McDonald’S Goes to Town With Mobile Ordering and Payment
And, when we say goes to town, we mean it. A Google search for mobile ordering and payment shows McDonald's dominating page one of the results:
By - Phil Talbot - go to guy | Mobile Ordering | Saavi
Those working in SEO can only lick their lips in envy. Clearly, when the world's biggest restaurant chain dives into mobile ordering and payment, it makes front page waves (and, contrary to what is claimed about Reddit, Google is the front page of the Internet) - we didn't even include €McDonalds' in the search.The news is featured in a lot of big name siteson web media like Bloomberg and Fast Company
The lowdown
Here's what they're all saying:
€ McDonald's is testing its new mobile ordering app in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Austin, Texas.
€ If the testing is successful, the app will be made available U.S.-wide.
€ The app was created to make ordering fastfood even faster and easier for McDonald's customers - especially the younger demographic who are increasingly using their smartphones as credit cards.
€ While McDonald's already has a mobile app for locating its restaurants, providing nutritional facts and announcing job opportunities, it lacked a mobile ordering and payment component that's offered byBurger King and Chipotlefor some time now.
€ Burger King's appoffers free delivery if you order a minimum of 10. McDonald's app counters with special offers and promos and a loyalty program.
The app comes in the middle of a U.S.-wide slump in McDonald's sales, as a banking-related site is quick to point out:
The adoption of innovation
What we're seeing is probably the late majority stage of the mobile app technology adoption life cycle. In this idea of how people (and companies) adopt technology, there are five groups of technology adopters that come in one after the otherin the cycle:
1. Innovators
2. Early Adopters
3. Early Majority
4. Late Majority
5. Laggards
In the idea of disruptive innovations, it is thought that there is a longer gap between early adopters taking up the innovation and the early majority.
eBay probably belongs to the innovator or early adopter group. Back in February, we mentioned eBay CEO John Donahoe saying they bet on mobile early (and heavily), even if most people didn't see the mobile revolution coming. In 2008, eBay was one of the first to offer a mobile ordering app at the Apple App Store - a shrewd, early move that's expected to get them at least 10 billion in commerce this year.
McDonald's mobile app testing could belong either to the early majority or late majority group, because it took time to offer mobile ordering and payment - five years (2008 to 2013) is practically a generation in the digital world.
However, if this article by Lauren Johnsonat Mobile Commerce Daily is typical for those trying out the experience, McDonald's mobile ordering and payment app still has a lot of tweaking to go through before it becomes ready for primetime.
And then there are the laggards.
Pioneering disruptive innovation theorist Clayton Christensen argues that, at first, big established companies ignore an emerging disruptive innovation because there are no big profits to be gained initially from it, until such a time that the market disruption becomes so great a threat that the established companies have to follow up with a €me too' offering in order to survive.
This is where McDonald's is right now. It has to come up with mobile ordering and payment like what its smaller competitors are doing. With U.S. profits slumping, McDonald's cannot afford not to go mobile. Follow the money. And go where people are increasingly hanging out: online.
What about you?
If you're an ordinary consumer, expect this move by McDonald's to make ordering your favorite Mac sandwich a breeze.
If you are a decision maker for a company in an industry that can take advantage of mobile ordering and payment, look to what your competitors are doing. Depending on your industry, you might still get to be among the early adopters.
By - Phil Talbot - go to guy | Mobile Ordering | Saavi
Those working in SEO can only lick their lips in envy. Clearly, when the world's biggest restaurant chain dives into mobile ordering and payment, it makes front page waves (and, contrary to what is claimed about Reddit, Google is the front page of the Internet) - we didn't even include €McDonalds' in the search.The news is featured in a lot of big name siteson web media like Bloomberg and Fast Company
The lowdown
Here's what they're all saying:
€ McDonald's is testing its new mobile ordering app in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Austin, Texas.
€ If the testing is successful, the app will be made available U.S.-wide.
€ The app was created to make ordering fastfood even faster and easier for McDonald's customers - especially the younger demographic who are increasingly using their smartphones as credit cards.
€ While McDonald's already has a mobile app for locating its restaurants, providing nutritional facts and announcing job opportunities, it lacked a mobile ordering and payment component that's offered byBurger King and Chipotlefor some time now.
€ Burger King's appoffers free delivery if you order a minimum of 10. McDonald's app counters with special offers and promos and a loyalty program.
The app comes in the middle of a U.S.-wide slump in McDonald's sales, as a banking-related site is quick to point out:
The adoption of innovation
What we're seeing is probably the late majority stage of the mobile app technology adoption life cycle. In this idea of how people (and companies) adopt technology, there are five groups of technology adopters that come in one after the otherin the cycle:
1. Innovators
2. Early Adopters
3. Early Majority
4. Late Majority
5. Laggards
In the idea of disruptive innovations, it is thought that there is a longer gap between early adopters taking up the innovation and the early majority.
eBay probably belongs to the innovator or early adopter group. Back in February, we mentioned eBay CEO John Donahoe saying they bet on mobile early (and heavily), even if most people didn't see the mobile revolution coming. In 2008, eBay was one of the first to offer a mobile ordering app at the Apple App Store - a shrewd, early move that's expected to get them at least 10 billion in commerce this year.
McDonald's mobile app testing could belong either to the early majority or late majority group, because it took time to offer mobile ordering and payment - five years (2008 to 2013) is practically a generation in the digital world.
However, if this article by Lauren Johnsonat Mobile Commerce Daily is typical for those trying out the experience, McDonald's mobile ordering and payment app still has a lot of tweaking to go through before it becomes ready for primetime.
And then there are the laggards.
Pioneering disruptive innovation theorist Clayton Christensen argues that, at first, big established companies ignore an emerging disruptive innovation because there are no big profits to be gained initially from it, until such a time that the market disruption becomes so great a threat that the established companies have to follow up with a €me too' offering in order to survive.
This is where McDonald's is right now. It has to come up with mobile ordering and payment like what its smaller competitors are doing. With U.S. profits slumping, McDonald's cannot afford not to go mobile. Follow the money. And go where people are increasingly hanging out: online.
What about you?
If you're an ordinary consumer, expect this move by McDonald's to make ordering your favorite Mac sandwich a breeze.
If you are a decision maker for a company in an industry that can take advantage of mobile ordering and payment, look to what your competitors are doing. Depending on your industry, you might still get to be among the early adopters.
