Digital Marketing: Website Compatibility and Business Performance: Deliveroo Case Study

 

Executive Summary

Website is an essential element of marketing as well as a tool for the improvement of market presence. The concerned report has a focus on the website of Deliveroo as the website crashed numerous times along with the payment error. Furthermore, the concerned report identified that the website design, UI, and UX of the Deliveroo website are not compatible for improved business performance. However, the company is suggested to focus on the suitability of their website, graphics designing, and UX design for improved performance. Furthermore, the report suggests moving to cloud computing (VPS-based structure) for reliable performance. Lastly, the report recommends implementing in-app purchases and content promotion for the improvement of suggested changes.

 

1. Introduction

Digital marketing is marketing that has wide popularity in the era of digitalization. Iot is used as evidence to show the reliability of the company along with a usability perspective to be utilized for the product and service promotion. However, the concerned report has a focus on the website of Deliveroo to understand the issues in their eC-commerce website. The aim of the concerned report is to define the recommended solution for the senior leadership team for the improvement of the issues faced in the website. Kaufman and Horton (2014) opine that the biggest challenges of digital marketing in the modern era are relevant to the knowledge regarding the content of marketing as well as the effective user interface designing and privacy issues. Hence, the report analyzes the issues of Deliveroo to suggest changes focus on the primary issues of the company as well as the proposed changes with a focus on the DISC Model to suggest the most suitable recommendation.

2. Background of the Company

Deliveroo is one of the fastest-growing food networks in the UK, and the company mainly partners with the restaurants to deliver their products to customers. The aim of the company is to ensure comfort in delivery. The company has created competitive advantages in terms of market performance as it targets a valuation of £8.8bn in terms of Share listing (BBC News, 2021). However, the performance of the company represented a landmark for the other IT firms of the world, with 650% revenue growth till now, along with the passionate business leader of the company delivering 35% revenue growth for the restaurants collaborates with (Deliveroo, 2021). It was first founded in the year 2013 and currently operates in more than 2000 cities and metropolitan areas of the UK region. The global operation chain of the company has spread over the 12 countries of the world, having a presence in Europe, Asia, Australia, along the middle east region of the world (BBC News, 2021). However, the company has created thousands of job opportunities in the restaurant industry which contributes to the revenue growth of the country. The company website claims that the operation of the digital platform of Deliveroo is based on the Frank algorithm, and it creates an opportunity to identify the real-time locations of customers (Deliveroo, 2021). Effective usage of machine learning and artificial intelligence defines the proposed time for the delivery of a meal, including the preparation time for the meal. The technological strength creates a competitive advantage for the firm, yet has faced issues in the past on numerous occasions as well as in contemporary times. Since the dawn of the company, the website for Deligveroo has faced technical issues in terms of internal algorithms and technical errors. It is represented in the succeeded section.

3. Issues in the Website

3.1 Performance Issues

The application and website of Deliveroo are the main sources of business as the company works mainly in the delivery sector. Hence, the issues in the website and application have an impact on the revenue channel of the company. Best (2019) opines that the customer of Deliveroo are not satisfied with the website performance 0of the company as on 22nd February of 2019, Down detector detected an error in the website at about 8.00 GMT, where 55% of the problem has occurred in the application of Deliveroo (Best, 2019). It further recorded that 33% of the error occurred on the website of the company, where 115 of the customers faced log-in issues on the website.  Mainly the website showed “Error 1106,” where the origin DNS error has occurred (Downdetector.co.uk, 2021).

Figure 1 Deliveroo Outrages in last 24 hours

(Source: Downhdetector.co.uk, 2021)

Balke (2019) points out an important issue relevant to the Website error is that the brand value of the company degraded as the arrogant and hungry customer posed on the social media platforms regarding the delivery error of the website. Furthermore, the competitors of the company grab this opportunity to leverage their customer base. Balke (2019) significantly defined that the company website was slow to respond to the click of the customer, and it took several times to show the order status. Moreover, the delivery side of the company was also disrupted by this issue, and the delivery to customers was delayed.  Greaves (2020) defines that issues at the customer interface while they opt for the delivery of food can show a significant impact on the sales volume of the company. This issue also created an issue where the amount was deducted from the customer of the customer while no order was placed. It was a serious impact on the brand image of the company (Greaves, 2020). Furthermore, the customer communication channel of the company was also disrupted during the time of the website crash. Downdetector further reports that the website performance remains poor during the time of 7.00 PM to 10.00 PM, where most of the issues occurred to the website, and it is the major time for the customer engagement.

3.2 Issues in the Content of Website

Charlesworth (2014) opines that content is the king of modern days marketing where the website plays an influential role in the improvement of business performance. Deliveroo website has few issues observed in their website considering the UI and UX design of the website. However, the Naming and website hosting are the two important parts to ensure the effectiveness of a website, where Deliveroo has a competitive disadvantage in its name of the website. Li et al. (2021) opine that improper domain naming can lead to the misdirection of the customer flow to a website as the name is the identification for a website. Furthermore, the overall business aspect of the company can be expressed in the website name, as Deliveroo expressed their working area in their name, but is much aligned to the delivery system. The name of the website can be more aligned to the food delivery concept, including a suffix mentioning the relevance of food.

Figure 2 Front page of Deliveroo

(Source: Deliveroo.co.uk, 2021)

Ritter and Winterbottom (2017) opine that the stability of a website depends on the effective UX design where the user can learn the proceeds to use the application along with the easy access to the areas of interaction with the website. The placement of a sign-in and log-in bottom of the website is placed at the leftmost top side of the website. Riggs et al. (2011) opine that ‘Cialdini’s 6 Principles of Persuasion to Boost Conversions’ technique, where the reciprocity, commitment and social proof along with the scarcity and authority are the determinants of the performance of a website. The color scheme of the Deliveroo website is not attractive as it uses the demised colors, and it is hard for visually impaired persons to use the website. Furthermore, the placement of animated graphics makes the website have less social proof. These issues are related to the UX, UI designing, as well as hosting name, which can be improved for performance improvement (Riggs et al., 2011).

4. Impact of issues on the performance

Downdetector has reported some of the most popular problems on the website of Deliveroo. The company website created check-out issues for 64% of the customers, where 24% of application users faced issues along with 12% of application users (Downdetector.co.uk, 2021). LEE (2021) opines in the salesforce blog that 64% of the marketers integrate their website to the digital marketing channel, where the Mobile-first approach has an effective positive impact on the performance. Issues faced in the mobile website and application create a negative impact on the marketing strength of the company. Furthermore, the Multi-screen approach of the website is an effective strategy for the promotion of a business in the digital environment (Shivakumar, 2020). However, the desktop website of Deliveroo is smooth, where the mobile website has an issue relevant to the check-out of the products and order placement.

Figure 3 Most reported issues of Deliveroo

(Source: Downhdetector.co.uk, 2021)

Shivakumar (2020) argues that trust issues are one of the prominent challenges for websites to gain popularity among audiences. Hence, socially relevant blogs and content are also required to be included in the website. Deliveroo has successfully done this job, but the company failed to create enough trustworthiness. Fimberg and Sousa (2020) opine that it is the duty of a website designer to create the trustworthiness of the website. The direct communication button on the website can develop a feeling of trust with the customer (Li et al., 2021). The WhatsApp or Messenger Plug-ins are enabled in a website to ensure instant communication with the website owner or the customer care section of the website. However, as per Fimberg and Sousa (2020), the website of Deliveroo can add WhatsApp or messenger plug-ins to enhance the ease of communication with the customer. Sarcastically, the website has no plug-ins to offer ease of communication to customers. It creates a trust issue regarding the service facility of Deliveroo.

5. Proposed Changes to the Senior leadership team

Apart from the website development, changes can be made in the social media marketing strategy of the company and content generation strategy for the website. Chudnovska (2020) opines that the digital marketing of a website can be improved with the UX design of the web as it encompasses all the interaction with the company and the customer.  However, the suggested changes based on the business model of Deliveroo (depicted below) are represented.

• Usefulness: The crucial aim of the website designing of Deliveroo is relevant to the improvement of website UI and UX so that the customer can find the website more full compared to the competitors’ website (Chudnovska, 2020). The smooth transition and the graphics embedding increase the effectiveness of UI design. By moving from the traditional and greyscale structure of the Deliveroo website, the company can change the UI of the website with eye-catching and real images. Chudnovska (2020) opines that higher utility in the UX design of a website results in higher traffic. So the utility of the website needs to be modified.

Figure 4 Business Model of Deliveroo

(Source: Deliveroo, 2021)

• Hosting: Deliveroo moved to the AWS hostings, where the company has gained an opportunity to manage the delivery and website crash-related issues quickly (AWS case Study, 2021). However, the cloud-based structure can be of three types, where dedicated hosting and VPS hosting are the two most important approaches to cloud computing. However, the company has an opportunity to move into VPS hosting, which is based on the Virtual proxy network and has higher security strength (Firmansyah et al., 2019).
• UX Design: LIU et al. (2016) Peter Movile UX design honeycomb can be implemented in the service design of the website. It defines that the website can be highly efficient to grab customer attention, with a focus on the usefulness and usability along with the creation of desire and findable. Hwangbo and Kim (2019) directly constitute the relationship between the UI and UX design of a website based on usability. More features in a website define the higher engagement of customers. Features such as lucky coupon competition, offers, and promotional templates at the starting of the website grab the attention of visitors to take any action on the website (Hwangbo and Kim (2019). The sales performance can be leveraged.

6. Digital Involvement Cycle of the Website

Awareness: Awareness of customers regarding the websites can create an opportunity for the two-directional movement of the brand. The interactive approach of a website can increase the awareness of the visitors regarding the website. Increased touchpoints within a website can increase the degrees of engagement with the website to build an awareness that ends with the commitment towards the website (Layon, 2013). However, the strategic placement of the sign-in button and ththe lognn button can increase the attractiveness of a website to build customer awareness. Furthermore, a smooth algorithm and the higher response rate of a website increase the degrees of communication with the website (Layon, 2013). The website crash and pending payments of customers on Deliveroo impacted its brand image. Hence, the company can move into VPN cloud computing for the improvement of awareness.

Interest: Attractive graphics and images of the real world create a reliable approach of audiences towards the website. Layon (2013) opines that the attractiveness of a digital product meets the expectations of customers with a strategic content management policy. However, the placement of real-world images can develop that interest among the customers.

Figure 5 Digital involvement cycle

(Source: Layon, 2013)

Involvement:  Increased interest enhances involvement, where the placement of different attractive activities, as mentioned, like lucky coupon competition and other elements, generates a higher engagement of users with the website. Moorthy et al. (2019) opine that involvement is the key to create enhanced brand loyalty. It is also useful for the development of customer-oriented marketing approaches. Furthermore, the readability of content on the website can build a strong involvement with the website.

Commitment:  Offers and appraisals are the most important aspect of digital promotion, where the placement of offers-related slides on the introduction page can improve customer interest. Additionally, Moorthy et al. (2019) opine that communication with representatives of a platform creates trustworthiness. Hence, the digital product of Deliveroo can focus on the implementation of plug-ins for improved communication with customers.

Loyalty:  Commitment and loyalty are correlated with each other as commitment creates involvement, and inversely loyalty creates commitment. Tam et al. (2020) opine that secure and effective hosting of a website builds strong customer communication, where the website can build upon the loyal audience base.

Advocacy:  Suggestion of products to customers increases the customer attraction towards a specific product, where the publication of content on websites is to be strategically modified to influence the customer demand (Tam et al., 2020). Advocacy in a strategic way can build upon loyalty as well as commitment towards a specific brand and website.

Champion: Successful implementation of the aforementioned framework makes a brand champion in the market, and the engagement can be enhanced. Strategic UX designing of the website with the glossy UI can enhance engagement, where the domain name of the website also matters for customer engagement  (Tam et al., 2020).

7. Recommendations

Looking into the business side of a website, it can be proposed that In-app promotion is an excellent model for the maintenance of revenue stream.

• Fu et al. (2020) opine that an in-App promotion feature in a website can reduce the marketing cost of the company. Deliveroo can promote hotels and other facilities through the application for the minimization of the marketing cost.
• Wang et al. (2019) opine that content is the key to success, where the in-app content marketing approach of the company can work for the development service facility. Furthermore, Deliveroo can promote blogging within their website for value addition to the website.
• The power of glossy and real-world images is that the website can be attractive for the audiences, and the website turns out to be more credible to pass the time. Hence, Deliveroo can move into real-world images for the designing of the user interface instead of animated graphics (Wang et al., 2019).

8. Conclusion

However, the overall analysis of the report identifies that Deliveroo has achieved a competitive position in the Uk market as well as in the international market in terms of their business growth. The company has faced issues in terms of website crashes and payment pending, which affected customer engagement. