Facebook is rolling out a new ordering food feature, in a bid to keep users hooked onto its app, and not stray off to another app for other tasks. The social media giant now has a new option on Web and mobile allowing users to order food online. This ‘Order Food’ feature is showing up for select users for now, and only users in America are set to get it first.
This new feature is possible due to Facebook’s partnership with Delivery.com and Slice in the US, announced back in October. TechCrunch reports that the option shows up on Facebook’s side bar or the app’s main menu. By clicking on it, the Order Food option throws up all the supported restaurants. The restaurants are displayed with a featured image, rating, cuisine, and a price point. There’s a Start Order button at the bottom of it, clicking on which will take you to the selected restaurant’s page. It then shows you if the restaurant is open for delivery or pickup. You can then add delivery address or switch to pickup, whatever you prefer. Then from the menu, you select what you want to order, see how much delivery fee is levied, final amount to be paid, check your cart, choose mode of payment, and confirm the order.
The feature is fairly simple, and is self-explanatory, once you begin to use it. Once the order is confirmed, it gives you an average estimate time of delivery as well. Unfortunately, this feature could not be tested by us, as the option is only showing up for select users in US for now. There is no word on if Facebook plans to roll this service out to other countries. Food ordering services like Delivery.com and Slice will benefit heavily from this new feature, as it can reach out and tap into the large audience database of Facebook. Facebook confirmed the roll out of the new feature to TechCrunch.
From the user’s point of view, it eliminates the need to open another app to order food, and can now do an additional task from Facebook itself. Ride sharing app Uber also tapped into the online food ordering market with UberEats, and has launched the service in India earlier this month. However, Facebook has made this feature available within its app, and hasn’t launched a separate app like Uber.
Let us know if this feature is showing up for you, and whether it is working smoothly in the comments below.
[“Source-ndtv”]
