With so much pressure from competitors and consumers, quick service chains are innovating and leveraging technology faster than ever. Some quick service chains, such as Starbucks, have embraced this and are leading the movement by speeding up payments, establishing more personalized relationships with their customers, and offering more than just food to their customers.Technology has become the leading tool for increasing efficiency, revenue, and perceived value. We have spotted three key mobile technology trends that are going to lead the fast food evolution in the year 2014.
Mobile Payment
Mobile payment is growing faster than ever. Restaurant chains are reducing transaction time from up to 90 seconds to as little as 2 seconds. This significantly improves the merchant’s business operation and bottom line. Ernst & Young estimates that by 2017, more than 50% of all transactions will be completed on a mobile device.
Rise of Digital Cards
There are currently over 1 million apps in the iPhone app store. Restaurants that jumped into offering a mobile app are realizing that it is expensive to build and maintain and just as expensive to convince customers to download the app and then keep it. The average smartphone user deletes 65% of the apps they downloaded over the past two weeks. As users move towards downloading utility and gaming apps, some restaurant chains have stopped marketing their apps to their customers. Restaurant chains are starting to see the value of app-free digital cards that do not ask users to download any apps.
Mobile Loyalty
Mobile loyalty has been around since the iPhone was introduced to the market but has suffered from a lack of user adoption and merchant participation. It has taken mobile loyalty program providers longer than expected to offer a viable mobile solution. Now restaurant chains are more interested in offering their own branded mobile loyalty programs instead of a program aggregated with other merchants. The time is right for anyone with more than a handful of locations to launch their own branded mobile loyalty program and watch revenues grow..
Hope you liked this post. We would like to hear from you on this. If you’re considering taking your restaurant chain mobile and offering app-free mobile based loyalty, stored value, or gift card programs, call us at 1-877-894-7631 or drop us an email at info@virtualnext.com