isn't necessarily rocketscience, but you know what?
Training people, christian,isn't rocket science.
But we've cut a lot of.
You know bigger, biggercompanies have cut a lot of
training budgets.
You know we don't.
We used to.
I mean, I used to have a companyand our onboarding process was
four weeks you know, for a frontof house member of staff, four
weeks wow, uh, manager, managerswas a lot longer.
(34:12):
I mean we're going about 20years.
That is unheard of.
Now you're lucky if you get twoor three days following
somebody and it's you know.
And and and and it's it is.
If I hear what you just said,again you know, and I hear it
from operators all the time interms of you can't get, you know
you can't get the teams, youcan't get.
Again you know, and I hear itfrom operators all the time in
terms of you can't get, you know, you can't get the teams, you
can't get the teams.
You know they don't listen.
(34:32):
Blah, blah, blah.
You know 20 other excuses aboutwhat you know, perhaps what Gen
Z and you know the currentworkforce is like Arm in arm
with possibly the worst.
You know training and you knowbudgeted or budgeted, you're
allowed to spend for training.
At the same time, I think, whatdo you expect?
We're getting what we deservehere.
(34:54):
And this fight for labour,cutting labour, this strive for
better margins, this betterspend per head, that is the
constant kind of battle Tomaintain that position.
If you think about it, withrising costs and rising um, you
(35:17):
know inflation and everythingelse, and you know labor costs
going up because of minimumwages, etc.
To maintain that position,you've got to either put your
prices up or get more guests in.
Not the same amount of guestsyou've got to get more guests in
.
So when we're acquiring newguests, we're not, we're not now
at, you know, level playingfield.
We've got to go beyond that.
(35:37):
So where are all these newguests going to come from?
And this is why we're all indecline.
Just, it's just the maths ofit's.
Just that's what it is.
So when we ignore the fact thatwe've got this low guest
retention but we're you knowwe're just missing out on just a
huge proportion of the businessthat's.
(35:57):
You know that that couldactually take away all this pain
that we're having.
Um and uh, yeah, so it.
You know.
When you just talk it through,just you can't argue with it.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
It's such an important mindset shift.
I have a client that's sodesperate it was We've done a
lot of work, but desperate andjust stressed about I've got to
get more people in the door.
I've got to get more people inthe door.
I've got to get more people inthe door and we've talked and
spent a lot of time focusing onwhat is happening within the
four walls.
Because, like you said, if theycould focus on taking care of
(36:33):
the people, creating more guestsbased on the clients or the
current guests that are alreadysitting in their restaurant,
that's where guest creationcomes from.
Right, word of mouth has alwaysbeen so important to restaurants
and it still is, more than ever.
Social media is just word ofmouth, right, but the operators
(36:54):
that operate from that scarcitymindset, that are squeezing
their costs and squeezing theirstuff, it's just.
It's not a sustainable businessmodel.
We need to think from a placeof abundance, in the way that we
think about how money comes in,the way that we think about how
money comes in, the way that wethink about how we take care of
our staff and the people thatwe bring on, our culture, our
guests, our food waste I mean.
(37:16):
There's so many things that wecan look at internally before
trying to just, you know, go tothis big wide world of social
media and, you know, loyaltyprograms and tech and all this
stuff it's just yeah, discountedmenus big one you know how do
we?
Speaker 2 (37:32):
get people in, okay, we put this three course menu on
for half the price that theypay for this, and you know we'll
do a fizz free fizz, 10 poundbottle of fizz friday or
whatever, whatever that,whatever that looks like, on
repeat.
And I, you know that is a bigmyth that that's running a
business.
And you know I get involved withcertain stages with clients
(37:56):
when they're in this process,and one thing's very clear that
they often don't go back andlook at the impact of what
they're doing in terms ofdiscounting, and I don't just
mean the financial impact whichis, you know, eroding margins
and creating bad loyalty,because loyal guests, you know
you're only loyal to that, tothat offer, you know, to get
somebody to come back.
(38:16):
I'm not talking aboutdiscounting and advertising and
stuff to, for I guess foressentially I'm talking about
emotional connections a disloyal, I guess loyal to a discount,
is not a loyal guest to yourbusiness.
Really, um, and yeah, it's,it's, yes, it's a bit, you know
(38:42):
to, to, to not understand your,what the discounting is doing to
your business in terms of youknow your team and your kitchen
and you know that burnout thathappens when you're, when you're
constantly discounting, knowand not realizing that actually
it's not adding anything more toyour bottom line in the long
run, which often happens.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
Yeah, it reminds me of the old days of restaurant
week, right, where the finedining restaurants a lot of them
would choose not to dorestaurant week because they
would say, look, we don't wantto put chicken on the menu, but
we want to be able to offersomething that is going to be at
the quality that we want it tobe, so it doesn't dilute the
brand.
But I've worked for fine diningrestaurants before that are
like, look, we've tried this andthose people only come in once
(39:17):
a year.
It doesn't make any sense forus.
Yeah, yeah, yeah and thenthey're packing people in like
sardines in order to get thesame margins, and then the
entire experience changes foreverybody in the room.
And the staff works twice ashard and they hate it every time
, every year, when it comesaround.
(39:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Wellyeah, it's so much value in this
.
Thank you for sharing yourthree-step process here the no,
grow and echo.
And yes, please share the.
The I'll share you that?
Speaker 2 (39:51):
yeah, I'll show you that because it's that's my
guest retention playbook.
I'll share the transfer, theemotional advantage about
transforming the order ofservice as well.
So there'll be a couple oflinks if people want to down um
to get hold of that, or they canjust come to me and reach out
to me.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Yeah, how do people get a hold of you?
