The effect of physical evidence in restaurant businesses on customer satisfaction: The case of Afyonkarahisar

The aim of this study is to determine the effect of physical evidence perceptions of customers in restaurant businesses in Afyonkarahisar province on customer satisfaction by importance performance analysis. In the study, first of all, domestic and foreign literature review about the concepts that constitute the variables of the study was made and the theoretical infrastructure was included. In order to realize the aim of the research, data were collected by questionnaire technique. The research data were collected from 635 customers who visited the restaurant establishments of Afyonkarahisar province between 01 February and 11 April 2021 using the convenience sampling method. A questionnaire was applied to the customers who visited the restaurant businesses located in the city center of Afyonkarahisar and the restaurant businesses within the thermal hotel businesses in the city center of Afyonkarahisar. A total of 450 customer surveys were evaluated. Percentage, frequency, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, factor analysis, reliability analysis, importance-performance analysis (IPA), correlation analysis and regression analysis methods were used in the analysis of the data, and the obtained data were interpreted in line with the purpose of the research. According to the findings, customers show that they should pay attention to the internal and external variables of physical evidence by evaluating them. In addition, it was concluded that there is a high level of relationship between the perceptions of the customers of the restaurant businesses regarding the physical evidence and customer satisfaction, and it was determined that the physical evidence perceptions of the customers affected the customer satisfaction with the regression analysis performed.