Restaurant chain outlines achievements after implementing customer experience programme less than a year ago

Restaurant chain outlines achievements after implementing customer experience programme less than a year ago

Restaurant chain Giraffe has significantly increased their social media presence as a result of implementing GoRecommend from multi-unit and food service retail customer experience management (CEM) provider, Empathica.

Since launching the GoRecommend social media advocacy engine in April 2011 [March/April 2011 Retail Technology magazine], Giraffe customers have broadcasted personal recommendations to over 10,000 friends and followers.

The application is an extension to a CEM programme from Empathica employed by Giraffe in December 2010, which enabled the brand to receive and make improvements based on feedback from over 11,000 real customers.

Increasing and broadening engagement

Not only have viewing and following figures for the brand sky-rocketed, but the chain also now reports that it is engaging with more targeted fans and followers, allowing it to broaden the reach of its marketing campaigns, and track, measure and optimise the campaigns accordingly. The CEM programme has enabled Giraffe to build a database of over 5,000 customers that have opted in for future promotions and news.

GoRecommend has proved valuable for staff members as well, who can now also see the impact of their performance and real customer recommendations via social media. Seeing a Giraffe advocate openly share their positive restaurant experience with dozens or hundreds of friends and followers provides staff with an added incentive to maintain the highest standards of service.

As an early adopter of social media, the Giraffe brand has, to date, accumulated over 16,000 Twitter followers and more than 13,000 ‘likes’ on its Facebook page.

Award-winning brand campaigns

The chain has already been recognised for its expertise in the social media field by receiving two esteemed awards: Caterer Magazine Web Awards selected Giraffe for its ‘Best Use of Social Media 2010’ award, while The GoldenTwits – awards that honour the most active and respected Twitter users – selected the restaurant for its ‘Best Business-to-Consumer Twitter Account’ prize, staving off impressive competition. Giraffe has also been nominated for the Best Use Of Social Media category in Caterer and Hotelkeeper Web Awards.

Giraffe’s marketing and branding manager stated: “GoRecommend has significantly strengthened our viewing and following figures, and we gain so much via Empathica’s customer feedback programme. Not only have we been able to track performance and make improvements at the back of the insights but we’ve also discovered that over 55% of customers consider our staff to be exceeding their expectations. This confirms to us that we’re working ‘in tune’ with our customers’ requirements and if that isn’t the case, we’ll be the first to hear about it.”