Noteworthy Advantages Of Using A Mobile App For Your Restaurant In 2022

Noteworthy Advantages Of Using A Mobile App For Your Restaurant In 2022
mobile ordering app
Over the past many years, we have witnessed a dramatic change in the ways of eating. The world is becoming tech-savvy with smart devices in every hand. Restaurants and food businesses that suffered a huge blow during the COVID-19 pandemic are leveraging technology to rejuvenate their business and expand their market. What started with digital marketing is heading towards a successful M-commerce. The food delivery app solution is a new concept. Earlier, the restaurants registered themselves on the food ordering apps such as Zomato that enjoyed a large customer base. However, the owners of restaurants later realized that owning a food ordering app has many benefits. This has driven a growing culture of app-based food ordering for restaurants. The food delivery mobile application market was estimated to value around $6752.32 million in the year 2020. The market is expected to grow at a rate of 25% CAGR between the years 2021 and 2030.
food ordering app
Food ordering apps, when used efficiently benefit the food business in many ways. Let us understand how a food ordering app or restaurant mobile app can boost your food business. Some of the main advantages are listed below:
  • Larger customer base
  • A dine-in experience is time-intensive. From receiving the customer, taking orders to placing the order for the table, consumes a lot of time. The people in restaurants can take time in ordering the food. This ultimately wastes the time of the waiters and chefs. Automating this entire operation makes the entire process very streamlined. The chefs can receive the order and start preparing them, and the waiters can continue with the food deliveries. This saves considerable time in the food ordering process. Moreover, many people can order on their way to the restaurant or from outside the restaurant to get fast service. This automatically increases the use of the food delivery app and expands the customer base.
  • Better marketing and branding
  • Mobile applications can be used to promote the restaurant and create brand awareness. The mobile app can be used to market the food items. Different offers like discounts on first-time orders and loyalty points can be rolled out through the mobile application. The application also ensures that the marketing messages reach the audience and attract them in the shortest period. Integrating the mobile app with social media platforms can have an immense impact on digital marketing. The business owners offer discounts on social media postings, and referrals to encourage the customers to download the mobile app. The mobile apps also open up new channels for customer engagement.
  • Better user experience
  • UX has become an important aspect of every business. The customers can place their order as soon as they enter the restaurant. The wait time in getting the food decreases. This in turn enhances the user experience. People stuck in traffic may choose to place an order at a restaurant with a mobile app. Restaurants can customize menus to offer something new and attract more customers.
    Cashless transaction is another benefit that the food ordering mobile app brings. Users can place an order sitting in the restaurant without shelling out any cash. The app can have several gateways of payment to ensure that every user finds something suitable.
  • Brand Spinoff
  • Food ordering apps have opened plentiful opportunities for testing and trial of different cuisines and food items. With the rise in food ordering over mobile apps, restaurants can experiment with new specialties. They can start small food joints with new dishes that are great for takeaways and parcels. This also opens new avenues of business for them.
  • Efficient resource management
  • Restaurants can cut down the time and resources wasted on attending to the customers and taking orders. The order placed using the digital menu can be processed faster as it directly reaches the kitchen via the app. The chef can continuously work on preparing dishes without any delays. The faster food preparation also enhances customer satisfaction. The food ordering app also eliminates the requirement of any person at the reception and long queues for order and payment. In addition to all the above, a mobile app also eliminates the errors related to orders and billing. This streamlines the entire process and enhances efficiency. Efficient resource management saves time and money.
  • Higher sales
  • A mobile app streamlines and optimizes the food ordering process in a restaurant. The same place can cater to more number of customers. This results is higher sales. In addition to this, the customers can also place orders from a remote location. This substantially scales the sales. A mobile app also helps in digital marketing and fetches new customers and orders. Overall, a food ordering mobile app can help you achieve surprisingly new sales figures.
  • Better ROI
  • Every business aims for positive and higher Returns on Investment. When the same physical restaurant starts selling more, it gives way to better returns. With individual mobile apps for food orders, the restaurants can save the cut that they have to give any other food delivery platform. They can pocket the 100 percent profit. Mobile app development is a one-time activity and requires a minimal expenditure. It can be used for years with no further investment. Restaurants can also save on the running cost.
    Owning a food delivery app has multifold benefits for any restaurant and food business. Even the customers would prefer using the mobile app.

