The food industry has undergone a tremendous digital transformation over the past few years. According to Statista, the number of people who order food online is expected to reach 2.64 billion by 2027 and the revenue of the online food delivery market is anticipated to reach $1.45 trillion by the same year. The statistics clearly indicate that online food delivery startups are flourishing in this expanding market and will continue to do so in the future.
With the increasing use of technology, more and more food businesses are turning to food delivery platforms to streamline their operations and provide excellent customer experience. As the demand in the online food delivery industry is increasing, creating an online food delivery platform can hugely benefit all stakeholders (business owners, customers, restaurants, and delivery personnel) involved in the food delivery sector.
Benefits Offered by Food Delivery Platforms
- Customers can conveniently order a wide variety of food from the comfort of their homes in less time.
- Food orders can be easily tracked by customers along with information about the estimated time of arrival.
- Multiple payment options like credit/debit cards, eWallet, and more provide seamless transactions.
- Restaurants can increase their revenue by expanding their customer base.
- Restaurants can efficiently manage their orders, with reduced errors and improved order accuracy.
- Multiple revenue streams offered by an online food delivery platform provide more earning opportunities to businesses.
- Reliable food delivery software provides actionable data that helps business owners in making strategic business decisions.
- Route optimization offered by food delivery platforms helps delivery personnel deliver food orders on time.
Considering the current scenario and the numerous benefits offered by food delivery platforms, we can say now is the perfect time for budding entrepreneurs to become a leading player among others by considering food delivery software. Henceforth, in this blog, we delve into everything you need to know about food delivery software before stepping into this industry.
Before beginning, first, let’s see the essential features you need to integrate, in order to make your online food delivery platform a success.
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Must-Have Features of an Online Food Delivery App
Features play a crucial role in the success of an online food delivery platform. Below mentioned are some of the important features that your food delivery software must offer.
- Advanced search filters: Customers want to quickly search and place orders for the food they want. They would appreciate an interactive search filter with various criteria such as location, distance, price, menu choice, cuisine, ratings, and others for an easy and time-saving search.
- Multi-platform support: To provide a seamless experience across all devices, the software should be compatible with devices such as the web, mobile, and tablets. Additionally, the food delivery platform should work smoothly and must have the same functionality across each platform.
- Marketing and promotions: The software should enable business owners to run their marketing and promotional campaigns, by offering loyalty programs, referral programs, discounts, and coupons.
- Multiple payment options: Multiple payment options are one of the most important features for providing customer satisfaction and increased conversion rates. The transactions on your platform should be swift, and to achieve that, various payment APIs such as Stripe, PayPal, and more can be integrated.
- Customer feedback: With this feature, the customers can provide feedback for the services they availed on your platform. Ratings and reviews not only help in building trust and credibility among your customers but also provide valuable insights into areas that need improvement.
Now that you have gained knowledge about essential features offered by food delivery software, next, let’s get more information about ready-made software, why you should consider them and how to make a good choice.
Majorly there are two ways to build and launch your online food delivery platform. You can either choose ready-made software or opt for custom development. Readymade software is an off-the-shelf solution that is cost-effective, hassle-free, and takes less time whereas custom development requires development from scratch, therefore, needs more effort, expertise, and investment.
Furthermore, let’s see why readymade software is a better option for starting your online food delivery business.
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Why Choose Ready-Made Food Delivery Software
Ready-made software is highly advocated by experts for various reasons. They offer major financial and commercial benefits and provide you with the opportunity to stand out among your competitors in the industry. Furthermore, let’s dive into knowing why ready-made software is a better choice.
1. Quick and Cost-effective
Developing a custom food delivery platform from scratch would require a team of developers and web designers. Hence, making this development approach more time-consuming and expensive. A ready-made software comes pre-packed with features and functionality which significantly reduces the time and cost of development. It significantly reduces your time-to-market, hence, providing you with a competitive advantage.
2. Proven Technology
Ready-made software has already been tested and used by several other businesses. Therefore, their reliability and effectiveness have already been proven, which reduces the risk of launching a new platform from scratch. Additionally, readymade software comes out of rigorous research, and intuitive development procedures, hence, making them a reliable option for food delivery business needs.
3. Scalability
Ready-made software is designed to accommodate growth as your business expands, hence, making them highly scalable.
4. Customer Support
The best readymade software are backed by 24/7 troubleshooting services which can help you quickly resolve all issues and errors. This ensures businesses can operate without any major disruptions.
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How to Choose a Reliable Food Delivery Software
Choosing the right food delivery software is a critical decision you need to make before starting your online food delivery business. In this section, we discuss, how to efficiently choose food delivery software.
1. Decide Your Budget
It is important to determine your budget as it will help you narrow down your options while choosing food delivery software. However, the cost will depend on various factors like the customization, complexity, and functionality you want on your platform.
2. Consider Scalability and Customizability
Choose the software that is adaptable and scales as your business grows. It should handle increases in order volume and customers on the platform efficiently. Moreover, every business idea is unique and it becomes important to look for software that offers customizations as per your specific business needs.
3. API Integrations
A reliable software must offer the pre-integration of popular APIs to seamlessly run an online food delivery business. Some of the essential APIs required by an online food business are payment APIs like Stripe, & PayPal, navigation APIs like Google Maps, and marketing APIs such as Mailchimp, and many more.
4. Consider Security
It is very important to ensure that the food delivery software you are opting for offers robust security features to protect customers’ data and payment information on your platform.
5. Look For After-Sales Support
Ensure that the software solution you are opting for must offer full after-sales support so that if any issue arises it can be resolved at the earliest without affecting your business.
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Wrapping Up
The online food delivery industry is booming and offers numerous lucrative opportunities for entrepreneurs. Food delivery platforms have revolutionized the way businesses operate in the food industry. Although, building and launching an online food delivery platform would require careful planning and execution, nevertheless, opting for a reliable software solution can make this journey a bit easier for you.
One such ready-made software that can help you launch your online food delivery business hassle-free is Yo!Yumm. This software comes packed with industry-specific features and is pre-integrated with essential APIs that let you seamlessly manage a food delivery business. Yo!Yumm team has served global clientele around the world and has a reputable name in the industry.
