Zomato, a platform for finding restaurants online has changed it’s methodology of rating restaurants – from a paper-based rating system to a digital one on their website.
Previous Zomato Rating System
The Zomato team used to visit the restaurant every 3 months and ask customers eating there to review it on a form as shown below:
Source:Zomato.com
This method was easy because the number of restaurants listed on Zomato was less back then. Now, with more than 18000 restaurants (as claimed), the team there was encountering a daunting task gaining customer feedback and updating constantly-changing menus.
New Zomato Rating System
The survey approach remains intact but the whole offline rating process has been shifted online. People visiting the website can rate the restaurant there itself. A simple widget takes the place below the restaurant listing where a user can rate the restaurant and see it updated infront of his eyes.
Source: Zomato.com
The pros to the new rating system are:
- More feedback through the easy-to-use widget: Having a rating widget with stars to mark the rating makes the process simpler than getting forms filled. Also, the online process brings the survey to a large group of people.
- The ratings will be updated real-time: This is one good pro. So, people who visit a restaurant’s listing on Zomato will know the up-to-dat info and the rating customers of that restaurant have given out till now.
- Buckle up restaurant: If a restaurant keeps getting poor feedback, and the new rating system means that the ratings will be polled by many users – a restaurant can take notice of its poor showing and buckle up. Actually, it totally depends whether the restaurant owner is internet-savvy and checks his Zomato listing at regular intervals.
And if you’re impressed by the new rating system, you shouldn’t forget that there are cons to it as well:
- Restaurant owners can rate their own places higher than their competitors. They can rate their competitors by giving them a poor rating.
Zomato CEO Mr. Deepin Goyal assured that they can keep the rating-others-badly nuisance at a low. The best thing about the announcement was that he mentioned not only the brownie points but also the shortcomings of his company’s new review system. Not many CEOs do that. He also mentioned that even the best of restaurants undertake spam ratings:
Trust us when we say that even some of the best restaurants in town do such things.
One good thing about taking the whole user survey online is that by using a widget Zomato can leverage more reviews. No user wants to rate a restaurant on different levels viz. ambience, food, service. Everyone has his own valuable time and rating a restaurant on overall experience should be the best method.
The new rating system might be seen soon in mobile apps which use Zomato’s API. It’d give more power to the user, as well as help Zomato in making the product quality better. On an ending note and fyi, here are some of the apps which use Zomato’s API:
- MapMyIndia
- MakeMyTrip
- MyCityWay
- Mate-On-Go
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