You are about to see a great transformation in the way people buy and consume food. With on-demand food delivery apps becoming the new favorite of food lovers. We can hope for good days for food ordering app development in 2022-23. The ease of food delivery apps is on the rise with providing people with features, more advanced, user friendly, making it easier to order food online through great food delivery app features and enjoy it at their homes with loved ones.
“The food delivery market in India is expected to increase by USD 716.53 million from 2021 to 2026, registering a CAGR of 28.13%”_ Technavio.
For the first time, people are starting to think about normalcy after a long covid-19 period. Believe me, people were never as sure as today about what they wanted. Many new food delivery trends came to life in 2020-21- many of them good. Trends such as zero waste and contac-tless deliveries have helped on-demand food delivery app development startups to grow in a natural environment, and offer features that their users expect the most. But there are many things you need to know before you start developing your on-demand food delivery app. There are certain food delivery app features we have added in this article you might wanna add before you jump on with developing a food app for your restaurant to make people love it.
So keep reading to learn which ones will stick around and grow in 2022.
What are the Types/Models of food delivery apps?
If you're planning to develop an on-demand food delivery app. There are three types of modern food delivery application models that are popular and dominate the online food ordering businesses and delivery industry. Food delivery businesses generally follow one of the following models.
1. Aggregators
Aggregator-based online food delivery businesses allow food delivery from multiple restaurants using a single platform. This business model aggregates services offered by various restaurants and conglomerates them into a single portal. The platform acts as an intermediary between customers and restaurants in this model.
“Zomato, Swiggy, and Uber Eats are some of the big names that have adopted the model”.
2. Available Service
1. Order Only Model
The then impressive model in the food industry, the order-only model is a food delivery business model. Most of you might know it by the platform-to-consumer business model. In this model the food order app allows users to place their order on the app and the local restaurants deliver the orders through their own fleet or any of the third-party courier services provided. The model was so popular amongst mobile application development for restaurants looking to build a strong online presence and a larger customer base.
2. The delivery model
The most popular and common food delivery business model is used by most of the big brands in the industry. The model handles customers, restaurants as well as delivery through their app platform following contact-less delivery norms at the same time. Restaurants prefer this type of marketplace to save their valuable time on dealing with the delivery process. Developing this type of food delivery model requires more resources to operate as compared to the order-only model.
3. Own Services
While most of the restaurants decided to follow the lockdown restrictions. Many tried and succeeded in adapting to the normal. Yes, many restaurants challenge the new normal by using third-party delivery apps to serve their customers in a difficult time. But as we know third-party delivery services come with their set of challenges too. Following which many restaurants adopted food delivery application development to start providing their own on-demand order and delivery service, in order to improve the overall customer experience.
How to build a food delivery app?
Building a modern food delivery app is a tricky task and it is as tricky to make people download it and fall in love with it. The pandemic and safety regulations made many applications so popular in the on-demand food delivery app category. That dine-in at a restaurant seems more like a family picnic than a daily eat-out. This is the biggest reason why you are here reading the essential features for developing a successful app. But how would you build a food app exactly?
If you are sure about the type of food delivery app you wanna build. Congratulations, you are now at level two of developing the food delivery app. It’s no secret that people will always go after what’s convenient. This is perhaps the most significant step to start from. Let’s get into the details.
1. Start with a minimal viable product (MVP)
MVP model is a great way to start, as it allows you to develop an app with just enough core features and run it for customer experience. Preventing you from offering a bunch of features that your customers were not looking at. It’s a proven way to test our idea and give yourself a chance to make changes in the app as per your customer’s needs.
2. Standard client app
Depending on the type of food delivery app you have chosen. The client app model lets you keep the features designed specifically for that business model. So you get a dedicated feature set for aggregators, delivery partners, and providers or restaurants.
