Cornell Restaurant Survey Tool Demonstrates Restaurants' Loyalty Power
|
Cornell Restaurant Survey Tool Demonstrates Restaurants' Loyalty Power
|
Category: Worldwide - Industry economy -
Figures / Studies
This is a press release selected by our editorial committee and published online for free on 2009-02-13
Using a survey at a student-operated restaurant, a new case study from Cornell's Center for Hospitality Research demonstrates the value of surveying customers generally and the additional data analysis possible from electronic surveys. The research is explained in the latest of the Cornell Hospitality Tools series, “Measuring the Dining Experience: The Case of Vita Nova,” by Kesh Prasad and Fred DeMicco, who are faculty members at the University of Delaware. Although the survey software is proprietary, the survey description and applications are available at no charge from the center, http://www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/chr/pubs/tools/.
To demonstrate the uses of their proprietary electronic survey software, Prasad and DeMicco review the findings of a year-long survey at Vita Nova, which is the student-operated restaurant at the University of Delaware. Noting the 12-percent response rate to their survey, the authors suggest that electronic surveys should boost guest survey participation, as well as elicit helpful suggestions. The tool uses a series of screen captures to depict the restaurant's data analysis.
Guests at Vita Nova demonstrated unusual loyalty and satisfaction, probably because they were aware that students operate the restaurant. For any restaurant, the loyalty and satisfaction measures from the survey would allow managers to fine-tune operations and menus as necessary to ensure customer loyalty and to remedy any problems. The survey also tallies so-called loyalty behavior (including return visits and referrals) to gauge a restaurant's “loyalty power.”
The Cornell Hospitality Tools series provides the industry with research-based methods for improving specific areas of their operations. Previously issued tools have provided mechanisms to improve managers' communications and to educate employees on issues arising from cultural differences.
|
|