Benefits of Food Delivery App for Customers

  • The user gets accustomed to the menu and prices in advance without delays.
  • They get a cashless experience. There are different modes of payment to choose from. Everyone is free is to pay the way they want.
  • The customers can save time in ordering food and making payments. With mobile apps, they get to skip the queues.
  • They get bonuses and discounts on ordering the food via mobile application.
A food ordering app is something every restaurant should possess. As we move ahead in 2023, we are going to experience more advanced technologies that can disrupt the current market. We need to stay updated and relevant to stay in the business. Restaurants should have a mobile app to roll out new offers and functionalities to the customers. Developing a mobile app is a one-time activity that can be completely outsourced. Many software and app development companies can help you develop the mobile application with the best UX and responsiveness. Restaurants should be quick to create an app and strengthen their market presence. A mobile app can be the one solution that can cater to the older generations as well as generation z.

What is the React Native Framework & how does it function?

What is the React Native Framework & how does it function?
React native app development
React Native is one of the most preferred frameworks for cross-platform app development and has been adopted by several industry giants including Facebook, Instagram, Skype Microsoft, Tesla, Shopify, Walmart, and UberEats. This framework was created by the Facebook team to address the limitations of React.js.
The Facebook-developed SDK React was a viable option for building web apps. However, when Facebook adopted a mobile-first strategy, web apps needed to be rendered to the mobile platform. This task was indeed challenging! At first, the Facebook engineers employed HTML5 to render apps on the mobile web, but this strategy failed. Thereafter, they embedded the WebView within a mobile-native container. This approach too wasn’t workable due to the absence of necessary attributes like gestures & touch events, a keyboard API, and image management capacities.
Then, they realized the need to build native apps for delivering an impeccable UX. But, the idea to build Native apps for Android and iOS separately involved roadblocks – an imperative coding process, separate codebases for different platforms, and a slow iteration process as each app’s prototype needed Playstore’s prior approval.
Finally, Facebook conducted an internal hackathon, and React Native, an improved version of React, was coined. The React Native framework was launched in 2015 as the one-stop solution for mobile app development and made open-source in the same year. Let’s explore more about the framework and its functioning!

React Native: An Overview

React Native is a JavaScript-based mobile app development framework that is used for crafting natively-rendered mobile applications for the Android and iOS operating systems. The unique selling point of React Native lies in the fact that developers can build apps for both platforms simultaneously using a single codebase. The framework uses platform-specific modules and APIs by compiling the JS code to native components. So, the React Native developers can use native components like Text, View, and Images as building blocks for creating new components.

How does React Native differ from React?

React Native is based on React for the web, the Facebook-developed JS library used for developing UIs. But, while React targets the browser, React Native targets mobile app platforms. As such, mobile app developers enjoy the convenience of using a known JavaScript library for creating mobile apps with a native-like look and feel.
React Native uses Text primitive in place of span primitive used for the web. This Text results in a native TextView for Android apps and a native iOS UIView for iOS apps. For this reason, despite using JavaScript for app development, the end application is not a web app embedded within the shell of a mobile app, rather it is a mobile app which is real native
React Native apps are created using JSX, a combination of JavaScript and XML-esque markup, just like React apps. The difference is that React Native uses a “bridge” under the hood for invoking native-rendering APIs. Here, Objective-C/Swift APIs are used for rendering UI components on iOS apps while Java/Kotlin APIs are used in the case of Android apps. Simply put, the bridge translates JS code into platform-specific components. As a result, the app renders real mobile UI components instead of web views; imparting the look and feel of a mobile app. Moreover, React Native exposes the JS interfaces for the platform APIs; this enables apps to access smartphone device features like a user’s current location, camera, etc.

How do React Native Apps function?

A React Native app is segregated into three different parts –native code, JavaScript code, and the bridge. The bridge interprets JS code for executing it in native platforms and enables asynchronous communication between Native elements and the JS code.

