To Go May Be Here to Stay
As businesses across the country have reopened and welcomed on-premise customers, many continue to offer curbside or delivery service – even businesses that previously didn’t offer delivery. Contactless service evolved as a survival mode for many business owners, but for some businesses curbside pick-up and delivery may become a permanent addition to business operations and a competitive advantage.
While there are different ways of offering contactless service, they have in common several advantages for business owners and customers. More often than not, curbside or delivery will save busy customers time. Business owners who have modified their offerings to expedite contactless delivery may have been able to reduce and simply their offerings — allowing them to reduce operating costs. When customers pay online, staff is freed from the tasks of entering orders and processing payment. Depending on the type of service or product offered, some business may make more money and reduce expenses when customers don’t visit the premises.
If you switched to contactless delivery for your business during stay-at-home orders, consider whether it might be worthwhile to continue offering customers these options in addition to your on-site business interactions. Here are questions to consider:
- Is your contactless service safe to staff and customers alike?
- Is your service functioning seamlessly?
- If you offer customers a choice of more than one mode of contactless delivery, which mode more popular with customers?
- What are the customer demographics for your contactless service? Age, gender, region and purchase volume/frequency might be good statistics to follow to get a sense of who uses contactless service most?
- How are your competitors offering contactless service?
- How might you enhance your contactless service, in terms of efficiency?
- How are you making up for reduced personal interactions with customers?
- How might you enhance the customer’s experience of contactless delivery in terms of a stronger sense of the safety of your contactless delivery?
- How might you make the experience more engaging and attractive to customers?
- Is there an opportunity to prompt repeat business through your delivery model?
If you would like to learn more about how this might apply to your business, let’s talk: