1. Should you create a separate area for pre-order collection and delivery?
It would be beneficial to do, so you create an online to a seamless offline experience.
Customers can arrive at the requested time, skip the queue entirely and pick up their freshly prepared food. Customers pre-order because of how hassle-free it is, so you need to adopt this same mentality and make sure the click and collect process is as simple as possible. The same applies for managing the process for delivery, having a separate area for collection allows your drivers to pick the order up quickly to get it to the customer as soon as possible.
Don’t worry if a queue begins to form in your pre-order zone, if you are organised and cooking food to be ready for the designated collection times, the queue will move quickly. A study by researchers at University College London have found that people will wait for an average of six minutes in a queue before giving up in frustration, so if a queue forms in your collection zone make sure it moves quickly!
2. Would it be useful to text customers to notify them when their order is ready?
Yes, clear communication to customers is essential as it gives them confidence that their order is underway. The Preoday platform lets you send out push notification so you can communicate when their order is received, is being processed or is ready for collection. Take a look at some of the examples you can send below:
Thank you for placing your order with us. Your order will be ready for collection in 30 minutes.
Your food is ready for collection. Thanks for ordering with us.
Good news! Your takeaway is on its way. We hope you enjoy it and look forward to hearing from you again soon.
It is important to plan and agree who is going to be responsible for communicating with the customer, so there is no confusion, and the process runs as smooth as possible. Staff training is therefore important, your staff are still the face and voice of the operation and will be both preparing the food and interacting with customers who place digital orders.
3. Should I develop a marketing plan?
Yes, it will be beneficial to keep you focused on marketing your new service. We recommend marketing your new service month-on-month to build its success. Consider developing a simple plan that contains key activities such as, using in-store signage on walls, tills, creating printed takeaway bag drops and regular social media posts to encourage downloads and orders. You can also pre-plan your promotions in advance so you can take advantage of seasonal offers such as Valentines Day or Christmas promotions. Take a look at a recent example from our client FishnChickn.
4. Do I need to create a separate area in the kitchen to dedicate to pre-orders?
As your pre-ordering business grows, you might want to consider a separate area of the kitchen that is dedicated to click & collect and delivery orders, so the process is as seamless as possible. The kitchen is the command centre of any restaurant or takeaway, whether it’s spacious or tiny if a kitchen is carefully designed you can deliver hundreds of meals in an evening for both collection and delivery.
Take some time to think about what you need to do to adapt your operations and download our eBook, to find out more about the operational factors you should consider before launching your online and mobile ordering service.
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