A user on Twitter @JohnSmi13410415 pointed out the addition of a new Food Ordering tab in the Google My Business dashboard. For restaurant and food-based businesses, allowing customers to place an order with ease has been top of mind for the last few years and demand for this only increased throughout the pandemic.
Google My Business has also faced a bit of backlash from restaurant owners due to third party ordering features that have been added to their profile without their knowledge. This new tab gives business owners a bit more control over the features available on their profile related to ordering.
What’s included on the Food ordering Tab?
Order Online
The first section allows you to control the ‘Order Online’ button. You can turn this button on or off, choose the preferred provider for users to be directed to, and dictate which providers offer pickup and/or delivery.
Previously, you only had the ability to enable or disable this on the Food Ordering section under the ‘Info’ tab but could not manage any other features. The ability to set preferred providers and which services they offer is completely new functionality.
Place an order
The second section allows you to control the ‘Place an order’ button. You can add a custom link here, typically to the restaurant or company’s direct ordering system if available. I would definitely add tracking parameters to this link to get insight into the ordering conversions coming from this button. Previously, owners had no control over this button and if it showed on your profile.
The Ordering.app
The last section highlights Google’s food ordering solution, The Ordering.app for businesses to opt into if they don’t have an existing ordering system. This will be a paid service owned by Google, costing 1.5% per order. Currently, Google is waiving all service fees until January 1st, 2022.
An important distinction is that the Food Ordering tab does not replace or include local business links such as the menu, order ahead, and reservation URL. These will remain in your info tab within the Google My Business dashboard and will continue to display as clickable links on your profile (not buttons).
The ability to enable food ordering on your profile still displays on the info tab in addition to being added to the Food Ordering tab. I would imagine this will be deprecated once the new tab is at 100% rollout.
Currently, enabling Food Ordering, managing the ‘Order Online’ and ‘Place an order’ buttons are not accessible via API or in bulk. These features have to be managed individually by location, directly in the GMB dashboard.
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Source: localu.org