Speaker 2 (40:11):
Yeah, find me on LinkedIn, probably the easiest
way, or ewan athospitality-benchmarkcouk, but
I'll send that over to you aswell.
Kristen, one of the otherthings I was going to say
actually, have we got still abit of time about two seconds?
Yes, please say actually we'vegot still a bit of time for two
(40:34):
seconds, please.
Um, is is when we're talkingabout return visit engineering,
and you know that I I talk aboutthe retention, you know, first
time diners at level, at thislevel.
Let's call this the funnel orthe pipeline.
You know we don't have apipeline in hospitality for some
reason we've got in every otherbusiness you can imagine this
sales pipeline but we don't haveany hospitality.
Yeah, but we do, you know, andit's't have a pipeline in
hospitality for some reason.
We've got it in every otherbusiness.
You can imagine it's a salespipeline but we don't have it in
hospitality.
Yeah, but we do, you know, andit's in your reservation system.
So this first-time diner I'msaying 95%, 90% to 95% generally
(41:00):
don't come back and you willsee that all the time.
But once they've come back asecond time, they then 20, 25
percent more likely to come backagain.
And then once they come backanother time, they're then 70
percent more likely to come backagain so the more you bring
people through this funnel, theexponentially increases the
(41:23):
frequency that they're going tocome back or the likelihood that
they're going to come back.
So when we talk about kind of Ithink I was talking to you last
time about um uh, about thewhite, red and black napkin, yes
, thing.
So this is a version of um uh.
So take the digital version outof kind of profiling first,
(41:43):
second, or, you know, bronze,silver, whatever you want to
call them guest segmentation,and I think it was john taffa,
bar rescue, I think this is fromum and it's putting down a
white napkin for a first-timeguest, or red napkin for a
second-time guest, or I thinkit's a black napkin for a
third-time guest, and each onegets a different experience and
a different invite to come backand the staff treat them a bit
(42:05):
differently or offer somethingat the end of it, because what
he's trying to do is drivepeople to that third visit where
it's now 70 percent more likelyto come back.
And yeah, so anybody, yeah.
So don't let the technology bethe blocker to doing something
like this, because there's loadsof things that you can do.
(42:25):
Doesn't matter who you are interms of guest retention, but
yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
Love it.
That's great.
So many pro tips, so much valuein this conversation Really
really appreciate you coming onand joining me for this
conversation.
I've learned a ton.
It gives me some really goodtalking points with with my
clients to to work with andfocus on.
So thank you so much forkeeping the guests first and
foremost.
That's what it's all about,right.
Speaker 2 (42:50):
Exactly Brilliant.
Well, thanks very much forhaving me, kristen.
It's been great and yeah,hopefully there's there's some
takeaways for somebody out thereand what we've talked about.
But but, yeah, reach out if youneed anything.
That's all you know.
Love to talk, talk to peopleabout it, doesn't matter.
Doesn't matter where you are inthe journey of it, but awesome.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
Thank you so much.
Um, everybody that's going todo it for us this week.
Please share this episode withanybody that you know that could
benefit, and we'll talk to younext week thanks, folks.
Do you know that guests that come back to your
restaurant a second time spend20% more than their first visit
and they bring in 10 to 15% moreguests?
Today I'm talking to EwanThompson, the Chief Performance
Optimizer for HospitalityBenchmark Services.
Ewan helps restaurants smashreturn guest frequency without
(00:31):
discounts or paid marketing.
He believes that nearly everyrestaurant is sitting on a
six-figure growth opportunity.
They just don't realize it'sburied in poor guest retention.
Today Ewan is unveiling hisguest retention playbook the
exact framework he uses withoperators to drive six-figure
(00:52):
growth through guest retention.
We're also talking about theemotional advantage, the four
touch points to elevate yourorder of service with emotional
intelligence, your order ofservice with emotional
intelligence, and we're going todeep dive into how to train
your staff to lead with aretention mindset with every
single guest, you and I.
(01:13):
Has offered two incredibleresources that can be downloaded
in the show notes of thisepisode, so make sure you don't
miss out.
Let's get started.
Welcome to the RestaurantLeadership Podcast, the show
where restaurant leaders learntools, tactics and habits from
the world's greatest operators.
(01:34):
I'm your host, Kristen Marvin,with Solutions by Kristen.
I've spent the last two decadesin the restaurant industry and
now partner with restaurantowners to develop their leaders
and scale their businessesthrough powerful one-on-one
coaching, group coaching andleadership workshops.
This show is complete withepisodes around coaching,
(01:58):
leadership development andinterviews with powerful
industry leaders.
You can now engage with me onthe show and share topics you'd
like to hear about leadership,lessons you want to learn and
any feedback you have.
Simply click the link at thetop of the show notes and I will
give you a shout out on afuture episode.
Thanks so much for listeningand I look forward to connecting
(02:21):
.
And I look forward toconnecting.
Ewan, you talk a lot aboutguest retention.
That's what you focus on withyour clients and that's what
your zone of genius and skillsetis in.
Can we start, though, by justreally basically defining what
does retention mean to you whenyou talk about that?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Okay, so I talk a lot about it because it's the best
bit, really christian, um, uh,and what retention is?
So, um, what's the kind of thetechnical term is is how many
guests are coming back.
Let's, let's, let's break itdown to that over a period of
time, so you might take one yearcompared to one year, or six
(03:04):
months compared to six months,and in that time, how many of
your guests actually came back?
And that, in a nutshell, isretention.
And then, when we talk aboutfrequency guest frequency it's
like how many times they'recoming back, you know, um, in
that particular cycle.
So one, two, three, five plustimes.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Okay, so you have the opinion that, or come from the
perspective that it makes moresense for restaurant owners to
focus on retention versusbuilding first-time guests and
driving traffic.
Would you talk a little bitabout that?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
No, oh well, yes, I will talk about that, but they
need to do both.
