Why Restaurants Shouldn’t Give Up The Fight Against Phones

It’s a restaurant owner’s worst nightmare.

A sloppy pic of their signature menu item goes viral on social media because one furious customer who had a bad experience posted the pic on Instagram along side a horrible review.

Enter. Damage control.

Yet according to a recent Bloomberg article the world’s top restaurants — from New York to Sydney, London to Lima — no longer fear customers who take food pics at their restaurants. A once highly controversial practice has apparently been embraced the Michelin-starred restaurants of the world. Bloomberg surveyed of 20 of the worlds’s leading chefs and restaurateurs and many now embrace phone pics of food, if for no other reason than they fear appearing like a behind-the-times technophobe.

“Mobile phones are such a huge part of life. It would be silly to start imposing restrictions,” says Nuno Mendes, executive chef, at Chiltern Firehouse in London.

Related: Ban kids at your restaurant, get more customers

Among all this phone-loving talk though is the overlooked fact that for restaurants without Michelin stars attached to their name, they have a higher chance of getting blasted online with a bad food pic. The vast majority of restaurants internationally don’t have the same standards for food presentation as the world’s leading restaurants. So when a popular, local mom and pop Chinese joint screws up the occasional dish, the last thing the owners want is for a pic of that dish accompanied by a damaging online review to be featured prominently on Yelp or TripAdvisor.

The image below shows a Seafood restaurant in New York City that got a scathing Yelp review in 2010 and now is no longer in business.

And what about this disgusting pic of a bug in a salad that was posted on TripAdvisor for a U.K restaurant?

Bad online reviews can break a restaurant much in the same way good reviews have major financial pay-offs.

A Harvard University study conducted in 2011 shows a one-star increase on Yelp among Seattle restaurants led to a 5-9 percent increase in revenue. Furthermore, a U.S. consumer survey from 2013 reveals that 80 percent of people have reversed a purchase decision based on reading negative online reviews.

Related: Is Yelp ruining mom and pop businesses?

So, how can a restaurant owner prevent an online reputation nightmare filled with bad food pics?

Aside from banning phones at their restaurant, which several establishments have already done, we recommend using a customer feedback tool presented to the customer at the end of their visit. The idea is to prevent angry customers from venting online by asking for their feedback, and given a negative response, following up with them immediately to smooth things over. The tool should notify a manager when a customer is unhappy and request the customer’s email address to address the issue right away.

Barring this, it goes without saying to keep food standards high. In today’s world, businesses cannot escape the wrath of social media spreading news like wildfire. Better to embrace than resist.