Restaurant Reviews during COVID-19 Pandemic: Harmful or Helpful?
We all rely on them, online reviews affect our choices more than we believe. Studies have shown that even people who believe their decisions aren’t affected by online reviews are in-fact affected by online reviews.
With almost all restaurants closed for indoor-dining or struggling just to keep the lights on one would expect the volume and importance of online reviews on platforms like Yelp, Google or Tripadvisor to drop but restaurants across the US are reporting a surge in negative reviews amid the pandemic.
It seems the importance of online reviews is becoming more apparent than ever during the pandemic with the rise of online sales and in the case of restaurants they provide an easy way to find out a restaurant’s revised hours and often reduced menus.
Some argue that online review platforms provide businesses with greater visibility and more resources to connect to their customers. But restaurants who feel unfair negative reviews are hindering already struggling businesses.
Why Reviews Matter
The U.S. Bureau of Statistics’ data states that 93% of consumers regularly read online reviews, 85% trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations despite not knowing the reviewers and 40% of consumers form an opinion after reading just one to three reviews.
Online reviews have a significant impact on our purchasing decisions but few think about the consequences attached to reviews.
Although more than 90% of people are influenced by online reviews only about 10% write them. Anecdotally, the most common reviews are those that either loves certain products or businesses and those that have a significant issue with a product or business and feel the need to warn others. That means the majority of people who either strongly agree with a review that’s already been written or have a mediocre opinion likely will not write a review.
Even the most popular restaurants on Yelp have hundreds maybe thousands of reviews but the fact is that any sufficiently popular restaurant will have hundreds if not thousands of diners on a daily basis.
This discrepancy gives significant weight to any review, good or bad.
Surveys have found that consumers spend on average 31% more at businesses that have positive online reviews. Another study found that each one-star increase added 5% to 9% to a business’ revenue.
Conversely, even a single bad review can lose 22% of potential customers. With three bad reviews, the number of lost potential customers jumps to 59%.
Due to the enormous impact reviews can have on business, restaurants are asking digital platforms to suspend reviews for the duration of the pandemic where the entire industry is struggling for the few customers that haven’t converted to cooking at home.
In response, Yelp has released a blog post on its website that outlines courtesy and care when writing reviews during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Good
There are plenty of ways restaurants benefit from online reviews. Most often online reviews are the primary way restaurants get valuable customer feedback. If an online review raised a legitimate issue with food or service that needs to be fixed the customer feedback is a valuable tool.
Visibility is very important for a restaurant, especially during a pandemic. Customers are homebound due to the COVID-19 pandemic and can no longer spontaneously stumble across restaurants. They are far more likely to search online for specific needs.
Data also suggests customers are also less likely to take a chance on an unknown product or establishment during the pandemic. Many households are more financially limited and want to reduce their exposure to the COVID-19 virus and are much more deliberate and cautious in their purchasing decisions which makes online visibility even more important.
A large number of reviews can even skew search engine results. The more positive reviews an establishment has the more likely it will show up when a prospective customer performs online searches in their category further increasing visibility.
During the pandemic, digital marketing campaigns are one of the best ways to generate buzz for businesses. Positive reviews can generate more interest and reach more people and potential business.
As long as reviews remain largely positive establishments stand to gain a lot of business. Many restaurants are enjoying almost normal levels of business despite the pandemic and many of them contribute their success to their positive online presence including reviews.
The Bad
Restaurants stand to gain when reviews stay positive but negative reviews can exponentially hurt businesses. There is a growing number of negative reviews left on businesses, many of which are not valid critiques of the business or are conditions outside of the business’ control.
Many negative reviews end up being outlets for customer’s personal frustrations or misunderstandings. These unconstructive criticisms do not help the business nor anyone who is reading reviews for an accurate representation of what their potential experience might be.
Some examples of one-star Yelp reviews include: “Don’t bother unless you like getting ripped off!” said a customer for an upscale ice cream shop. One star for a local barbecue joint: “Who in the world would put sauce on a SMOKED BEEF BRISKET?” One star for the Chinese dumpling shop: “Thought it was real Chinese sit down style with a waiter. Not a fastfood joint, where you had to order at the counter, then pickup at the other end!!!”