What I'm not saying is what'shappening at the moment is we
are requiring and everyrestaurant's doing this and I
look at a lot of numbers and alot of reservation platforms and
we are acquiring guests.
(04:00):
That's what we do and that isthe primary focus of everybody
running a restaurant.
What I'm saying is we need tojust look at how we're retaining
these guys, because when youlook at the numbers I rarely see
when I first look at uhplatform data 90 to 95 percent
(04:20):
of guests do not come back, andwhat I'm saying is we need to
shift the dial and have a lookat why these guys aren't coming
back into our restaurants andwhat we can do to influence that
performance, because it's huge90 to 95.
Don't come back don't come backwithin within the time period,
(04:41):
so that's generally a year, soyear on year, and you're not
seeing 90 to 95 percent of that,so put that into perspective I
looked at a reservation datalast week um there are two, two
and a half million turnover siteum, so that equates to about 10
000 bookings a year.
(05:02):
Out of those 10 000 bookings,500 came back um, so it's a big,
big, big opportunity wow, andit's it's more cost effective to
focus on retention versus goingafter.
Yeah, correct, yeah there's somuch that it brings in terms of,
(05:25):
you know, all these KPIs thatwe go after as restaurant
managers and restaurantoperators, and guest acquisition
is expensive in itself.
Advertising, perhaps.
I mean five, perhaps even fiveto seven times cheaper to retain
a guest than is to acquire anew one.
(05:46):
But also, new guests spend less.
So a retained guest and I pickthis up in, you know the United
States all the time they'respending 15 to 25 percent more
organically.
So they're more comfortablewith your restaurant they're,
you know they've been perhapsonce or twice and um, they, you
(06:07):
know they're, they become alittle bit more relaxed to order
rather than going to theirgo-to, perhaps their go-to
dishes.
So yeah, it's.
And what else do they bringback?
More covers.
So retain guests organicallybrings back more people as well.
So so we're always focused onthese kpis and they spend per
(06:28):
head and our margins and ourlabor percentages, and you know,
rightly so we are.
But but when we ignore guestretention, which is something
that that covers all these otherkpis, you know, at your peril
do that.
That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Yeah, I mean it makes sense, right, that a guest that
comes back a second time orthird time or fourth time is
going to spend more money, right?
They're more comfortable inyour environment.
Like you said, they know themenu, they know the qualities
there.
They're probably going to bethere.
You've earned their trust,right.
Maybe they've had a greatexperience with the team, they
love the menu items and so theyare willing to lean in and get a
(07:05):
little bit more adventurous andtry some other things that they
wouldn't necessarily try, orlean on the staff a little bit
more to make somerecommendations, right, with
some food and wine pairings orsomething like that.
Have you noticed that in thedata that you're pulling, are
the guests that are coming backa third time and a fourth time?
(07:27):
Are they spending more eachtime they come, or is it pretty
consistent across the board?
Speaker 2 (07:34):
um, so it depends on the restaurant.
Yeah, I was literally lookingat the data this morning for
somebody and every level had aspend increase.
So second and third and fourthtime had a spend increase, but I
don't always see that.
I certainly do see a goodincrease compared to a first
(07:55):
time and one time, you know onetime diner.
So, and it's significant, andit's significant, you know it's
more than you could do if youwere just focusing this from a
spend-per-head perspective andtrying to get your team to
upsell and sell more.
You know it outweighs thatgenerally most of the time.
(08:16):
So, yeah, they are spending more, but you know, one of the
things about guest retention isit doesn't happen by accident
and what we believe you knowfive star reviews um, you know
that kind of good well, goodservice, good food.
(08:37):
We believe that is enough andit's the wrong thing to think
about because it isn't.
And I see and speak torestaurant owners all the time.
We look at reviews and they golook, you know, and rightly so
they're proud of theirperformances and their guest
retention numbers could be, youknow, pretty low 5%, 5%, 10%.
So it's not enough anymore justto have good food and good
(09:03):
service.
We've got to be emotionallyconnecting with've got to.
We've got to be emotionallyconnecting with our audience and
we've got to be doing itconsistently.
Um, and we've got to give thema reason to remember, um, and
what so many aren't doing isgiving them that reason to
remember yeah, how do you, youand how do you help them close
that gap?
um, so well it's.
(09:27):
It's.
It's really starts with like areal inward look at yourself and
your business and what's goingon on the guest journey.
I frame it into a um, what Icall no grow echo, so three kind
of stage process.
Um, but I encourage restaurants, you know, and restaurants seem
to do this themselves.
(09:47):
It's the same kind of platformthat I do with our clients as
well.
So, but that first bit is no,it's really understand you and
your business and where thingsare.
You know, perhaps dropping off,perhaps that's your team.
It's getting into the numbers,it's looking at your onboarding,
(10:09):
your training, you knowanything, get people excited
around guest retention and whatit means and how it can impact
your managers and what theirroles are going to be to play in
it.
But then into the guest numbersthemselves.
The guest journey.
You know where does that guestjourney start?
And it certainly isn't comingthrough your front door and
leaving.
It's well before that.
(10:29):
It's when they looked at yourwebsite.
It's how they found you, it'severything they went through to
make that booking.
Um, and you've only got to, like, walk in their shoes a little
bit, you know, with a bit offresh eyes, and realize
sometimes we put some amazinghurdles up for people trying to
book our, trying to do us afavor and booking our
restaurants.
(10:49):
Yeah, and some of the, some ofthe things you've got to do
sometimes to to leave your carddetails, or to you know to
change your booking, or to youknow to request something, or
you know, or just anything youknow.
Sometimes it's just you knowthe list of terms and conditions
that you need.
You know to request something,or you know, or just anything
you know.
Sometimes it's just you knowthe list of terms and conditions
that you need you know half aday to read, and it's you know.
(11:12):
So it's just you know.
That's.
That's what I mean.
It's just we've got to make thisalmost, almost look at it like
amazon how easy it is to orderon amazon and you know sometimes
how you know you can.
Almost.
Also, you've already ordered itby mistake and it's coming, and
you don't how you know you can.
Almost.
Also, you've already ordered itby mistake and it's coming and
you don't realize you've done it.
And that's how we've got tothink about our restaurants in
terms of how do we make it this,this journey?
(11:32):
You know it's easy and seamlessand, as you know, as good as
possible.
So, and then, right the waythrough to after people have
left, how is that connection?
How have we built up someemotional equity?
How have we, um, how are weable to personalize perhaps a
response or, you know, reallykind of, you know, connect with
(11:53):
our audience after they've goneas well?
so, it's yeah, it's a lot, it'sa lot to think about, but, um,
but yeah, and it really wouldlook at what you do all.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
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business.
The clock is ticking.
From the conversation that youand I had last week in
preparation for this episode, Itook one of those nuggets that
(13:05):
we talked about and I want tohear your perspective on loyalty
programs.
But I was talking to arestaurant operator here in town
who's been they've been opensince 1965.
And he said and I've gotanother client that's asking me
too, like I want to start aloyalty program, what do I do?
And we were talking and he saidyou know, since we've been open
(13:28):
since 1965 and our clienteleare very tech adverse.
He's like we're trying tofigure out ways that we can do
things on pen and paper or workwith our staffs to take notes so
that when people come back weremember their drink order.
You know, and I'm thinking backin the old days where we used
to have log books behind the barand the bartenders would write
down notes about guests.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
And I told him the little nugget that you had
mentioned about setting up aseparate phone line so that if
guests want to book areservation a VIP guest or
repeat guest wants to book areservation rather than calling
the restaurant or trying to booksomething online this line
right, which is the owner'sseparate phone number and just
(14:07):
hey, call me and I'll make thereservation for you, yeah, so so
this is, this is, you know,when we talk about, um, kind of
this, uh, hook, you know the endof, perhaps the end of a meal,
you know this, but what toolkitdo we have to get people to come
back in?
And then, pretty much in mostother businesses it's like do
(14:28):
you want to rebook?
You know, get going yourhaircut, when do you want to
book it in again?
When do you want to come?
When do you want to?
You know, when do you want tocome back in it?
And in restaurants we don't lookat it like that too much,
because we think it's like it'sawkward and it's an awkward
thing to say and the guest isgoing to go, I don't know when
they want to come back, yeah,and you know, and that's that's,
you know, that's that's theright way to look at it, because
you don't want to be, you knowit's such a ridiculous.
(14:49):
You don't want to leave thattaste in their mouth if you got
it wrong, as the last thing theyremember is like someone trying
to force them to book again.
But you can do things, you know.
You know, and this, thistoolkit, that, that, that
perhaps you, that, that we about, or I talk about in terms of
giving our teams, you know, theability to be able to kind of
like say, oh okay, we've got anevent coming up or the menu
(15:11):
change, or there's, you know,book, book.
You know this is my number, bookwith me.
You know, send me a message andyou know I'll take care of it
all and it's, you know, itdoesn't have to be, you know,
you think that doesn't even haveto be your own number, that
could just be your restaurant'sa restaurant, perhaps cell phone
, that's separate.
I mean, some of the platformsthese days actually do have a
(15:32):
number and it converts to amessage and you're able to do
that if you do have that sort oftechnology.
But there's, I think, theblocker.
What happens in everything thatwe do in a restaurant
environment is somebody blocksit out in their head and it just
doesn't get past the next stageand it's good.
(15:52):
Oh, we can't say that to aguest.
Well, actually there's 20, 30things you could do and it all
comes out with sitting down andkind of looking at what you're
doing and looking at the guestjourney and realizing the value
in slight, perhaps even smalllittle changes.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Um, you know, we'll have on guest retention yeah,
and I think you knowunderstanding the cues, uh, are
really really important theverbal cues and non-verbal cues.
I was actually I was in chicago, um, for the national
restaurant association show andI had a, took myself out to
dinner, had an extraordinarytime and I was just so
(16:31):
overwhelmed with just thehospitality and the touch points
and how engaging the staff wasthat I made it a point on the
way out the door to say to theteam working the door thank you
so much.
This was so lovely, I said.
I looked while I was dining.
I noticed you guys havedifferent restaurants in your
group.
Next time I come to the city,you know, I'd love to check out.
I look forward to checking outmore and more of the restaurants
(16:53):
in your group and the I don'tknow if she was a host or
manager, it didn't matter.
She said thank you so much forsaying that I would love to send
you my phone number and haveyou book with us next time you
come into town.
And so that was lovely.
It didn't feel forced, itdidn't feel salesy and I did not
get an automated text messageresponse right after I gave her
(17:15):
my number, which felt reallygood, because I think that piece
of tech of thanks for diningwith us next time.
You know that feels sales.
Yeah, yeah, gross and I I lovedthat she didn't.
She didn't send me a text atall, it was just this like
really nice exchange.
Uh, that felt very, verygenuine.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
So yeah, what, what was um?
So what was the kind of thething that stuck out to you
there?
Then it was the emotionalconnection that this team kind
of put onto you.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah it just.
The overall experience waslovely.
It was a french restaurant.
The vibe was just gorgeous anddark.
They had a ton of fake flowerscovering the entire ceiling,
like hanging from the ceiling.
It was just this very like warm, inviting experience and the
staff embodied that too.
It really was just I mean, youtalk about the little lamps
(18:11):
lighting your menus at the barjust very intimate and cozy and
they were gracious.