Significant threads involved in the functioning of a React Native application

React native app development services
Main (Native) thread: The main thread, also called the Native thread, is used for UI rendering in iOS and Android applications. It manages the task of displaying UI elements and processes users’ gestures.
JavaScript thread: The JS thread basically deals with the app’s business logic and defines the structure as well as the UI functions. The functions of the JS thread include executing the JS code within a separate JS engine, making API calls, processing touch events, etc.
Shadow thread (Shadow Tree): This thread generates shadow nodes and acts as a mathematical engine that uses algorithms to transform layout updates into accurate data and UI events into the correctly serialized payload.
Native module thread: Whenever an application requires access to the platform API, the process takes place in the native module thread.
Customs Native Module thread: Such threads are used for accelerating an app’s performance when custom modules are used. For instance, React Native handles animations using a separate native thread so that this task is offloaded from the JS thread.
Out of the aforesaid threads, the most important threads that help a React Native app to function are the Native thread and the JS thread. Interestingly, there is no direct communication between these two threads and so, they do not block each other.

Functioning of a React Native App: Crucial Steps

Check out how a React Native app works!
Step # 1
When an app launches, the Native thread loads the app and spawns the JavaScript thread for executing the JS code. The Native thread hears UI events such as touch, press, etc., and passes on these events to the JS thread through the React Native bridge.
Step # 2
JavaScript loads and the JS thread sends information to the shadow thread on what has to be rendered on the screen. The shadow thread then calculates layouts using algorithms and decides on how the view positions should be computed. The shadow thread then passes on the layout parameters to the main thread for rendering the view.)
Step # 3
The Main thread collects UI events and sends them to the shadow thread. Events are converted into serialized payloads and sent to the JS thread.
Step # 4
The JavaScript thread now processes the payloads and then updates the UI or calls native methods.
React native development company
Step # 2, step # 3, and step # 4 get repeated continually every time JavaScript’s event loop is iterated.
After every event loop in the JS thread gets completed, the native side receives batched updates to native views; these are then executed in the Native thread. Remember, the batched updates should be sent by the JS thread to the Native thread before the deadline for the rendering of the next frame, to keep up the app performance. A slow JS thread due to complicated processing in the JS event loop hampers the UI. The only exception wherein a slow JS thread doesn’t affect performance is in scenarios when native views take place entirely in the Native thread.

How does the React Native Bridge ensure smooth interaction amongst the threads?

The React Native Bridge allows asynchronous communication between the threads so that one thread doesn’t block the other. Moreover, the messages are batched – messages are transferred between threads in an optimized way. Furthermore, the bridge serializes messages so that two threads cannot share the same data or operate using the same data.

How to set up the React Native App Development Environment?

Here’s how to set up the environment to create a React Native app with the help of Expo.
  • Install Node.js, get Expo’s command-line tool, and then put the command npm install Expo-cli –global. Once the Expo cli tool gets installed type expo init todo-app.
  • Now a screen will be displayed and you need to select the option “blank” for a blank app. Include the workflow features of Expo as well. Then, enter your app’s name, press enter, and continue the setting-up process.
  • Navigate to the new project created for starting the app with the command npm start and for stopping the app you need to press Cntrl + C. The developers’ server will run and a new tab having the Expo manager screen gets opened in the web browser.
The app can be previewed by either running it on an Android emulator or by installing the Expo app on your mobile phone and running the app on the device by scanning the QR code. Thereafter, you need to install a text editor like Atom, Sublime, Visual Studio Code, etc. Now you’ve got all the necessary tools to create a React Native app.

Final Verdict:

React Native is a profitable option to pick if you need to build a mobile app that targets Android as well as the iOS operating systems. Cross-platform development with React Native speeds up your development and reduces development costs. Hence, this framework is best for entrepreneurs who intend to build a quick app prototype for validating the app idea.
Need technical assistance and expert guidance on React Native app development? Contact Biz4Solutions, a highly experienced React Native development company in USA and India, offering world-class services to clients across the globe.