How to Drive Success with an Unforgettable Dining Experience

Restaurant owners know that change is constant in the industry. New trends emerge, and guests expect higher standards - it’s easy to get left behind. 

However, you don’t necessarily need the new technology or decor. Instead, you need to focus on creating a memorable dining experience that will wow patrons and turn them into repeat customers. 

Creating the ultimate guest experience and earning loyal customers keeps your restaurant in the game, but where to begin? 

Here are 23 proven ways your dining experience can exceed expectations, from attentive wait staff to the perfect ambiance - give your business the boost it needs to stand out.

How to Create a Memorable Dining Experience

Does your restaurant have excellent dishes and enjoyable music, yet customer feedback isn’t as positive as you hoped? Unfortunately, you may be lacking in the dining room. 

Good service that goes above and beyond was once a a perk, but now it’s a standard guests expect - and rightfully so! 

Let’s cover the 23 ways you can make your dining experience reflect the genuine care you have for your guests while offering something unique to the restaurant industry. 

1. Genuinely welcome your guests

Patrons can tell when they’re valued, after all, they are the lifeblood of the industry. Welcome them into the restaurant with a greeting that comes from the heart, not the script. 

Swap out the robotic phrases for something the guests will remember, such as maintaining eye contact, asking how they are, and even complimenting them on their outfits, for example. Train staff to give them the best tools for providing a genuine yet professional welcome that makes guests feel right at home.

2. Give a pre-service gift

The dining experience can start as soon as patrons sit down, so why wait? Be attentive to guests and offer them something small to enjoy as they order their drinks. A taster of house champagne or a special mini appetizer makes guests already invested in what you offer, a great way to ‘fill in the blanks’ where competitors don’t.

Your gift doesn’t necessarily have to be fancy either; no matter the business style of your restaurant, you can put this into practice. It’s all about creating a guest experience that shows you care and are happy they decided to stop by your dining room instead of the many others. 

3. Use the guests’s name

When used appropriately, guests feel like they are dining among friends and family when addressed by their name. Remember it from the reservation or pass it between the host stand and the server. 

Using their name when seating a table or asking how their dish is adds a personal touch and shows you see them as more than a patron. However, be conscious not to use it too much, as it may start to seem unprofessional. 

4. Train servers to sell each dish

Even in the restaurant industry, words matter. If a sandwich is described as "a steak sandwich with aioli and arugula," it sounds like a dictionary entry. 

If that same sandwich were described more fully (“The steak is marinated overnight in a special house-made marinade. It’s served on crusty ciabatta bread with fresh arugula and our famous garlic aioli”), it would be an experience.

As well as for food, having extensive knowledge of wine pairings could mean the difference between selling an expensive bottle or not. Train staff by letting them try all the menu items. With their own comprehensive understanding of the flavors and combinations, they can sell any dish with much more authenticity.

Download our free Menu Engineering Course to learn how to increase revenue and lower costs.

5. Train staff about dietary restrictions and allergies

Knowing menu items inside and out is more than about what to sell to guests; it is also about what not to sell them. Dietary restrictions and allergies can be so serious that patrons will suffer health issues, creating a memorable dining experience for all the wrong reasons. 

Ensure your servers and chef know exactly what dishes are vegan, nut-free, dairy-free, etc. Some point of sale (POS) systems show all the ingredients in the menu items, so if guests are equipped with a mobile device, they can check from the comfort of their table. 

6. Allow guests to sample wine and beer

It sounds simple, but good service is comprised of lots of little pleasant surprises. If a guest asks to sample drinks such as wine or beer, always be willing to bring them one. 

Better yet, offer before they ask to show you’re one step ahead and want to focus on the overall restaurant experience instead of getting them to pay for drinks they didn't love. 

H3: 7. Pay attention to creative non-alcohol beverages

The water at your restaurant could be the freshest, crispest water, but it's still water and will get old pretty fast. Other than standard carbonated soft drinks like Coke or Sprite, explore more ways to add non-alcoholic menu items. 

This not only makes guests feel spoilt for choice but is also a way to increase revenue, especially in the hot summer months. 

Also, some guests want to experience all the senses of a cocktail or wine without the alcohol for various reasons. Make patrons of all ages feel welcomed and just as cared for by a menu catered toward mocktails or spritzers. 

8. Give servers handheld technology

The restaurant industry has its own special mobile phones, just like ours—except they are used for things essential to elevating your dining experience. 

Toast Go™ 2 offers restaurants the full, robust functionality of a traditional POS terminal in a comfortable handheld. Servers can take and check on orders, send memos to the kitchen, split checks, take payment, and more.

Using this technology allows restaurants to decrease table turn time and increase revenue. The cherry on top, however, is how it benefits guests. 

The handheld POS streamlines the operational side of being a server, allowing them to focus on a more personalized approach by taking time to warmly welcome first-time guests to the dining room or describe the great food on the menu at mouthwatering length.

Gone are the days when servers ran back and forth from table to terminal, hoping to remember every guest's order or who paid for what on which card. Toast Go™ 2 offers restaurants a streamlined solution to cumbersome chaos.