It just all matched.
It was just very much on brandand the experience just flowed
all the way through, which wasgreat.
And this restaurant you had toenter in and then go up two
flights of stairs to actuallyget to the front door of the
restaurant, so you kind of hadto go on a journey before you
(18:33):
even got to step foot in thefront entryway.
But it was just uh, it wasmemorable.
I've never had somebody say letme give you my personal phone
number.
Um, we would love to.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
I've never had anybody do that before.
Yeah, we were.
We were talking about that, youknow, that's the thing.
So, yeah, yeah, I mean, there'sso much you can do and it's
free and it's.
You know, imagine, before youarrived, you got a message from
her saying hi, kristen, I've gotthe most amazing table for you,
(19:07):
looking forward to seeing youtomorrow.
From, you know, from Ewan, andI'm there that day when you
arrive, and you know, we'venever met before your first time
in the restaurant.
I mean imagine that compared towhat I mean, you thought that
was great at the end.
Imagine, before you've evencome in and you go oh my god,
that you know that is free, youknow there's, you know, know
there's so much you can do whenyou, you know, when you kind of
(19:29):
have a plan.
And I think what stops uscertainly perhaps the big oh,
it's too big, oh, we can'tcontact everybody.
We can't.
You know we've got 100 bookingsor 300 covers in tonight.
We can't contact everybody.
And the point of guestretention is you're not going
after everybody.
You don't need to like this.
(19:51):
Five percent, ten percent ifyou're at 95 percent return you
know you're 95 percent, yourguests aren't coming back if you
get up to 90 or 85, a five orten percent, that is huge to
your, to your revenue, like huge.
And that's a one revisit, nevermind two, three, four and five.
So so this misconception wherewe've got to boil the ocean and
(20:13):
go for everybody and, um, youknow, and you end up not doing
anything, really uh is you knowit's completely wrong.
And so you can do thesepersonal touches.
You can, you know, you cancapture personal and
personalization from yourexperience and use that in a
message to you yeah and the morewe use, you know, for the tech,
(20:34):
the less tech minded which, bythe way, I don't sit in that
camp that massive like tech.
You know, I'm not that person,but I do work with it and I do
utilize it and I, you know, lookat it quite a bit.
But I know, like, with AIcoming, that anything that you
now put into Capture's guestdata that can be able to be
scraped and pulled out andpersonalised into a message to
(20:55):
you so we can make that perhapsmore scalable to a lot of people
.
But we've got to get theinformation in there in the
first place.
But it's I don't know me thetext.
What the tech helps us yeah, ithelps us is not the soul, it's
not the emotional connectionthat has to be delivered by an
(21:19):
ops team, you know, who actuallygive a shit, who actually care
yeah, I agree with you and Ithink now that we're talking
about this, I've got all theseother examples coming up.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
I think that one thing I learned in working in
the brunch restaurant for sevenyears is that people were very
much creatures of habit and wewould see the same people come
in every single day, mondaythrough Friday, to get their
same breakfast order.
And tourists can be that waytoo right.
If if we are going out to eatand we find like for me, I'm the
(21:49):
same way with a breakfastrestaurant.
If if I find something I like,it's going to be my go-to place
to get my meal started, fuel myday.
But when I was in Denver atthis amazing restaurant called
Alma, alma Fonda Fina, they justgot nominated for a James Beard
award.
Um, monday, the 16th of June,and you have you can't make a
reservation.
You can't get in, I think, anyearlier than 60 days Like it's
(22:12):
taken 60 days to get areservation there.
I tried to walk in a couple oftimes as a as a party of one,
totally packed, which is amazing, right, just keeps me wanting
to come back and try to get inmore and more.
I went in for dinner, sat onthe patio and talked to the
manager and said hey, I've triedto come in a couple of times,
so excited to be here.
The weather was shit that nightbut they took amazing care of
(22:33):
me.
It was great.
I was happy to be outside.
And they happen to have acancellation for the next night
for the chef's counter.
And the manager came back outand said I don't know if you're
here tomorrow, if you're in town.
Came back out and said I don'tknow if you're here tomorrow, if
you're in town, but I've got areservation that opened up for
one at four or for two at four30 at the chef's counter.
Do you want it four 30 in theevening for dinner?
Right, he got past theassumption that I didn't want to
(22:56):
come back two nights in a rowand I said, hell, yeah, and yes,
I brought a friend, right.
So I think I think, if we couldget over these assumptions that
, like you're saying, whenpeople are walking out the door,
what if we say, hey, we've gota dinner available?
What if we say, oh, we've got acancellation tomorrow night?
Do you guys want to come?
I, it's a, it's an invitationto bring people back more than a
(23:18):
sales tactic, right, I thinkit's all about the approach and
the language we use.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
Yeah, and it doesn't have to be on the night.
Could be, and the language weuse yeah, and it doesn't have to
be on the night, could be thenext day, it could be a week
later.
Could be a text from themanager who's met you, who knows
you, now you have arelationship with.
Could be a text from the hostperceptionist, whatever you know
, it doesn't you know whoeverwants to get everybody involved.
Could be could be the serverwho's amazing and gives other
connections.
It doesn't matter as long asit's genuine.
And it isn't, and it doesn'tcome across to you like you
(23:44):
mentioned, like taking my number, get a message, an instant
message straight away and allthat goes out the window.
You know it's, it's false.
But when it isn't false andit's backed up with, you know, I
mean I talk about five starreviews aren't enough and food,
good food and good service isn'tenough, but it has to be there.
You know the food and theservice has to be there.
(24:06):
The hospitality comes on top ofthat and that when I talk about
hospitality, not necessarily inthe building, it's you know,
it's this relationship with thisfollow-up, it's.
