Ordering food from our favourite eating place has never been so easy. Especially, as food tech-companies such as Zomato and Swiggy have announced the 10-minute delivery, it’s no less than a technological miracle!
A variety of geospatial data and big data approaches are leading to the digital disruption, and food tech companies are well implementing this new change making the concept of using maps just to locate a place a passé.
Acing the high-tech marvel, food delivery market is expected to grow $15 billion by 2023. With companies like Swiggy and Zomato already having a presence in almost all of the Indian Tier-I and Tier-II cities it is likely that this market will grow rapidly with new players coming in with differentiated strategies.
These numbers and statistics indicate the benefits for a few early adopting companies, making it more urgent than ever for others to keep pace with digital transformations and adoptions. The reason being simple if the delivery time is too high or if the user isn’t shown a good number of restaurants, then he/she might not place an order in the first place!
Hence, customer experience and quick delivery remains the top most priority for food delivery services and underlying philosophy behind the improvisation to the delivery model.
Besides, with the emergence of “cloud-kitchens” last-mile delivery, it is something that is making a huge storm in the market in terms of size and technological improvements. Location intelligence along with artificial intelligence is helping them to predict customer buying patterns and stage inventories in the cloud kitchens nearest to where the demand for home delivery is more and the high accuracy geospatial data will take the delivery from last-mile to last-meter.
Also getting an edge with Location intelligence solutions, for quick service restaurants and cloud kitchens, it is critical in enhancing marketing strategies by getting the message across at the right time as the competition gets fiercer.
An increase in customer base, maximizing market share, and improving individual outlet performance are some of the primary benefits Quick service restaurants and cloud kitchens can receive by using location intelligence platforms.
Furthermore, for these food tech-companies real-time traffic, order preparation time, delivery executive efficiency, time and distance are the ingredients for a more informed view. They play a very important role in various legs of completing a delivery. Subsequently, will also help food-tech companies grow their business.
Moreover, there are two important aspects that need to be considered from the point of delivery, door level accuracy of house address to save navigation time and hyperlocal spatial analysis for predicting the demand for food items based on historical orders and customer persona in an area.
Therefore, food-tech companies are using location data for improving the various facets of their organization. Food Tech companies are using location data to help their customer to search or find new restaurants near them. They do this by finding which restaurants can take orders and deliver them within the minimum delivery time. This is known as serviceability. The trick here is to find the right time to ensure delivery and provide an ample choice of restaurants for which the delivery time can be calculated as quickly as possible.
Today different location intelligence companies are offering solutions using geospatial technology to enable digital transformation a effective decision making. Their location intelligence tools help quick service restaurants and cloud kitchens offer better customer service and deliver greater efficiencies in terms of loyalty programs, promotions, and more by analysing geographical business data.
Some have created grids for various categories like affluence, buyer persona on certain products, risk grids, etc for major cities in India. Similarly grids for food preferences can be created based on the demographics along with infrastructure details for a grid and the catchment boundary for a foot outlet to serve within less than 10 minute of drive time for ensuring sustainability in the long term.
On this front, food tech brands can now leverage location intelligence solutions for tackling a variety of challenges related to the discovery, engagement, and activation of customers at the right time and place. Since location intelligence can help reveal relationships between data sets that would have not been obvious otherwise.
Also, Data analytics for predicting orders during the time of the day and day of the week will help the food outlet operators plan for their daily & hourly activities. In fact, fast deliveries will not only ensure more revenues but also improve the bottom line for the companies. Spatial technology integration in food order apps and the availability of hyperlocal analysis to outlets will change the game for everyone.
(Ashwani Rawat is Co-Founder & Director, Transerve-a Location Intelligence company)
