Setting up reviews & retention

Reviews & retention turns diners you’ve already served into regulars, and turns happy visits into public reviews — automatically, and the compliant way. DineKit follows up after every visit with a friendly nudge, collects honest feedback, alerts a manager the moment something’s gone wrong, and brings lapsed guests back with a win-back offer, all from inside your own WordPress site.

The compliance rule (read this first)

Every consenting diner gets sent exactly the same message, containing both a private “how was it?” feedback form and the same public review link. There is no sentiment screening — DineKit never checks whether someone left a good or bad private rating before deciding what to show them.

This matters because the alternative — quietly steering only your happiest diners towards a public review while routing anyone unhappy into a private form instead — is called review gating. In the UK it’s illegal under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers (DMCC) Act 2024, as set out in CMA guidance (CMA208), with penalties of up to £300,000 or 10% of turnover. It’s also against Google’s own review policy. So DineKit simply doesn’t do it.

A low private rating from a diner additionally triggers a manager alert so you can put things right — but it never hides or replaces their public review link. Every diner sees both options, every time.

Before you start

• DineKit installed and active on your WordPress site.
• Open Reviews in the DineKit admin menu to find the settings for this feature.
• Have your Google review link to hand (the short g.page/r/… deep-link is easiest — it’s on your Google Business Profile under “Get more reviews”). Add it in Reviews settings so it can be included in every message.
• It helps to have table bookings and/or online orders running, since review requests are triggered from real visits and DineKit can pull in what a diner actually ordered.
• Worth reading alongside this guide: Guest CRM, which stores the visit history and contact details this feature relies on.

Step by step

1. Open Reviews in the DineKit admin and read the compliance explainer on the settings page — it summarises the same rule above and confirms your setup follows it.
2. Add your public review destination(s). At minimum, paste in your Google review link. This is the same link every diner will see, alongside the private feedback option — there’s no separate “positive reviewers only” link to add.
3. Set the delay for the post-visit review request email — a couple of hours after the visit is a sensible default, since a single meal is quick to judge and same-day requests tend to get better response rates than a message sent days later.
4. Check the message template. It’s built around a single call-to-action, a friendly personalised greeting, and — where DineKit has the data from a booking or order — a mention of the actual dish they had (“hope you enjoyed the ribeye”), which jogs their memory better than a generic “how was your visit?”.
5. Turn on automatic sending if you want DineKit to handle this without you lifting a finger (see below), or leave it off and send requests manually per booking from the booking diary using the “ask for review” action.
6. Check the feedback inbox periodically so you can see what diners are telling you privately, and keep an eye out for manager alerts on low ratings.

The post-visit review request email

After a visit, DineKit can send a short email that includes both the private feedback form and your public review link, side by side. Key parts you can configure in Reviews settings:

• Delay — how long after the visit the email goes out (default around two to three hours after; adjust to suit your service).
• Single call-to-action — the email is kept simple and focused, rather than competing links and offers, so it’s easy for a diner to act on.
• The “jog their memory” touch — where DineKit knows what was ordered (from booking notes, pre-orders, or the order itself), it mentions the actual dish. It’s a small personal touch and, unlike a generic thank-you, it’s specific to that diner’s visit.

This detail is never used to decide who gets asked for a public review versus who doesn’t — it’s just a nicer, more personal email that everyone receives in the same form.

The feedback page

Place the

shortcode on a page (DineKit can set this up for you) to give diners a simple first-party feedback form: a quick star rating plus an optional comment. This private feedback page is shown to every diner alongside the same public review link — it’s an additional, parallel option, not a replacement for the public review, and not a screening step that comes before it.

Manager alerts and the feedback inbox

When a diner leaves a low star rating on the private feedback form, DineKit sends a manager alert straight away. Treat it as a recovery task, not a filter: acknowledge it, apologise, and try to make it right quickly — a phone call or a message back to the guest, or a note for their next visit. It’s a parallel channel that runs alongside the public review link, never a gate that stops a review from happening.

All feedback — good and bad — collects in the feedback inbox inside DineKit, so you’ve got one place to see what diners are telling you and follow up on anything that needs attention.

Automatic sending and win-back offers

Turn on automatic sending and DineKit runs an hourly background job that checks for recent diners and sends the review request email to them on a soft opt-in basis (people you’ve dealt with directly as customers, giving them an easy way to opt out of every message). Sending is capped so it doesn’t run away with itself.

The same automatic system can include an optional win-back offer aimed at guests who haven’t been back in a while, encouraging a return visit rather than trying to influence what they say publicly. Any incentive DineKit offers is tied to a return visit or to leaving private feedback — never to leaving a positive or public review, which is banned by both the FTC and Google’s own policies.

Consent and unsubscribing

Every review request and win-back email includes a clear unsubscribe link, and DineKit only sends to diners on a soft opt-in basis — people you’ve had a direct transaction with, being offered similar services, with an easy way to say no thanks at any point. Respect an unsubscribe or opt-out straight away; DineKit will stop sending to that guest.

Tips

• Keep the delay short. A couple of hours after the meal, while the visit’s still fresh, tends to beat a request sent the next day or later.
• Don’t be tempted to add a second “for happy customers only” link anywhere in the flow — that’s exactly the gating pattern the compliance rule above rules out.
• Check the feedback inbox regularly, not just when a manager alert fires — general trends in the comments are often more useful than any single rating.
• SMS review requests are on the roadmap but not available yet — email is the channel today.
• If you want to offer an incentive, tie it to a return visit or to leaving private feedback, not to leaving a public review.

Related guides

• Guest CRM — where diner contact details, visit history and past orders come from.
• Take table bookings — bookings are one of the main triggers for review requests and the “jog their memory” detail.
• Getting started — set up DineKit from scratch if you haven’t already.