You know, if you've got thetech to, perhaps the epos
integrations where you can seewhat people have ordered and
what their, what their go-todishes are and you can start
running events inviting them tobased on that.
(24:27):
Right, you know, but that'sstill a space.
Pushy sale pushy doesn't have tobe pushy, but it's very much of
a sales approach.
And when I talk about reactiveservice, which is what everybody
does, it to intentionalhospitality, which is what I'm
talking about with guestretention, um, it's not about
selling.
We're not about selling, we'reabout guiding, we're about
(24:48):
pointing things out, you know.
You know that's.
That's the experience.
That's the experience in-house,you know.
But it's also the experiencewhen we're perhaps reaching out
someone before they came in.
If we've identified them,someone to reach out to, you
know, not trying to do everybody, so that can be a very
personalized thing and that canbe built from guest notes.
So when you came in last time,you know you were here for
(25:10):
something you know graduation,or your daughter or whatever,
you know a birthday or somethinglike that, and you know, and if
you then be able to say, oh, itwas great to see you last year
on your daughter's birthday,you're coming back again, I
can't wait to see, and somethinglike that it's, you know, that
just makes it just just amassive point of difference and
um, but you've got to have the,you've got to have the offer
(25:32):
right and the service right, andobviously, well, I say
obviously but I think I need tosay it, um, because it's
important, but it's, but it'snot enough, and this is why I
say this is the fun bit, kristen.
This is, this is why, because itgetting people to come back in
is, isn't that?
Isn't that why you run arestaurant?
(25:52):
Isn't that why we openrestaurants?
Isn't it about getting peopleto come back in?
And isn't that when you're,when you, you know, as an
operator I was for for years andyears and years that's the fun
bit.
That's the kind of like, likesurpassing expectations, like
really, you know, wooing guestsand wowing somebody, and you
(26:14):
know that this is all we'retalking about.
We're just talking about it ona, on a, perhaps a, perhaps
perhaps a bit more of a kind ofscalable thing, but that's all.
Ultimately, that's all we'retalking about.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Yeah and you don't.
We don't need a reservationplatform.
We don't need data in order tobuild great connections and
relationships and make peoplefeel good.
Right, I think I've been taught.
I've been thinking a lot aboutthis since we talked last week
Like, yes, there's been so muchyou know that I've experienced
over the years of buildingculture and putting together
(26:48):
teams that truly care aboutpeople and that really care
about the experience, but Idon't think I've ever said or
led with a mindset, a retentionmindset.
When it comes to the team.
I don't, like we've talkedabout, yes, we want repeat
guests, but I am just I can'tget over the comment that you
(27:09):
made last week about liketraining your teams to have to
lead with a retention mindset.
How do you help people do that?
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Yeah, okay.
So now are you now thinking whyhaven't I been doing this?
It's a simple reframe.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
I think maybe have in so many in certain words, but I
but.
But I asked somebody the otherday.
I asked a restaurant owner.
After we get off the phone, Isaid is every single person on
your team understanding thatretention is the goal of the
guest experience?
And they just looked at me likeI had two heads yeah, yeah,
yeah there's a disconnect heresomewhere yeah, there is, there
is, is, and why.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
I don't know why that is, but it's everywhere and
sometimes, you know, sometimesit's like the wood through the
trees, isn't it?
You just can't you.
Just why are we here?
What are we doing?
Yeah, and when we when I, youknow, work with you know a lot
of restaurants, they'll have anorder of service or service
(28:10):
criteria or whatever.
That is a rightly so and theyshould do, and the goal has
always been, you know, make sureit doesn't sound robotic.
You know, starters in fiveminutes, drinks it in two
minutes, blah, blah, blah, blah,blah.
Upsell this, do this, upselldessert, mentioned teas, coffees
, etc.
Etc.
And and that, in a, you know,flippant way I've just put it,
is what your order of service isand and what.
(28:35):
What it doesn't have isemotional, the emotional
connection, which I call, like,the emotional advantage, and so
a lot of the work that I willhave somebody focused on.
All I work with is transformingthis order of service, and I
don't mean transform it, andthis is the beauty of it is, we
were not about rewriting it.
(28:56):
You know, do all the bits youwant to do if you want to get
them in.
You know that is how you do it,but we're about adding in
emotional connections to this.
So this is, this is.
This is the way that goes on inthe building.
So this is, this is, this is thebit that goes on in the
building.
And you have, you know, you'vegot you've got a team of people
in your restaurant who for, ifit's like most restaurants,
(29:18):
perhaps a wanting development, aneed in development feel like
they haven't been trained, feellike somebody else who's just
coming to have more trainingthan they've had.
You know all these things thatgo off when people says that we
probably don't get to the bottomof enough.
You know, with.
This is why I love guestretention as a piece of work, as
a there's a not a piece of workas a complete strategy to run
your entire restaurant group on,because it covers all these,
(29:41):
these other things.
It's like this, this onboardingpiece.
If we, if we onboardedeverybody with this retention
mindset and, you know, reallycome to buy into it.
And this is why we're doing itand we're going to train you on
this, to do this, and this iswhat good looks like, and you
know you get off on that thatgreat foot.
And if you've got a managerthere in the business going
right, okay, we're going toincentivize you on guest
(30:03):
retention and this is how we'regoing to get there.
You know this is.
This is professional restaurantmanagement development.
You know it's like.
This is proper, how to lookafter guests, how to you know
everything else has to be inline.
Everything else has to be good.
So so if I'm, if I'mincentivizing you or bonusing
you as a manager on on guestretention, on guest retention
(30:25):
numbers I know those retentionnumbers are going up.
Everything else in thatbusiness has to be pretty good
because that guest is not coming, going to come back for for
shit.
You know it's got to be good,so I am.
So why don't we have that in?
