Restaurant customer loyalty: how do staff build the real thing?
Restaurant customer loyalty comes from staff who are intrinsically motivated to look guests in the eye, make a connection and ask how they're doing. Technical skills can be taught. Genuine interest in guests can't. Some tasks strengthen guest loyalty and others get in its way: every hour spent behind a laptop is an hour taken away from the floor.
So where should staff be spending their time?
A useful framework is the difference between floor work and screen work. Floor work is everything that happens in direct contact with the guest: greeting, reading the table, asking follow-up questions. Screen work is answering reviews, asking for feedback, keeping your Google Business Profile up to date and updating the website. A manager who would rather sit behind a laptop than work with guests loses touch with the place where loyalty is built. Screen work is easy to automate. Floor work isn't.
Why does motivation matter more than skills?
People who work in hospitality only for the money don't make genuine connections. Guests notice it at the table, and later in their review.
When is a manager not the right fit?
When they choose the laptop over the guests. Nothing happens on that screen. It happens with the guests on the floor.
Which tasks can be taken off the floor?
Requesting and answering reviews, Google Business Profile posts and website maintenance. AI agents can handle this work, so motivated staff can stay with the guest.
Nothing happens on that laptop. It happens with your guests on the floor.
Frequently asked questions
What is the biggest staffing problem in Dutch hospitality?
According to Michiel Huysmans of Teds All Day Brunch, there are too few people who consciously choose hospitality as a career and are intrinsically motivated. Pay discussions play a part, but the core issue is motivation. Without it, contact with guests feels forced, and staff can't truly look guests in the eye and build a relationship.
Can technology replace customer loyalty?
No. Loyalty is built through personal contact at the table, and no software can take that over. What technology can take over is the screen work around it, such as asking for reviews, answering reviews and keeping online profiles up to date. That leaves staff more time for the guest, which is where loyalty is built.
How do you hire staff for guest focus?
A common approach is to weigh intrinsic motivation more heavily than technical skills during hiring. Skills can be taught. The real question is whether someone enjoys contact with guests and the moment guests leave happy. For managers, it also matters whether they would rather be on the floor than behind a laptop.
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Video transcript
I think that the main worry that we have as an industry is that there are not sufficient people wanting to work in this industry with an intrinsic motivation to work in this industry. Yeah. So the amount of people that we also, so I don't really care about your technical skills, but you need to be intrinsically motivated to work reality, because otherwise you will not be able to look people in their eye and feel and make a connection and feel and say, hey, how are you doing and how do you feel?
Location. So, and if you cannot do that, if that becomes unreal because of the fact that you do it only because you need money or only because you whatever, yeah, then there's a problem. And I think that the amount of people who are intrinsically motivated, and we can have discussions that they need to go up even a little bit and earn a little bit, still a little bit more or still a little bit less or whatever, and in my opinion, that the whole problem at this moment in the Netherlands is there is insufficient people who who, who will determine for themselves hospitality is my career of choice.
And I feel that because I've, I've, I've, I've had a number of different types of companies, a lot of tech focus with a lot of developers and things, and, or technical marketing things or whatever. Uh, and I feel, uh, for myself, I think that you can get most out of life if you feel that you make connection with other people and that they are actually happy with. So, uh, so we have had people that worked with us where we at some point needed to say, okay, if you prefer to stay behind your laptop than work with our guests as a manager, then you're not the manager that needs to work with us because, uh, that nothing really happens within that laptop.
It works, it happens with your guests on the floor. So that's the, so those are things that I think are the, the, the, the, the things where we need to Not, yeah, what we need to focus on is getting more people enthusiastic to work in hospitality.