9. Let guests order and pay at the table

Once guests have polished off their food and drinks, the last thing they want to do is track down the server for the check. On the other hand, waiting for a long period of time for the server to come to the table is just as frustrating. Don’t let the whole restaurant experience suffer on account of the final hurdle!

Improve the guest experience by allowing them to pay, sign, and tip at the table with as little waiting time in between as possible. A great way to do this is by using Toast Order & Pay, which lets guests order and pay for their food from the convenience and safety of their own devices. This eliminates the need for menus, printed receipts, and handling multiple cards or cash payments. 

Guests can order and pay as soon as they are ready, with no waiting for a server and no handling of credit cards and pens needed. This ultimately improves table turn times, reduces your labor costs by freeing up staff, and increases tips.

10. Try self-serve kiosks

Kiosks can be used to create a self-service business model—a sustainable, affordable way to provide a positive guest experience. 

Honeygrow, a healthy-living, quick-service business, offers guests a customizable stir-fry and salad menu and is a great example of how restaurants can successfully sustain themselves and create a memorable dining experience without the traditional dining room and servers.

As you enter Honeygrow, you will see self-service screens that will allow you to build and customize your own food and drinks. Order tickers are immediately sent to the line, where the attentive team assembles the order and calls out the correlating order number when it’s ready.

During this process, there is no point at which guests interact with the wait staff. It’s an innovative way to shed restaurant industry restrictions and allow employees to focus on creating high-quality dishes that will earn repeat customers. 

11. Take care of the kids

People of all ages love to go out for meals, including kids. Make your restaurant family-friendly by designing certain elements with children in mind. Menu items that are simple and a bit smaller will encourage children to get stuck instead of getting impatient and fussy. 

In addition to the food, having plastic cups, high chairs, and toys on hand will ensure their safety and happiness throughout the meal. Once parents know your restaurant delivers such good service, they will become loyal customers. 

12. Transfer tabs and split checks

Ordering drinks at the bar to then being told to close their tab before sitting at the table for dinner creates a frustrating guest experience. It adds extra steps to an already long evening and gives the impression that the restaurant is inefficient. To combat this, make sure your POS offers pre-authorization functionality.

Preauthorization allows restaurants and bars to start a tab for a customer, swipe their card once, and return the card to the customer rather than holding it behind the bar. This allows restaurants and bars to charge the customer's card for their order in the event they leave the establishment or switch to table service. 

Similarly, it's equally frustrating for people when a restaurant can't split a check, it's a necessity that guests expect. Your system should make it easy to split checks by table, person, or even menu items.

13. Give a post-service gift

Mints and little chocolates are great, but you’ll have to be more creative than that to improve the guest experience. Take time to think about the restaurant’s brand and explore gift ideas that align with it. For example, a personalized thank you note or a mini bottle of house wine.

14. Set up a loyalty program

Repeat customers come back because they either love the music, atmosphere, food, or even cleanliness of your restaurant - but it’s time to repay the favor. Add even more incentive to come back with loyalty programs that offer a discount or select free food and drinks to loyal customers and watch as they become lifelong guests. 

An effective loyalty program has a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) component, as it allows restaurant owners to stay in touch with guests and personalize their future experiences. 

Toast Loyalty is an integrated rewards program that ensures patrons come back time and time again. Guests can join a loyalty program on the POS checkout screen by simply entering their email and tracking their progress online. On the operator's end, you can track customer data, customize sign-up bonuses, offer birthday rewards, and much more. 

15. Invest customers in new product offerings

Make guests feel valued and part of the restaurant family by getting them involved when changing menu items, wine pairings, or organizing events. Take to social media and invite feedback using polls, Q&As, or surveys. 

Getting the opinion of those who ultimately matter most ensures that you provide what they want while letting your in-depth knowledge and experience of the restaurant industry guide you. Once you change something, take time to read online reviews for any valuable feedback, whether it be positive or negative.

16. Improve online ordering

In the U.S., 60% of people order takeout once a week. If you haven’t already incorporated online ordering services, you're missing out on big business. 

One of the major benefits of online ordering is its efficiency, guests expect a quick, easy transaction that will appear on their doorstep as soon as possible. Even if you already have an online ordering system, check online reviews and ask customers directly for their feedback.

Online ordering software is easier, faster, and more accurate than traditional call-in ordering. Plus, if it integrates with your POS system, you can fill orders faster and view online ordering analytics in your system. 

17. Offer delivery service

Third-party delivery platforms like GrubHub or UberEats are twice as effective as marketing channels with loyal users of their own. For example, a customer could be ordering from you for years without ever visiting your website or stepping into your dining room.

The drawback to third-party delivery platforms is that they take a big cut of commissions charged per order, and helpful customer data isn’t shared.

Instead of going through other parties, you can keep delivery in-house, which streamlines delivery costs and provides control of your margins and guest data.