Why don't we have that as ahuge kpi, um and and I know we
(30:46):
don't because I look at a lot ofrestaurant apis and I work with
a lot of management teams andyou know it's it's margins, it's
it's spent per heads, it'slabor percentages, it's never
guest retention, um and uh andit.
It's such a beautiful thingbecause it's, as I say, it's a,
it's a development piece for theentire business.
(31:08):
So, yeah, um, but I was justgoing to say actually before,
just one of the things that youknow.
It was about this emotionalconnection in service I was
talking.
I was talking about notrewriting your um order service,
but adding this emotionalconnection.
Um, and there's four stagesthat I call that.
I won't go into them.
(31:29):
I might send you a copy of this, actually, that people could
perhaps link to because it'scalled the.
Emotional Advantage.
It's just about transformingyour order service with welcome,
guide, personalize andappreciate.
So it's these four, so this bigwelcome from everybody.
It's guiding people through themenu, depending on whether
their first, second, third orfourth time dimes or what have
(31:51):
you.
It's really appreciating, uh,it's really personalizing sorry,
what's you know.
So capture, capturing,personalization, so you can use
it again or recommend, but, um,you know, but certainly be able
to have something in in thatguest profiling and then this
really appreciate and engineerthis emotional landing for when
(32:13):
guests leave.
And it's about building theseemotional connections.
But that's it.
In two seconds I'll send you acopy, kristen, and people can
perhaps download it.
Speaker 1 (32:24):
And then that four-step retention strategy is
gold, it, and then thatfour-step retention strategy is
gold.
I am seeing so many restaurantsmissing all four of those
points, and so much so that whenI do go out and I see the ones
that are nailing it, it likeliterally brings a tear to my
eye, because it is thefoundation of hospitality, right
(32:45):
, and it is something that wehave lost, uh, in the last
couple of years, I think, postpandemic especially and I I know
a lot of operators getfrustrated and they say you know
, these people don't want towork.
Um, they just don't get it.
They're so much harder to train, but I think we've.
We've been so.
Some of us have been so used toworking with people for so long
that have experience in thebusiness that we're forgetting
(33:08):
to train and teach thesefundamentals that are again at
the core of everything arestaurant needs to survive.
Like you said, focusing onguest retention alone increases
everything else in your business, enhances and improves
everything else in your business.
It's, it's not rocket science,but I appreciate you bringing
that top of mind.
Speaker 2 (33:28):
Yeah, yeah, it's rocket science, but but?
But there is a science behindit in some respects, because
we're not looking at it.
And the numbers, you know, ifyou can track the numbers I'm
not saying everybody can, but ifyou can track the numbers, then
that's going to put you at anadvantage because you know
you're making progress or not,and you can also incentivize
that with your team.
(33:49):
So, um, but it.
It isn't necessarily rocketscience, but you know what?
Training people, christian,isn't rocket science.
But we've cut a lot of.
You know bigger, biggercompanies have cut a lot of
training budgets.
You know we don't.
We used to.
I mean, I used to have a companyand our onboarding process was
four weeks you know, for a frontof house member of staff, four
weeks wow, uh, manager, managerswas a lot longer.
(34:12):
I mean we're going about 20years.
That is unheard of.
Now you're lucky if you get twoor three days following
somebody and it's you know.
And and and and it's it is.
If I hear what you just said,again you know, and I hear it
from operators all the time interms of you can't get, you know
you can't get the teams, youcan't get.
Again you know, and I hear itfrom operators all the time in
terms of you can't get, you know, you can't get the teams, you
can't get the teams.
You know they don't listen.
(34:32):
Blah, blah, blah.
You know 20 other excuses aboutwhat you know, perhaps what Gen
Z and you know the currentworkforce is like Arm in arm
with possibly the worst.
You know training and you knowbudgeted or budgeted, you're
allowed to spend for training.
At the same time, I think, whatdo you expect?
We're getting what we deservehere.
(34:54):
And this fight for labour,cutting labour, this strive for
better margins, this betterspend per head, that is the
constant kind of battle Tomaintain that position.
If you think about it, withrising costs and rising um, you
(35:17):
know inflation and everythingelse, and you know labor costs
going up because of minimumwages, etc.
To maintain that position,you've got to either put your
prices up or get more guests in.
Not the same amount of guestsyou've got to get more guests in
.
So when we're acquiring newguests, we're not, we're not now
at, you know, level playingfield.
We've got to go beyond that.
(35:37):
So where are all these newguests going to come from?
And this is why we're all indecline.
Just, it's just the maths ofit's.
Just that's what it is.
So when we ignore the fact thatwe've got this low guest
retention but we're you knowwe're just missing out on just a
huge proportion of the businessthat's.
(35:57):
You know that that couldactually take away all this pain
that we're having.
Um and uh, yeah, so it.
You know.
When you just talk it through,just you can't argue with it.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
It's such an important mindset shift.
I have a client that's sodesperate it was We've done a
lot of work, but desperate andjust stressed about I've got to
get more people in the door.
I've got to get more people inthe door.
I've got to get more people inthe door and we've talked and
spent a lot of time focusing onwhat is happening within the
four walls.
Because, like you said, if theycould focus on taking care of
(36:33):
the people, creating more guestsbased on the clients or the
current guests that are alreadysitting in their restaurant,
that's where guest creationcomes from.
Right, word of mouth has alwaysbeen so important to restaurants
and it still is, more than ever.
Social media is just word ofmouth, right, but the operators
(36:54):
that operate from that scarcitymindset, that are squeezing
their costs and squeezing theirstuff, it's just.
It's not a sustainable businessmodel.
We need to think from a placeof abundance, in the way that we
think about how money comes in,the way that we think about how
money comes in, the way that wethink about how we take care of
our staff and the people thatwe bring on, our culture, our
guests, our food waste I mean.
