Commentary

Making mobile ordering your friend

April 5, 2017 by Nic Gray — CEO, Hyprloco

Mobile ordering is becoming a more prevalent channel that guests choose to interact with your restaurant for off-premise orders. Mobile promises to increase revenue and make the guest’s experience faster and more convenient. But what are the unintended consequences when that solution works well?

Starbucks recently made headlines while trying to tackle this question as its wildly successful mobile ordering system has led to longer wait times for in-store customers as baristas are being overwhelmed by multiple streams of orders. According to Business Insider, the coffee-centered chain is facing woes as stores are being inundated with mobile orders that are drastically slowing down service and alienating customers.

The numbers show the consequences in that Starbucks' same-store transactions, a measure of customer traffic, dropped 2 percent in the most recent quarter. It's a result that has left many questioning how to manage the mobile order process more efficiently.

When mobile ordering overwhelms a store it creates a slowed customer experience throughout. Customers experience longer lines and confusion as additional stressors and responsibilities are placed on employees. All of these factors negatively impact customer satisfaction. And, in today's environment of instant reviews that can quickly become a very public blight on a store which results in substantial losses, you need to know how to avoid this pitfall and put mobile ordering to work for, rather than against, you.

Here are some simple rules to manage the ordering and pickup process:

Make sure your people are ready for mobile

Based on significant lessons learned, fast-casual burrito giant, Chipotle has managed to cut wait times by as much as 50 percent while using mobile ordering. By leveraging a combination of more tactical hiring, better training and measured ingredient stations the chain has developed a better way to manage ordering spikes. They also managed to more accurately predict when food will be ready for their customers. By having the right employees in the right places to manage the waves of mobile orders as well as the orders of people waiting in line, Chipotle has managed to keep customers coming back.

Drive toward loyalty

Creating a meaningful connection with guests through their mobile devices is a tremendous opportunity to develop a loyal brand relationship. By accessing something omnipresent on almost every human being — the cell phone — companies can establish and maintain an intimate conversation with its customers. After Starbucks recent stumble the company is actively looking for solutions to manage customers in line while an influx of mobile orders jams up baristas. The most promising tools that Starbucks is using right now include mobile payment options and loyalty programs. While these paths show promise, they don’t solve the core issue of managing customers coming at your staff from multiple angles.

Real-time intelligence

Whether people are paying for a $4 burger or a $40 steak, they want the perfect dining experience. Technology is a tool that should be leveraged to help line employees consistently deliver the best product and a more tailored service.

An example of a company trying an alternate strategy to manage the wasted time and frustration caused by the mobile order bottleneck, Starbird Chicken has opted for a manual workaround that uses an app and creates a system that requires customers to actually click through steps on the app.

Recently, Starbird said this work-around allowed customers to place orders on their phones, drive to Starbird, pull into a parking space and have food delivered to their car in under five minutes instead of waiting in a long, exhaust fume–filled drive-thru lane. It an active customer engagement strategy that solves some of the problems associated with drive-thru and curbside pickup.

Stay ahead of customer needs to win at mobile ordering

A winning mobile ordering strategy requires getting ahead of customers needs, managing lines and leveraging real-time intelligence to make customers feel welcome. A comprehensive solution empowers frontline employees to know things like:

• Who ordered what.
• How far customers are from the restaurant.
• When to fire orders.
• When patrons arrive in-restaurant.

The bottom line is that mobile is here to stay and will only become more ubiquitous. The restaurants that adapt and apply real-time intelligence to the guest pickup experience can leverage that smooth operation into a serious competitive advantage.

Photo: iStock