As the technology behind developing a food delivery app continues to grow (Internet and mobile). The challenges to providing a unique set of features walk parallel to it. There is still much to consider before listing out the feature as there are different core modules one should consider. If you are unsure about the accomplishment of the latter. Be right here we are about to take you there.
Features of a Food Delivery App
Customer’s App Module
- Search Filter
There are many features that you can afford to ignore while developing a food delivery app. But a sophisticated search filter for users to find the right restaurant and food options or menu choices. Shouldn’t be one of them. This feature is a great example of how you can make customers appreciate your efforts to ease things and save them a lot of time while ordering from your food app.
- Order Placement
Developing a food ordering app must be created on the basis of the best user experience. A carefully designed layout, containing attractive menus, carts, and a lot more. Try to keep the order placing process as simple as possible for your customers. Add different categories for food and restaurants. Implement order tracking features that facilitate a good customer experience and influence them to buy from your mobile app.
- Real-time Location
Order tracking and real-time location features are important for a seamless food ordering experience for mobile app users. To make the process easier. Provide a map, displaying the estimated time to deliver their orders. Let them locate the orders and track their movement. Don’t keep it for the sake of keeping it, do it for the sake of your hungry customers’ satisfaction.
You can use available technologies such as real-time GPS, which is also one of the essential features in the user and admin module in a food delivery app.
- Payment Gateway Integration
Easy and no-time consuming payment methods can be a great attraction for your potential customers. Payment gateway integration, being the final step, plays a crucial role in the success of any ordering and delivery app. The payment gateways and options for mobile wallet software, such as Google Wallet, Apple Pay, iOS PayPal accounts, Mastercard, Credit/Debit Cards, Internet Banking, and Cash On Delivery (COD) options, can all be used. You can choose the most accessible or keep them all.
- Coupons
Special promotional offers and discount coupons are great ways to attract new users to your food delivery app. Just like many other food ordering apps out there in the market, you keep a similar page as payments to be used to offer promotional, reward points, or discount code utilization.
- App chat option
The other essentials on the list are chat and notifications options at large. Simply to make it easier for mobile food app users to enquire about the menu, help in tracking orders progress, and get apps using support. Online chat assures your customers that you are available whenever they need more information. This is a great tool for your MVY app model to be tested and decided by the customers if they want it or not.
- Reviews and Ratings
If you are aiming for a greater customer experience for food ordering app users. Enable them to rank and evaluate restaurants and food menus listed on the app. If you have trust in surveys, they are more inclined towards keeping a form and rating criteria in on-demand food apps. Businesses use this method to learn how happy their customers are with their applications. If you have genuine feedback and ratings, there is a good likelihood that people will visit your app.
- Order History
An optional feature that you can try in your MVP food delivery app model is to provide users with information about the past orders they have placed from your app. This is a great way to save their time on finding and placing the same order again.
- Nearby Restaurants
This is where food ordering and delivery apps are worth someone's while. Nearbuy restaurant listings are a must-have feature for you. It lets your users filter the restaurant listing and find restaurants in their locality. Offers great opportunities for app developers to attract a wide range of customers.
Delivery Driver’s App Module
- Registration
At the food application development end, food delivery app features can provide automated document submission and driver background checks. This is a feature that can be used for growing stages where registration and checks can’t be done manually. The delivery driver’s module provides a great interface for the driver to add and verify their details to be submitted to the app provider.
- User Profile
The delivery driver module assists drivers with many features. It creates a different user's profile to keep their details, and schedules in the app only. This way the admin or the driver itself can find and track their order schedules, payments, earnings, and performance.
- Alert and Notification
In a food app, delivery drivers are provided with features to receive notifications on new orders and alerts for changes and updates related to orders and location.
- Order Processing
With these features of a restaurant app development, delivery drivers can use their driver’s module in the food delivery app to track the estimated order processing time and manage multiple orders accordingly.