(37:16):
There's so many things that wecan look at internally before
trying to just, you know, go tothis big wide world of social
media and, you know, loyaltyprograms and tech and all this
stuff it's just yeah, discountedmenus big one you know how do
we?
Speaker 2 (37:32):
get people in, okay, we put this three course menu on
for half the price that theypay for this, and you know we'll
do a fizz free fizz, 10 poundbottle of fizz friday or
whatever, whatever that,whatever that looks like, on
repeat.
And I, you know that is a bigmyth that that's running a
business.
And you know I get involved withcertain stages with clients
(37:56):
when they're in this process,and one thing's very clear that
they often don't go back andlook at the impact of what
they're doing in terms ofdiscounting, and I don't just
mean the financial impact whichis, you know, eroding margins
and creating bad loyalty,because loyal guests, you know
you're only loyal to that, tothat offer, you know, to get
somebody to come back.
(38:16):
I'm not talking aboutdiscounting and advertising and
stuff to, for I guess foressentially I'm talking about
emotional connections a disloyal, I guess loyal to a discount,
is not a loyal guest to yourbusiness.
Really, um, and yeah, it's,it's, yes, it's a bit, you know
(38:42):
to, to, to not understand your,what the discounting is doing to
your business in terms of youknow your team and your kitchen
and you know that burnout thathappens when you're, when you're
constantly discounting, knowand not realizing that actually
it's not adding anything more toyour bottom line in the long
run, which often happens.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
Yeah, it reminds me of the old days of restaurant
week, right, where the finedining restaurants a lot of them
would choose not to dorestaurant week because they
would say, look, we don't wantto put chicken on the menu, but
we want to be able to offersomething that is going to be at
the quality that we want it tobe, so it doesn't dilute the
brand.
But I've worked for fine diningrestaurants before that are
like, look, we've tried this andthose people only come in once
(39:17):
a year.
It doesn't make any sense forus.
Yeah, yeah, yeah and thenthey're packing people in like
sardines in order to get thesame margins, and then the
entire experience changes foreverybody in the room.
And the staff works twice ashard and they hate it every time
, every year, when it comesaround.
(39:37):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Wellyeah, it's so much value in this
.
Thank you for sharing yourthree-step process here the no,
grow and echo.
And yes, please share the.
The I'll share you that?
Speaker 2 (39:51):
yeah, I'll show you that because it's that's my
guest retention playbook.
I'll share the transfer, theemotional advantage about
transforming the order ofservice as well.
So there'll be a couple oflinks if people want to down um
to get hold of that, or they canjust come to me and reach out
to me.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Yeah, how do people get a hold of you?
Speaker 2 (40:11):
Yeah, find me on LinkedIn, probably the easiest
way, or ewan athospitality-benchmarkcouk, but
I'll send that over to you aswell.
Kristen, one of the otherthings I was going to say
actually, have we got still abit of time about two seconds?
Yes, please say actually we'vegot still a bit of time for two
(40:34):
seconds, please.
Um, is is when we're talkingabout return visit engineering,
and you know that I I talk aboutthe retention, you know, first
time diners at level, at thislevel.
Let's call this the funnel orthe pipeline.
You know we don't have apipeline in hospitality for some
reason we've got in every otherbusiness you can imagine this
sales pipeline but we don't haveany hospitality.
Yeah, but we do, you know, andit's't have a pipeline in
hospitality for some reason.
We've got it in every otherbusiness.
You can imagine it's a salespipeline but we don't have it in
hospitality.
Yeah, but we do, you know, andit's in your reservation system.
So this first-time diner I'msaying 95%, 90% to 95% generally
(41:00):
don't come back and you willsee that all the time.
But once they've come back asecond time, they then 20, 25
percent more likely to come backagain.
And then once they come backanother time, they're then 70
percent more likely to come backagain so the more you bring
people through this funnel, theexponentially increases the
(41:23):
frequency that they're going tocome back or the likelihood that
they're going to come back.
So when we talk about kind of Ithink I was talking to you last
time about um uh, about thewhite, red and black napkin, yes
, thing.
So this is a version of um uh.
So take the digital version outof kind of profiling first,
(41:43):
second, or, you know, bronze,silver, whatever you want to
call them guest segmentation,and I think it was john taffa,
bar rescue, I think this is fromum and it's putting down a
white napkin for a first-timeguest, or red napkin for a
second-time guest, or I thinkit's a black napkin for a
third-time guest, and each onegets a different experience and
a different invite to come backand the staff treat them a bit
(42:05):
differently or offer somethingat the end of it, because what
he's trying to do is drivepeople to that third visit where
it's now 70 percent more likelyto come back.
And yeah, so anybody, yeah.
So don't let the technology bethe blocker to doing something
like this, because there's loadsof things that you can do.
(42:25):
Doesn't matter who you are interms of guest retention, but
yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
Love it.
That's great.
So many pro tips, so much valuein this conversation Really
really appreciate you coming onand joining me for this
conversation.
I've learned a ton.
It gives me some really goodtalking points with with my
clients to to work with andfocus on.
So thank you so much forkeeping the guests first and
foremost.
That's what it's all about,right.
Speaker 2 (42:50):
Exactly Brilliant.
Well, thanks very much forhaving me, kristen.
It's been great and yeah,hopefully there's there's some
takeaways for somebody out thereand what we've talked about.
But but, yeah, reach out if youneed anything.
That's all you know.
Love to talk, talk to peopleabout it, doesn't matter.
Doesn't matter where you are inthe journey of it, but awesome.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
Thank you so much.
Um, everybody that's going todo it for us this week.
Please share this episode withanybody that you know that could
benefit, and we'll talk to younext week thanks, folks.
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