SevenRooms Auto-tags: segment your guests effortlessly

A regular who comes every month, a guest who spends €200 a visit, a birthday next week, a diner allergic to shellfish: your team may know all this, but only if someone remembers. And nobody sorts a database of several thousand profiles by hand.

That is what SevenRooms Auto-tags are for: labels applied automatically to guest profiles, based on rules you define. They do two things: help your team recognise guests in service and target your emails without spreadsheet exports or manual updates.

In this guide, we explain the difference between the three types of tags in SevenRooms, how to create custom Auto-tags step by step, which rules to set up in a French restaurant, and how to put them to work day to day.

Reservation Tags, Client Tags, Auto-tags: what is the difference?

SevenRooms has three types of tags, and each has its own job.

• Reservation Tags apply to one reservation, not the person: birthday, business lunch, terrace request, an allergy in the party. They go away with the reservation, but remain available for reporting afterwards.
• Client Tags apply to the person and stay on their profile until you remove them: VIP, allergies, preferences, "knows the chef". They are visible across all venues in your group.
• Auto-tags apply by themselves to a guest profile when the guest meets your criteria: "3 visits in 3 months", "spent over €150", "birthday this week"...

The key difference: the first two are added manually by your team, or by the guest while booking online. Only allergies and special occasions are offered on the booking widget, and you can enable or disable each tag. Auto-tags are added and removed by the system, with no data entry.

Rule of thumb: Reservation Tags for "tonight", Client Tags for "who is this guest", Auto-tags for "what they do at your restaurant". The three work together.

Default Auto-tags: what SevenRooms already gives you

Before creating anything, look at what exists. SevenRooms ships a library of 30+ ready-made Auto-tags in five categories: Feedback, Guest, Order, Spend and Visit. A few useful ones for a restaurant:

• Birthday and Anniversary: the guest has their birthday within 7 days before or after. The tag stays 14 days in total, or disappears if the guest visits during that window. The date must of course be on the profile.
• Repeat Guest (2+ visits in 3 months) and Regular (3+ visits in 3 months).
• Spender: at least 3 visits and a total spend of X. You choose the amount that defines a big spender.
• First Timer and First Timer Completed: the first visit, before and after it happens.
• It's Been a While: last visit between 30 and 365 days ago. The tag is removed as soon as the guest has a new reservation, and Welcome Back takes over.
• No Show Last 7 Days and Cancellation Last 7 Days.
• Positive Feedback and Negative Feedback (SevenRooms feedback of 4-5 or 1-3 stars in the past month), with equivalents for external reviews.

Some of these tags show on the profile for your team; others are hidden and only used for automated emails. Superusers can edit names and criteria (the spend threshold, for example), on the packages that include this option.

Note: the All Guests tag is not available in Europe. Only Marketing Opt-Ins, which covers guests who explicitly agreed to receive your emails, is.

How to create a custom Auto-tag, step by step

When the defaults are not enough, build your own. One caveat: Custom Auto-tags are only available on select SevenRooms packages. If you do not see the option in your account, your package probably does not include it: ask your Customer Success Manager or support.

Step 1: open the builder. Go to Marketing > Auto-tags, then click Create Auto-tag. A panel opens with three settings.

• Auto-tag Name: the name shown on the guest profile and in the Auto-tag centre. Make it readable for your servers: "Regular", not "R3M".
• Auto-tag Type: Local (visible only in this venue) or Global (visible in every venue of the group). In a group, Global makes sense if a loyal guest of one restaurant should be recognised in the others.
• Marketing Segmentation: if you tick this box, the tag is not displayed in service and is used only to target Automated Emails and Email Marketing. Tick it for purely marketing tags, so your hosts' screens do not get cluttered.

Step 2: pick the attribute. Every Auto-tag needs at least one condition. Click the field to see the available data points, then choose the attribute (last reservation date, visit count, spend...). Three fields then appear: the attribute, the condition type (equals, greater than or equal to, includes...) and the value.

Step 3: combine conditions. Two buttons let you refine the rule.

• Add "OR" condition: the guest must meet at least one condition.
• Add "AND" condition: a new block appears, and the guest must meet all conditions.

Step 4: set the time frame. For date-based criteria, you choose the time frame type (past, upcoming or between two dates) and its range. A relative time frame, such as "within the past 30 days", is recalculated continuously: the tag is applied when the guest meets the criterion and removed automatically when they no longer do.

Step 5: save, then check. Open a few guest profiles you know well and confirm the tag appears (or not) as expected.

