Imagine you are on a weekend trip in another city and you have no idea what or where to grab a bite. This is the perfect moment to check the Iens web site. This web site gives an overview of all registered restaurants in the Netherlands with accompanying reviews and ratings. This information is also valuable when searching for new places in your own neighborhood. All the reviews are independent and written by other consumers. Iens is an example of a current business that applies a business model that involves active customer participation. The business web site only includes customer input.

Iens.nl is a Dutch web site which contains independent reviews about restaurant trough the Netherlands, written by consumers. This web site is a link between restaurants and its guests. Both consumers and restaurant owners are able to put a particular restaurant hours, prices, contact information and location can be added by the restaurant owner. This information gives consumers a more detailed overview about what they can expect from this restaurant and its dishes.

The aim of Iens is to help restaurants reaching potential customers and inspiring consumers to try and taste the culinary aspects of the Netherlands. Consumers can grade restaurants and write reviews about their visit. This is valuable information for other consumers (who are searching for a nice place to eat) and it is also valuable for restaurant owners to get an overview about consumers’ opinions. Registered “tasters” of Iens write approximately a hundred thousand reviews on a yearly basis. Consumers who write reviews more often will get a more professional taste status; this status is visible in the review. Other consumers can add more value to reviews written by “professional” tasters, than reviews written by novice reviewers.

Consumers’ reviews conclude the following components: a rating for the food, service and atmosphere. Another part of the review is a written text about the visit. This text could contain opinions about the service, the atmosphere in the restaurant, the price level, etc. The date of the visit is also published. The figures are first approved by the editors before being published.

I think this is a sufficient way to find a nice place to eat, especially when you are visiting other cities. My friends and I go on city trips a couple of times a year, each time we visit a new city. These city trips contain shopping, eating and drinking. We always use the Iens web site when searching for a nice restaurant to have dinner. This prevent us from wandering around for hours to find a place, this lost time we can no spend with lovely conversations and laughing. Of course restaurant owners can write their own reviews, using a pseudonym. But I do trust in the honesty of this web site.

Regards,

Robin Hofman
402632rh