Food Delivery App Development – Robust On-Demand App For Restaurant

Growing Online Food Delivery Market – Market Size and Global Forecasts

The food delivery market is not growing, but it’s exploding, popular food delivery players like UberEats, Zomato, Doordash, etc. have become the talk of the town as they enable customers to enjoy lip-smacking food at their doorsteps. The acceptance of modern tech tools in the restaurant industry is gaining pace as both businesses and end-users are reaping exclusive benefits.

Another major reason behind this explosive growth is the penetration of smartphones in user’s daily lives. Restaurants, food service joints, and franchisees leveraging mobile applications in order to make their customer base strong. Forbes has predicted that the online food delivery market will soon cross $200 billion, this number itself explains the potential of this market.

Moreover, apart from ordering food, food delivery applications are used to make online reservations, customers can also access digital menu cards. Technological advancements such as GPS are also becoming a common feature and allow customers to track their parcel in real-time. Hence, more and more entrepreneurs want to develop a food delivery app as it automates their business and gives an edge over the competition.

Market researchers have predicted that the online food delivery market will keep exploding, here they have presented some interesting facts,

There are a couple of reasons why the food delivery market is thriving, digitization spheres in each sector and the restaurant industry is no more an exception. From online ordering to cloud kitchen to social media, technology is surely revamping the restaurant industry.

Key Components That Makes Great Food Delivery App

When you plan to develop an on-demand food delivery app for your restaurant business, you should be aware of some basic elements. Here we have described the top essential elements that make the entire ordering and delivery process smooth.

There are 4 main elements in any food delivery app which includes:

• Customer app
• Admin panel
• Restaurant app
• Delivery provider app

The customer app is developed and designed for end-users, from where consumers place and track orders online from the listed restaurants.

Another important element to consider is the Admin panel. The admin panel will manage the whole application and oversee all the activities such as manage users, manage restaurants, manage delivery providers, generate reports, set commission prices, etc.

Your food delivery app has another important element- that’s the app for restaurants. The multi-feature restaurant app makes it easy for managers to fulfill orders on time.

The last, yet powerful element of your food delivery software is an app for delivery providers. The solution comes with all the handy features that make the delivery process speedy and efficient.

A Stepwise Guide to Develop a Food Delivery App for Your Restaurant

Developing a food delivery app from scratch is a tedious task. In order to make an outstanding food ordering app, you need to perform some basic steps before jumping on the bandwagon. Because without a clear business plan and market research, you can not survive long in the market. Perform mandatory tasks, let’s start with the evaluation of a business idea.

Write Your Business Plan

Jot down what your business is about and prepare a solid business plan that includes all the crucial information regarding your upcoming venture such as:

• The customers
• The company
• And about you

Your business plan must contain details related to location, finance, customers, resources, and marketing activities. Further, analyze your business idea and determine if the business model itself is fruitful according to the market.

Identify Target Market

After writing a solid business plan, the next step is to validate your business model based on your targeted customers. Consider demographic factors of your ideal customers such as age, location, income, gender, occupation, ethnicity, etc.

Choose Business Model

Whenever we talk about the food delivery business, there are mainly three types of business models available, the order only model, the order and delivery model and the last is fully integrated model. Based on your business requirement, choose the model that ensures you favorable results.

Work on Features and Functionalities

To develop a successful food delivery app, you need to integrate amazing features that deliver a top-notch experience to users, restaurants, delivery providers, and admins. Include essential features that make the overall ordering and delivery process smooth.

Select the Technology Stack

From integrating third-party APIs to the database to the back-end to designing, you need to consider a cutting-edge technology stack that improves the functionality of the app and creates a pleasant customer experience.

Have an Insight into Types of Food Delivery Apps

To comprehend how to develop a food delivery app, you should first know its types. There are three types of food delivery apps: aggregators, new delivery apps, and a fully integrated model.

Aggregator Apps: Aggregator apps are also known as third-party apps. Most small restaurants follow this approach where customers place orders and wait for it to be delivered by the delivery provider. If you are running a small restaurant and lack online visibility, this option would work best for you.

New Delivery Apps: In such kind of food delivery type, restaurants do not have to hire their own delivery providers. This is the ideal option for those restaurants that either have not established their own delivery service yet or simply cannot afford it.

Full-stack Food Delivery App: This app stands for complete delivery solutions, from managing orders to delivery partners to assigning orders. Everything can be managed with ease.

Find the best option for you and dwell in the emerging food delivery market.

A detailed Explanation of Food Delivery Business Models

The online food delivery business has become a “sweet spot” for many entrepreneurs, choosing the business model that could meet your business requirements. If you are unaware of how online delivery works, check out the app workflow and make the final decision, or consult a food delivery app development company that can understand your requirements and provide you with suitable solutions.

There are numerous food delivery apps popular in the market, however, each of them works on different business models but here we would like to have a glance over the business and revenue model of the food delivery app.

Food Delivery Apps Business Model

Food delivery apps usually follow three-tier segments which include customers, restaurants, and delivery providers. For the smooth running of a business, it is important to connect all three segments in an appropriately way. Here we are going to explain how it is beneficial for users, restaurants, and delivery providers.

Food Delivery Apps Revenue Model

There are different ways from which food delivery apps make huge money; these ways include:

Commission on Orders:
This is the primary source of revenue, food delivery apps receive a commission on each order, the commission rate varies from business to business.

Advertising:
Another exciting way to generate money is displaying ads on apps. Restaurants who want to increase their visibility and order value can pay high.

Delivery Fees:
Usually delivery charges based on distance, if the customer’s location is far from the average limit, food delivery apps can charge additional delivery fees.

Required Development Team Structure

Developing a multi-feature food delivery app is not a cakewalk. You should have an experienced team of developers who are well-versed with trending technologies and frameworks. Your team must have:

1. UI/UX designers
2. Android and iOS developers
3. Front and back-end developers
4. Product manager
5. Tester
6. Marketing and sales team

From a discussion about the project to actual development to the final delivery of the project, each team member’s role should be decided in advance to make the overall development cycle smooth and speedy.

Cost Estimation to Develop a Food Delivery App

It would be challenging to come up with the exact development cost of the food delivery app. Well, the cost of developing a food delivery app depends on numerous factors such as the type of the app, the number of features you want to integrate, the cost of developers, app design, etc.

More features and functionalities=more cost

Development Part	Approx. Hours
Research and planning	30
Basic feature integration	120
Visual prototypes	40
Design for Android and iOS platform	120
iOS development	600
Android development	650
Backend development	225
Admin panel	60

One of the major factors that regulate the cost of food delivery apps is location. Yes, if you want to work with developers belonging from western countries such as Europe and the USA, per hour development cost would go high. Whereas if you choose India, per hour development cost would lie between $20-$25.

If you want to have an extraordinary app with some unusual features, the price may go up. After all, the food delivery app development cost does not only depend on coding, it’s a long process that includes designing, development, testing, and support.

If you want to know the exact development cost, contact us, we will make your app development process less painful.

Stick to Your Budget While Developing an App for Restaurant

It is always critical to minimize time and money spent on building apps. If you are looking to develop an app for your restaurant but lack finances, here we have come across the most cost-effective ways to cut down development costs.

- Implement Ready-made Solutions

Getting started with a ready-made solution is always a profitable idea. As you don’t need to spend a huge amount on development and infrastructure, change logo, theme, business name and start selling online. It saves development cost, time and enables you to hit the market earliest.

- Develop an MVP App

Instead of spending huge time and money on the development, opt for MVP. This is the basic version of your app that you can test on real users. Collect feedback from users and make necessary changes. It will cost you less in the end than redesigning the app from zero.

- SaaS Model

Recently we have overheard the term “ SaaS” as most startups choose this business model, as you don’t have to ponder thoughts on development, infrastructure, designing, etc. Pay as per your usage and start receiving orders online.

How Food Delivery Apps Makes Money - Monetization Strategies

Food delivery apps do not make money only from delivering food to customer’s doorsteps. There are numerous ways through which they can make money.

- Commission income:

This is the primary source of revenue through which the food delivery app makes money. The owner earns revenue in the form of commission on each order placed by customers.

- Delivery charges:

If the customer’s location is far from the restaurant, the customers have to pay additional delivery charges.

- Advertising income:

Advertising is another way that food delivery apps make money. New restaurants can take advantage of the platform’s popularity as they can pay a certain amount, so that restaurant will appear at the top of the search results. It will help them to receive orders and revenue simultaneously.

Best Tech-Stack for Food Delivery App Development

Earlier, we have discussed that your food delivery app should have modern features and functionalities, so it is imperative to choose the best tech stack that delivers exceptional user experience and make your on-demand food delivery app development future-proof.

For front-end development consider HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript
For back-end development consider Java, Node.js, and Python
For the Database consider My SQL, PgSQL, Amazon Aurora

Third-party APIs

For Payment – Braintree, Stripe, PayPal
Restaurant List- Google Places API, Foursquare API
For Registrations – Facebook SDK, Gmail SDK
For Storage – AWS, Google, Azure
For Analytics – Firebase, Google Analytics
For Push Notifications- Twilio

Things to Do Before Launching Food Delivery App

Finally, your restaurant app is ready to launch, it seems like a simple task but the time between food delivery app development and app launching is important as it will decide the success of your app. Here you need to follow certain pre-launch tactics.

- Do Market Research

The App development industry is crowded, you need to conduct market research before launching your app to both stores. You can also analyze competition, it will help you determine the best way to launch and monetize your app.

- Create a Landing Page

The best way to engage users with your food delivery app is to promote it before it’s been launched. Create an appealing landing page that captures the user's eyeballs and compels them to leave their email ID. This will help you drive reviews and installs at the time of launching.

- Create a Buzz

Promote your app on social media and various platforms, it will drive traffic to your website and application. Generate some pre-launch buzz by posting fresh and quality content that excites people to install your food delivery app when the app launches.