During the Coronavirus outbreak, we have experienced lots of changes. The businesses also got hit by the pandemics; however, some sectors grew exponentially, where the food industry is one of these. With the support of food delivery app development, the food industry consistently caters to customers’ demands. There are several online food ordering apps in the market that users can use to order the food at their respective locations.

If we specifically talk about the US, then fast-food app demand raised by 21%. In 2020, the top food delivery apps had 91 million US downloads 2020 with moderate growth of 3% yearly. These apps facilitated many users to have their favorite food.

Other than food delivery apps, the non-delivery apps like Subway and Taco Bell also experienced growth of up to 60%. Therefore, the food delivery industry is one of the biggest market segments having unlimited growth opportunities.

If you are a restaurant owner or an entrepreneur searching for why restaurants need a well-executed food delivery mobile app development, you are on the right path. There are multiple possibilities for revenue generation via availing of restaurant app development services.

Once you get the app and then apply the appropriate marketing strategy, you can transform your entrepreneurship dream into a reality. For having a well-executed mobile app with basic features, you need to spend up to $2000- $8000 US dollars, and it can go up with increasing features and functionalities.

What Are the Reasons That Makes an Online Food Delivery App Beneficial for Restaurants?

The Worldwide online food delivery segment is expected to reach 306,808 US dollars in 2021 with a CAGR 2021-2025 of 10.01%, with market volume projected to reach $449,292 by 2025. It is also confirmed by National Restaurant Association (USA) that restaurant sales will be trend higher.

So, one of the prime benefits of food delivery app development to the restaurant business is having great revenue and growth in the market. The competition is on the verge, and there are many competitors in the market then; having an excellent food ordering app can help you overcome the existing and upcoming challenges.

Let’s have a look at the reasons why restaurants need an app to deliver the food

1. Better Reach to The Customers

To better reach potential customers within geographical boundaries, making a food delivery app is an excellent solution for restaurants. It can help you connect with local customers in a great way where customers can enjoy the services.

Moreover, you can think about fantastic revenue generation by applying localized marketing techniques or geo-marketing techniques via an app. Developing a restaurant app will be worthwhile if you hire dedicated developers with in-depth experience with technologies such as iBeacon Technology.

2. Boosting Brand Image

Having a restaurant app is such a great idea to boost the brand image. Via an app, you can offer customers high-quality food, the best services, and specialized deals. It will attract the attention of users and will help you to retain existing customers.

You can also promote your app via social media platforms to increase the user base. Once the user installs the app and finds it interesting, they will have a positive image of your brand whether they will use it or not.

3. Smooth Reservation

Although food delivery is such a great thing and people liked it most, restaurants have started opening with Covid-19 unlock, so instead of ordering food, if customers want to make a reservation, it would be best for the business if they can have a hassle-free reservation.

Read More:- Features To Include while Developing An Outstanding Food Delivery App

It will increase their joy of availing of the services. The easy reservation facility via the app will also generate trust among the customers.

4. Let The Customer Updated

It is always positive for every business if the customer stays updated about the services and offers. Regarding the restaurant business, it always works best when the customer gets the latest offers or deals. Here an experienced mobile app development company will be more helpful to develop the solution so you can send push notifications about the special deals to the customers. It will be beneficial in terms of revenue generation as well.

5. Improved ROI (Rate of Interest)

It is a thing that every business takes care of, so the same is applied to restaurant businesses. You can use your app for improving the ROI by offering loyalty or referral programs or both to the customers.

For example, via your app, you can offer loyalty programs at the festivals such as Thanks Giving Day, Christmas Day, or New Year’s Day. It can increase the number of customers and revenue directly. Indirectly it will be your low-cost strategy for the promotion that, in turn, will provide high ROI.

6. Offering Personalized Experience to The Customers 

As a restaurant owner, you will have full control over the app to collect the user’s data generated while interacting with the app. This data will be useful to make and implement the strategy to provide a personalized experience to the customers that will depend on their previous transaction & ordering history. It includes sending personalized messages and deals. It will also be advantageous for brand retention and engaging the customers.

7. Better Service Experience

The restaurant business can be run on three models Pack and Carry, Online Delivery, and Dining. If you are running your business based on these or any two of these, then a customized app will work as a great tool to provide a better service experience to the customers.

Suppose you got the order on the app where some customers will pick their food and some customers want to reserve the table; then you can easily manage all the tasks with ease, and it will not affect your service quality.

8. Fine Management

The success of a business depends upon that how you manage it. An online food ordering app can help you manage all the tasks that including payment management and order management. To have this functionality, your app must be built by a comprehensively experienced mobile application development company that has produced several app solutions related to the delivery app for restaurants.

9. Learning From Reviews

Critics always work as a great guide to improve the systems, so via app functionality, you can request the user by sending a notification to the customer to fill the feedback or review after completing the order. Later you can use this feedback or reviews to improve the service quality.

