Turning Guest Feedback into Gold with Martin Vander Ghinste of Feedelity

<p>This week Chris sits down with Martin, founder of Feedelity, in London for Hospitality Tech Expo.</p><p>Before starting Feedelity, Martin worked in private equity and then at Hawaiian Poké Bowl, one of the fastest-growing chains in the Benelux with 50 sites. There he saw two people trying to handle around 2,000 guest messages a week across Google, Deliveroo, Uber Eats, Just Eat, TripAdvisor, email, contact forms and surveys. They were copying and pasting complaints into ChatGPT to reply. So he built something better.</p><p>Chris and Martin talk about how Feedelity pulls every feedback channel into one AI-powered inbox and categorises each message down to the dish. They cover how the data revealed that service and friendliness come up in reviews more often than the food itself. They also get into the “Wheel of Fortune” feature that gives the silent, happy majority a reason to leave a review.</p><p><strong>In this episode:</strong></p><ul><li>How a 50-site chain was drowning in 2,000 guest messages a week</li><li>Going live in two minutes, with no credit card and 30 days of feedback analysed straight away</li><li>Why measuring feedback beats reading every review</li><li>Real stories: two sites ignoring the music policy, and a supplier issue that made the corn too salty</li><li>AI replies that learn your brand’s tone of voice</li><li>The Wheel of Fortune, which gets 8 to 12 times more five-star reviews</li><li>Why asking for feedback isn’t annoying your guests</li><li>Why the problem is even bigger in the UK than in Belgium</li><li>Martin’s one piece of advice: every piece of external feedback should trigger an internal action</li></ul><p><strong>Chapters:</strong><br />00:00 Intro<br />01:09 Martin’s background: private equity to Hawaiian Poké Bowl<br />02:17 The problem: 2,000 messages a week, two people<br />04:18 From late nights to quitting the day job<br />06:07 What Feedelity actually does<br />07:23 Using competitor data to price with confidence<br />08:01 Why service trumps food<br />10:04 Measuring vs reading: the music policy story<br />11:43 AI replies in your own tone of voice<br />13:45 Why simple is the hardest thing to build<br />15:09 The Wheel of Fortune<br />18:08 Why asking for feedback isn’t annoying<br />19:04 Replying to reviews: 23% more repeat delivery orders<br />19:29 Red flags: catching the serious stuff fast<br />21:03 Results: 4.8 on Google and the salty corn<br />22:39 UK vs Belgium<br />24:45 Martin’s one piece of advice<br