It also allows you to put a face to the brand by meeting the customer face to face and safely transferring their delicious food. Keep your budget in mind, as you will have to hire and train staff to complete these orders for you.

Toast Delivery Services work directly with DoorDash, allowing you to integrate delivery with existing online ordering channels. 

18. Allow online reservations

In the same vein as online delivery, it’s time to take a good look at your reservation software. Is it clunky and hard to use? If so, it could easily be the difference between a busy weekend and a quiet one. 

Perhaps you don't have an online reservation system at all, and in this case, it's better late than never to put one together. By not having online reservations, a lot of patrons will be put off from the start. Guests expect to be able to reserve a table online without having to call a restaurant and speak to a server.

By updating your restaurant’s reservation capabilities, you can also record and save data about each customer and integrate it into the CRM platform. Having a good idea about who your guests are and what they prefer is essential for creating the best dining experience for them.

19. Offer online gift cards

Increase revenue short-term by offering gift cards both online and in person. 

Toast data shows that guests who make a purchase using a gift card spend more than the value of the gift card. It’s a great way to get repeat customers, as once they experience your professional, attentive, and most of all enjoyable guest experience for the first time, coming back is a given.

Make sure that the gift card can be via phone call, when ordering online, or in person at the POS system or kiosk using a contactless QR code.

20. Harness chatbot technology

Robot servers are becoming increasingly common, and so are chatbots. They are intelligent artificial intelligence AI systems trained with lots of data to provide guests with the assistance they need, such as making a reservation, enquiring about events, and much more. 

These questions all have a theme; they are repeatedly asked by customers every single day, which takes up a lot of time for staff to answer. Therefore, releasing them from this duty presents the opportunity to focus on complex questions instead.

21. Publish the recipe for your signature dish

We get it; the chef never reveals his recipe, but in this case, it’s a no-brainer. Being transparent with guests has the power to make your restaurant stand out and show others that it’s not all about money, sometimes, it's about sharing your passion for food with others. 

To add a level of excitement, give away the recipe for your signature dish on social media. This approach drives engagement and is an opportunity to attract new customers. 

Don’t worry, people won’t stop coming to your restaurant because they can make your dish at home, in fact they will likely want to order it even more, especially if they are from out of state and saw your post on social media.

22. Gather and implement guest feedback

After you bid farewell to your patrons, you won’t know for certain how the dining experience went until you hear what they really thought. Sending them a short survey to gauge how enjoyable they found the restaurant experience has lots of benefits. Toast’s Guest Feedback feature helps you do this seamlessly.

Choose from both qualitative and quantitative methods. Using number data is perfect for statistics and finding patterns to help you improve in the future. Qualitative, on the other hand, taps into the thoughts and feelings of the guests and offers in-depth responses.

Gathering feedback is one thing, but implementing it is where it counts. Regularly tally up the responses and look for trends. This is where you’ll see the biggest areas of improvement, such as the music being too loud or the atmosphere feeling rushed.

There are many ways to gather guest feedback, and even old-fashioned comment cards are miles better than nothing. Wouldn’t you be more likely to become a repeat customer if a restaurant owner demonstrated they genuinely care about your dining experience?

23: Genuinely thank your guests

You’ve welcomed guests into the restaurant, sat them down, and provided exceptional service throughout their meal with special bonuses throughout to create a restaurant experience like no other, but now it’s time to say goodbye.

Train staff to genuinely thank guests for spending their time with you, invite them back, and, most importantly, keep it real. A robotic script and a fake smile won’t fool anyone.

Serve an Experience

As you can see, there’s a lot more than tasty food and good service that goes into creating a memorable dining experience. It’s safe to say, however, that it is definitely worth it. 

Get personal and connect on a deeper level with patrons by providing personalized touches like addressing them by name, handwritten thank you notes, and birthday vouchers. 

Also, don’t forget to go above and beyond to show guests that you genuinely care. This involves knowing menu items like the back of your hand and which ones your particular table will find enjoyable. 

Finally, take these tips and tricks as a guide for your own business. Consider your brand and values and what your guests mean to you. Showing them your appreciation will come naturally, and soon, you will have a line around the block of loyal customers waiting patiently for the ultimate dining experience. 

FAQs

What is the meaning of a dining experience?

The dining experience refers to all the senses guests feel as they sit down in a restaurant’s dining room. This includes the music and sounds they hear, the overall atmosphere, the level of service, and, of course, the dishes. 

How do you define a great dining experience?

What correlates as a great dining experience depends on the person and what they prefer. 

Certain elements they will look for include:

• Presentation of the dishes.

• Level of service provided by staff.

• The ambiance of the restaurant, e.g., interior design, lighting, and decor.

• The restaurant’s atmosphere, including other guests and location. 

How do you explain a restaurant experience?

This is how the guests feel about their overall experience at the restaurant. If it is largely positive or negative, it will leave a lasting impression which could jeopardize your relationship with them in the future. 

However, being in the gray area isn’t always a great thing either. Being forgettable doesn’t leave a big incentive for people to go out of their way to come back like they would if they were loyal customers.