10. Standing Out of The Crowd

It is self-understood that competition is tough, so for the restaurant business industry as an owner, you need to have a unique app that offers some great features that users miss in other apps. It is why on-demand app development is on the high rise, where the online food delivery market is projected to reach $161.74 billion by 2023. The best features will make you stand out from the crowd.

11. Easy Access to The Menu

The restaurant food delivery app can also serve best in showcasing the menu to the clients on their mobile devices. You can find it may be as simple as every food delivery application has. Still, the point is, as per Chadwick Martin Bailey, one of the top research websites, that more than 62% of customers like to explore the menu on their mobile devices. So, facilitating the users for the same will increase the number of customers and better user experiences.

The Restaurant App Development & Its Examples

If you plan to launch a customized app for your restaurant, it will be such a great idea. More than 70% of users like to order food online from their mobile devices, and the percentage of users increased after Covid-19. It may be possible that you may have a website, but the user may find it difficult to access it from their mobile device.

Read More:- What is the cost of running any food delivery app, like Swiggy or zomato, per month?

So, if you have an app, then they can directly use it for ordering the food. Before proceeding with the further actions, you need to focus on the following categories, including the examples.

1. Restaurant Locator App

These apps help the customer navigate the restaurants in their nearby locations to reach them with an easy approach. The best example is doordash and Zomato, which allows the users to find out the restaurants having fine dining establishments, order food online from their favorite restaurant, and track the meal order they have placed via an app. The Zomato app has a 45% market share in the online food ordering industry.

2. Table Reservation

It is also one of the finest options for restaurant mobile app development. It facilitates the users to reserve the table via an app instead of making manual efforts such as phone calls. It also helps the restaurant owners to manage the bookings. It saves time allotting the tables and getting the clients’ orders while booking the table; they can also order the food by accessing the online menu. OpenTable is one of the perfect examples of it. Among leading restaurant reservation technologies open table market share is 18.98%.

3. On-Table Ordering App

This kind of app facilitates the restaurants to make the menu available online where customers can order the food from their mobile device by scanning the QR code or by the login.

Implementing the same facility in your app will save staff time to distribute the menu and get orders from clients. After ordering the food at the same time, the user can process the payment. One of the top-notch on-table ordering apps is FlipDish which captured 37% market with JustEats in the UK.

4. Online Ordering and Delivery App

These apps are most popular among the users where they can order the food, and it will be delivered at their locations. Therefore, there is no need to introduce the Domino’s Pizza app as it is a top-rated restaurant ordering app. Especially in Pizza delivery where Domino’s shares more than 50% market.

5. Loyalty Program App

Starbucks is one of the finest examples that offer exclusive or specialized deals to its loyal customers. It is the main reason for their customer retention. Whenever it comes to ordering food from a restaurant or a cafe, consumers always choose one where they can have great deals, offers, or discounts. So, you can consider it the best option to implement in your app.

Process To Develop Food App Clone for Restaurants

It is a quite complicated process to develop a food app clone for restaurants, and the reason is that process includes several stages that you need to be focused on.

1. Market Research

It is the first and most crucial step for the future of your mobile restaurant app, where you need to conduct appropriate market research that includes the existing statistics and forecasts. Here you need to decide about who will be your target audience, and what kind of issues they face with existing restaurant or food delivery apps. Then, it will be helpful for you to address the issues.

2. Strategy and Goal Set-Up

Having an app does not mean success things depend upon the strategy, planning, and goal set up for the restaurant business. Therefore, you need to also prepare your unique strategy to gain the desired results.

3. Hiring A Software Development Company 

Finding and hiring a perfect software development company is above anything else. Instead of taking a hurried decision, it would be best to shortlist the companies, research & compare, and then finalize it. It will help you to have quality food industry solutions in the form of an app.

4. Features & functionalities 

Although you have decided to go for a food app clone for your restaurant, you should be well prepared about features and functionalities. Several apps may have common features, but if you want to make your restaurant app different from others, there is great to include some distinct and unique features.

Read More:- Process of Food delivery App Development

5. Marketing Campaign 

Once the app is developed and launched after testing, you need to work out the marketing campaigns. For the same, you can utilize the power of internet marketing and social media marketing. It will help you increase your customer base.

6. Feedback & Review Analysis

Feedback & review analysis is such an excellent business practice that supports improvement. It also helps modify the food ordering app as per reviews done or feedback collected from the customers.

7. Customer Support  

This step is as crucial as the above steps. In case of poor customer support, the user does not retain the brand, so it would be best for the business to provide excellent customer support.    

The Conclusion

There is much need for new-age solutions for several sectors and the food industry is one of them. The food delivery app development is one of the potential segments of the business world where entrepreneurs such as restaurant owners, meal services providers, and food delivery aggregators are focusing on it. The online food delivery segment is projected to have revenue growth of 16.6% in 2022. The user penetration will be more than 26.5%, where business models like the platform to consumer delivery will be on the top. So, if you are planning to step into the restaurant business, it would be far better to focus on a customized restaurant app for your business.