Pitfalls to avoid

• Do not mix categories. All conditions in one Auto-tag must come from the same category (Profile, Reservation, Visit History, Visit, Review, Feedback...), shown before the condition name ("Visit: ...", "Reservation: ..."). SevenRooms will let you save a tag mixing Feedback and Review, for instance, but it will not behave as expected.
• Reservation is not Visit. "Reservation" covers past or upcoming bookings in the books; to count only guests who actually sat down, use "Visit".
• "Reservation" conditions are evaluated separately. With "Party Size 6 or more" AND "Booked By = Google Reserve", a guest is tagged if they once had a table of 6 and on another day a Google Reserve booking, not necessarily the same one. To combine criteria on the same reservations, SevenRooms offers the Booked Reservation Count Enhanced and Completed Visit Count Enhanced conditions, also limited to select packages.
• POS data requires a connected POS. Spend per visit, gratuity, item price or item name: these criteria need an active POS integration. For a dish, you must enter the exact name of the item in your POS.

Auto-tag examples for a French restaurant

Here are concrete rules, to adapt to your average check. Condition names are those of the SevenRooms list; thresholds are our suggestions.

• "Regular": the default Regular tag (3+ visits in 3 months) already does the job. For a stricter threshold, build it with Visit History: Total Visits greater than or equal to 5. Greet these guests by name and seat them at their favourite table.
• "Big spender" (Visit: Total Spend greater than or equal to €150 on one visit, within the past 30 days): needs a connected POS. For a restaurant averaging €55 per person, that is a table that ordered bottles or the tasting menu.
• "Wine lover" (Visit: POS Item Price greater than €60, at least once): guests who order premium bottles. Your sommelier spots them before they arrive.
• "Large party regular" (Booked Reservation Count Enhanced condition: at least 3 reservations with a party of more than 6): recurring groups, ideal for a private dining offer or your year-end company dinners. The "Enhanced" version evaluates both criteria on the same reservations.
• "Birthday coming up": the default Birthday tag is enough. To target a specific month, the Profile: Birthday Month condition exists, but it only applies if the guest provided their date. It is up to you to make that field optional or required at booking.
• "Shellfish allergy" (Profile: Tags includes "Crustacés", "Fruits de mer"...): groups several Client Tags into one tag visible in service.
• "Win back": the default It's Been a While tag (last visit between 30 and 365 days ago) covers this safely. If you build your own, stay within one category, for example Profile: Last Reservation Date only.

Tip: start with 4 or 5 tags at most. Beyond that, your servers stop reading them, and you lose track of what each one is for.

Using your Auto-tags: emails, service and reporting

A tag is useless if it triggers nothing. Here are the three uses.

1. Segment your emails. Auto-tags feed the audiences of Automated Emails and Email Marketing. Classic scenarios:

• Birthday: an email sent when the Birthday tag appears, with a free dessert when they book.
• Win-back: an email to guests tagged It's Been a While, inviting them back. Exclude those who already have a table booked: that is the job of the Upcoming Reservation Next 30 Days tag.
• Thank-you after a first visit: First Timer Completed, for 30 days after the first visit.
• Offer for regulars: early access to your seasonal menu for your "Regular" guests.

"Exclusion" tags such as Reservation Within 7 Days exist precisely to avoid writing to a guest who dined yesterday.

2. Recognise guests in service. Auto-tags show on upcoming reservations. Your team sees regulars, big spenders or birthdays on the shift at a glance, without opening each profile. To keep hosts from drowning in tags, tick Marketing Segmentation for every tag used only for emailing.

3. Steer with reporting. Reservation Tags let you count, for example, how many "birthday" reservations you had last month and what they earned. If those tables spend more, promote them more often on your booking widget, or offer a dessert as an Upgrade.

Warning: your emails remain subject to GDPR and guest consent, which is why the All Guests tag is not available in Europe; our guide on email marketing and GDPR walks through what to do.

SevenRooms Auto-tags: frequently asked questions

Need help setting up Auto-tags on SevenRooms?

Well configured, Auto-tags save your floor team time and make your emails more relevant. Poorly set up, they contradict each other, clutter your hosts' screens or never fire. Between condition categories, AND/OR logic and POS data, there are plenty of traps.

māhie is an agency specialised in restaurants and hotels, and a SevenRooms expert. For your Auto-tags, we can:

• audit your existing tags and segments to find the ones that serve no purpose or never fire;
• design custom rules: regulars, big spenders, birthdays, win-back, adapted to your average check;
• configure your Automated Emails linked to those tags (birthday, thank-you, win-back);
• train your teams to read and use tags in service;
• connect your data (POS, Webflow or WordPress site) and track the reservations each campaign generates.

Want a guest database that segments itself? Discover our SevenRooms expertise or Contact māhie and we will review your setup together.