Mobile ordering has become the buzz word for the food industry in 2015. Online ordering via both desktops and mobile apps are increasingly becoming common for fast food and quick service restaurants. According to EatStreet, an online ordering provider, digital ordering is growing 300 percent faster than the dine-in traffic. Not surprisingly, food giants and restaurant chains are announcing their own mobile ordering apps or plan to do so in the near future.
In an April 2014 online survey conducted by AYTM, 32% of respondents said they “regularly” ordered food online, of which 4% ordered using mobile apps.
Another survey conducted by ad agency Sullivan Higdon & Sink in February 2014 claims that of the US internet
users, 26% respondents said they had ordered online from a restaurant in the past year, with parents or boomers being 37% and millennials consisted of 35% of the age groups among whom online ordering was most common. While, 58% found the idea of ordering food online appealing.
Mobile Ordering Apps by food chains:
Taco Bell is one of the first fast food chains to embrace the ‘mobile-shift’ in food ordering by launching an app for both android and iOS users. Mobile app users can link a credit, debit or gift card for enabling payments and then head to the menu directly for ordering items of their liking. Customers can head to their nearest Taco Bell when hungry to pick up their order. After they come within 500 feet of the store, the app utilizes GPS technology to send out a notification asking users to “check in” and pick up their order. This would alert Taco Bell’s kitchen that the customer is nearby beaming the order into the POS queue and the kitchen can start whipping up the order right away. This process also ensures that food is always served hot. Users who prefer to keep their their location sharing turned off can manually notify the store when they arrive to pick up their order.
Burger King and McDonalds have also launched similar mobile apps keeping their young and mobile savvy customers in mind forming their largest target demographic.
Digital Food Malls:
Online ordering providers like EatStreet create an online market place for food chains and restaurants providing them all in a single app. This gives more cuisine options to the undecided consumers and brings new customers for the restaurants in the market place who may have not gone to them otherwise. Online ordering providers charge a percentage of orders (placed via the app) to the restaurants.
Monetizing restaurant’s Facebook Page:
An online ordering system can be implemented on your restaurant’s Facebook page thus monetizing your social fans.
Online food ordering via desktops and mobile has many advantages that attract both millennials and boomers. It is easy to use, gives more clarity on the price and menu options and reduces the waiting time. On the seller side, it reduces the demand on staff that need to engage with customers over phone or in-store; reduces in store queues and gives a plethora of data about customers for example popular food items, preferred mode of payment (mobile wallet, mobile payment through apps, or regular web payments), and preferred mode of order type (delivery or pick-up). Digital ordering is definitely the next big thing in the fast food industry, providing a win-win for all.
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