Many consumers simply take the aggregate review score at face value and do not investigate further. A restaurant that may have had issues years ago but significantly improved its food or service in recent times may still have a low aggregate score which compels consumers to immediately consider other options.
Similarly, any situation or conditions that restaurants are currently experiencing due to the pandemic are not indicative of a restaurant during normal operations. A negative review left on a platform on Yelp about slow service due to additional health and safety measures to prevent COVID-19 will likely not be valid by next year.
Many restaurants were forced to quickly and significantly shift their normal operations to off-premises sales which are mostly digital sales. Online ordering and delivery have increased by more than 400% since the pandemic started, this seismic shift is difficult even for fast-food restaurants, who already have the resources and expertise, to adapt to.
Due to the precarious and most likely temporary state of the restaurant industry, many food critics have decided not to review restaurants during the pandemic.
“The notion of being in a place where underpaid staffers are financially compelled to interact with unscreened and unprotected patrons seeking leisure is unacceptable to me on a very basic human level,” said Ryan Sutton a food critic for Eater.
Sutton also writes about the human cost of restaurants during the pandemic. “I think about how scores of restaurant workers have died, and how those that have recovered are going back to work without knowing whether they’ll fall ill again.”
The Infatuation, a popular restaurant review app has announced they will be taking down numeric reviews from their media outlets.
“Restaurants are facing the most profound changes and challenges in their existence,” wrote Hillary Reinsberg, editor-in-chief of The Infatuation. “How could we possibly go in and fairly rate them within the next year? Or the next two years? Would our old ratings be accurate?”
But despite calls to suspend reviews altogether during the pandemic, platforms like Google and Yelp disagree about the harm negative reviews bring to struggling businesses. In a hollow gesture to help the industry it relies on, Yelp promised $25 million in relief only to later admit that the relief would come in the form of waiving advertising fees on its platform.
Yelp has released guidelines and encourages users to consider the context of the pandemic before leaving negative reviews.
The post mentions that “Many restaurants are experiencing more takeout and delivery orders than ever before. Menus are evolving to meet new demands. Business owners and their employees may be struggling. Consumers may not be getting a typical customer experience.” Which addresses many common concerns of negative reviews left by customers.
Restaurant owners who are negatively affected by the onslaught of thoughtless reviews do not think Yelp and other major online review platforms are doing enough for the struggling industry.
What to do about a Negative Review
Yelp and other major online review platforms do not allow reviews, positive or negative, to be taken down at the behest of the business owner. This is to ensure the integrity of the reviews as businesses cannot simply pay the platform to artificially boost their aggregate score by burying negative reviews. But that means restaurants have few options in dealing with negative reviews that may be hurting their business.
One way to combat a negative review is to encourage or remind other customers to leave positive reviews. If enough customers leave positive reviews a restaurant’s aggregate score will rise. Manufacturing or paying for positive reviews will likely backfire as online consumers are accustomed to picking out fake or generic reviews. The best way to generate more positive reviews is by interacting with your customers and reminding them leaving positive reviews one of the best ways to support your business.
If you are sure a negative review is manufactured or false, a business can flag the review to be inspected by the platform itself. If the platform can verify that the review is either demonstrably false or there is proof that the review was manufactured the platform can take down a negative review. Don’t forget to claim ownership of your business on the platforms first!
Finally, the most direct and possibly most effective way to deal with a negative review is by interacting with the person who left the negative review. If a business has claimed ownership of the business page they can leave comments on reviews. Staying calm and professional is a must for online interactions with customers. There may have been a misunderstanding or there may be something a business can do to make it up to a customer who lost time or money at your establishment.
Often, a customer will change a low negative review to a higher one if their issue gets resolved.
Even if the customer is unwilling to cooperate and does not change or take down their review, people who read reviews may see a business’s response and decide the negative review is false or does not apply to their situation. If a business actively engages with their customers and work to make the best experience possible it may have a positive effect on those that read the reviews. Make sure to put effort into the responses as generic responses often have the opposite effect and may be perceived as disinterest.
Some lucky restaurants enjoy the benefits of online reviews while others are crushed under unfair reviews. This may catalyze industry leaders in restaurant reviews to move away from the current system and adopt a more industry-friendly system. One thing is for sure, as the industry is forced to modernize and digitize there will be a reckoning between restaurants and the businesses that profit from them.
