Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. A user equipment (UE) may receive, from a base station via a reconfigurable surface, a set of reference signals reflected by the reconfigurable surface using a set of precoder configurations. In some aspects, the set of reference signals are transmitted within a set of reference signal occasions of a sweep procedure associated with configuring the reconfigurable surface with different precoder configurations of the set of precoder configurations for reflecting signals. The UE may additionally transmit, to the base station via the reconfigurable surface, a feedback message including an indication of at least one precoder configuration of the set of precoder configurations based on receiving the set of reference signals. The UE may then receive, from the base station via the reconfigurable surface, a downlink transmission based on transmitting the feedback message.