Should You Consider DIY for Your Online Food Ordering System

Why do we settle for average when we can obviously build something even better for not only ourselves but also our customers.

How many of us have taken the free trial and then signed up for the paid version of the service that claims to be designed with a D.I.Y (Do it Yourself) user interface.

Although during the trial period it seems that we can use it easily.

But as we start using it, we actually realize the scope of the work we are trying to accomplish. And guess what, that stuff is way beyond for some of us to achieve without spending more time and money.

According to Psychology Today, DIY is bad advice for entrepreneurs and creatives. It is better to go with a DIT (Do it Together) approach.

Perhaps, it was better to hand over the task to a professional in the very first place. To build something better for the people who are eventually going to benefit from our services, we need to be careful with the quality.

This is the time when products are built with a DIY user interface to allow the user to do almost everything, from installation to running the product successfully, all by themselves. But these products struggle when it comes to even small customizations.

For those of us who have been in this situation know that these products have been designed to work for everybody. And these products would require you to be constantly involved with the backend and leave you hardpressed for the time which could be better utilized elsewhere. If you are not 100 percent sure about what you are getting into you can waste a lot of your time and money.

So, the question is: Do you have the time to manage the backend instead of managing something even more important, the restaurant itself?

Also, these DIY products are not equipped to handle your special needs.

But the question is does a product exist that can bridge that “gap” between the service provided by a professional and a service that claims to have a DIY user interface to compete with the professional service.

It is hard to argue with the fact that you only get what you pay for. So, when you think you are in control of the product/software.

Actually, you are in control of something which generic and has been made in a way that works for the whole wide world.

Instead of spending time on your primary you have to spend more time on the software to make it work for you. You should realize that something is wrong.

You need that life saving “extra-support ” which definitely comes at extra cost.

So, what are the 2 things you just did?

  • First, you paid to the software provider to use the product yourself.
  • Secondly, when you couldn’t accomplish that you paid them more to procure that extra support.

Then dear friend you have wasted a large amount of your money and time.

In this article, we are going to discuss what DIY means for an average restaurant owner/manager.

At Restolabs, we provide online ordering software for food services like restaurants, catering and food trucks. Over the years we have learned a lot about what does the backend of online ordering software mean for a regular restaurant owner/manager.

With the help of data collected from our customers, we know how our average customer likes us to manage the online ordering software for their restaurant.

Running a restaurant is a highly demanding job which requires working extreme hours. From those wee morning hours spent to procure ingredients to the basic preparation and managing the tables when you open can be a handful for a restaurant owner. And on top of all these responsibilities if you also need to manage the backend of the ordering software then you are really going the extra mile.

Honestly, a lot of us cannot do it all. And, this holds true for the most of our customers. Majorly, we have 3 kinds of customers.

First, This customer is not interested in in the backend at all and only concentrates on running the restaurant with all his attention.

This customer informs us about any problem and we fix it for him/her. Our support team runs the entire backend for them. We set their menu, add payment gateways, run promotions, send newsletters and basically, we do everything else. This process exclusively works on good coordination between the customer and us.

Who is this customer: A customer who is very busy and less technology oriented, who prefers to give the maximum attention to their food and guests.

How many are there: Almost 63 percent of our customers.

The second customer has the time to take care of the backend. S/he takes care of usual tasks like setting up the venue timings, payment gateways, order type, taxes and so on...

But the customer sometimes faces problem while setting up the complicated menus: like make your own sandwich, salad or pizza. These are the menus which require a lot of customizations.
We help them to set up the menu.

Who is this customer: Restaurants owners with larger staff who can afford to spend that extra time required for smoothly running the backend of the online food ordering system.

How many are there: Almost 28 percent of our customers.

The third customer requires the least assistance: They just sign up and take care of all things by themselves. And they only contact us when they face a big problem.

Who is this customer: These are restaurants with in-house IT staff.

How many are there: Only 9 percent of our customers.

Conclusion

If you are about a start a DIY project make sure you are 95 percent sure what you want from it. If the project has a very large scope or it is bound to impact the lives of many people, then it may be wise to seek professional advice.

Take the time to plan before you decide to invest in a DIY project. In the end, you don’t want to waste time or money or in a very bad case, both of them on something that should have been done by a professional.

For any further queries and suggestions, you can reach us at info@restolabs.com. If you have interest in knowing about or getting your own online food ordering system then you can start here.