- The Locations and the Routes
Top food delivery applications in India are using location and route features. To enable drivers to track their orders' routes and locations in the app itself. So theory can manage and deliver different orders from the same location or on the same routes. When you use the driver app for delivery services, you and your employees can track the status of the delivery at any time.
- Manage Multiple Deliveries
In the food delivery app drivers’ module dashboard, routes and orders are displayed with all relevant information. From exact food delivery locations to similar landmarks. With precise tracking, drivers can monitor their delivery times and optimize them to deliver multiple orders.
- Call/Chat Option
Thanks to the chat and call features in the food delivery app. Now it is easier for users and riders to communicate with each other. It lets riders and drivers communicate with each other before a pick-up, and users can call or chat with riders to help with finding the location or tracking the orders they have placed.
- Order History
In-app features for riders and drivers enable them to manage and store current and other previously completed orders’ history. Though the details are limited to 24-48 hours, it is enough to make sure that they get their accurate daily or monthly wages. The details include proof of delivery, user ratings, and time taken to deliver the order based on the date, order number, or driver.
Admin Dashboard
The dashboard is an important feature for the admin panel of a food delivery platform for startups. This will help you immensely to manage your restaurant. The admin dashboard bestows all the important features on the dashboard, about orders and deliveries and payments.
- Performance Analysis
In the admin dashboard, the most important feature is the performance analysis. Be it for delivery riders, orders, menu items, or the app itself. Food delivery apps provide admins with every tiny piece of information necessary to evaluate the above-mentioned performances. Following with the exact analysis of visitors, locations, abandoned carts, inventory, and of course the top-selling menu item. Based on these real-time analytics and reports, admins can work on the weaker areas specifically for more sales and online orders.
- Manage Order Requests
Admin Dashboard management is provided in order to manage orders and other business activities. Such as validating and authorizing payment methods for multiple users and executives. A single platform connects multiple users, delivery executives, and admins to share a wide range of data to serve specific and different purposes.
- Real-time Update
Benefits of restaurant app development seems in the admin panel or dashboard provide real-time updates and reports to monitor activities of other modules. Admin of a food delivery app gets prompt updates of changes in delivery executive status, order progress, menu changes, ratings and reviews of riders and orders, canceled orders, and other important data.
- Payment and Commission Administration
Admin can manage and make changes to payment and commission policies. Includes setting up commissions for delivery executives and restaurants. Directly from the admin panel for every single partner or executive.
- Offers and Discounts
Loyalty programs and discount offers through food delivery apps are the best way to keep attracting customers to order from your food app. Admin of the food app can manage the discounts and offers from the discount management dashboard in the admin app module. The offers are usually assigned to new and existing customers based on their order history using the food ordering app.
- Push Notifications
Push or pop-up notifications in the admin dashboard help app admins to keep track of important events, payment of an order, delivery of food to a courier, approach of an executive to a delivery point, delivery time, and more. Push notifications are real-time alerts, which assist admins to manage campaigns, improving users'’ experience and increasing customer loyalty.
- Restaurant Management
Restaurant administrators can manage all listings directly through the app. Admins of food delivery apps can view an altered version of a general outline of the app. Admins can add restaurants, update restaurant information, check restaurant status, or remove any restaurant from the list.
- Campaign Management
Campaign management features are inbuilt in food delivery apps. It is the right place for these features as well. It enables admins to create loyalty campaigns to boost customers engagements and transactions, create new offers to get new online customers. With real-time analyses of user’s activities & behavior towards relevant food items and products.
Restaurant App
- Registration and authentication
Restaurant app has inbuilt user registration form for new customers, admins and delivery executives. It may not require much effort, its sole purpose is to collect the information needed to authenticate the app users to login to the food delivery app. It collects information such as mobile phone number, real name, location, OTP, etc.
- Management of menus
Menu managing is easier with robust features in the admin panel. Restaurants can offer attractive food menus with different cuisines and pictures to help customers place their orders easily with online food ordering apps.
- Management of orders
Easy and user-friendly features to add orders, schedule orders to ensure timely delivery or update or cancel the order. The admin panel feature allows you to easily view and manage recent orders, their status, delivery process, etc. It provides a user-friendly control panel that provides a seamless user experience.
- Ratings and testimonials
Restaurant reviews play a significant role in determining whether or not potential diners would like to eat at a restaurant, so it is worth your while to keep your best-reviewed restaurants at the top. With the Restaurant Review app, you can add any information that you feel will benefit your customers who read reviews.
Revenue Models for Modern Food Delivery App
- Commission
Aggregator commission is the most popular and effective way to earn revenue. It is used by many top aggregators such, zomato, Swiggy. As a third-party food order and delivery partner you set fixed or variable commission charges to be deducted from the orders placed and delivered via your on-demand food delivery application. It works from the admin end, so when the admin receives an orders’ payment he can simply deduct commission cost, and send the rest of the amount to the restaurant.
- Subscription
Post covid-19 period, a model completely different from the traditional commission model, the subscription model has come in demand. Nowadays, companies are moving towards selling products over their app and website so they can receive a good recurring subscription revenue, either monthly or yearly. This is beneficial for companies looking to convert new customers and make retaining customers.
- Paid Advertisements
Exclusive paid advertisements are the best revenue models to earn money in the food delivery business. This model can run with any other model without affecting the other. This method
One of the best methods to earn money in the food delivery business is 'advertising.'
- Delivery and Other Charges
Another popular alternative to running successful revenue streams is delivery charges. Every order includes a specific or different fee based on the order delivery location. These charges are visible to users while completing the order. Aggregators can offer subscription plans for minimal fees as well, where users subscribe or become members to avoid the delivery charges and save a decent amount of money on food orders and delivery.
Tools and Technologies to Use
When looking to develop a successful food delivery app, mere useful functionalities and keeping the most trending features is not enough. The most important criterion is to select the right tools and technologies. There are different tools available in the market that are scalable and maintainable, as per your business needs. As technology evolves with time, so you choose wisely.
- Development: A web application is developed using HTML5 and CSS3 as markup languages and Javascript as a programming language. You can even create the front-end using Angular and React.
- Mobile App Development: Top recommendations are to use a hybrid framework like Flutter or React Native to create cross-platform iOS and Android mobile applications.
- Backend Development: You would be overwhelmed by various backend development platforms. The best way to find the best fit is to ask your IOS or Android developer. Ex. PHP and NodeJS.
- Databases: MySQL and MongoDB are most popular for database purposes.
Cost to Develop a Food Delivery App
Every app that is dynamic and functional costs differently due to its complexity and the expertise required to fulfill a specific business need. Including the complexity of the application, the overall cost of developing a food application depends on various factors such as software developer costs, the number of platforms you are targeting, and the number of integrations. During the discovery phase, the app development company calculates the amount. Also there could be some overhead charges as well, which may include app customization, UI/UX designs, quality checks, project management, research costs.
“Consider, for example, a $30 per hour software developer, then the cost to build an on-demand delivery app development starts at $50,000 for each platform (Android, iOS). For exact quotes you can contact our sales team or call us directly”.
Conclusion
Throughout this article, we have covered everything you need to know about building a food delivery app. Perhaps you have also figured out what kind of developer you're looking for. Finding the right developer is just as crucial as making a perfect food delivery app. Simply creating an app is not enough when the market is growing so rapidly. All factors need to be aligned perfectly to help your brand stand out. These guidelines and recommendations should speed up the development process for sure.
At your service
If you are still unsure about the features your users would want in your app. Our team of food delivery app development experts can guide you through the journey and assist you to develop and launch your on-demand food delivery mobile application services in minimal time and make it popular in the development and marketing phases.
Whether you are a restaurant or just a third-party delivery platform. We can help you choose the right features for your food ordering and delivery app. To help you create a successful online food delivery business.
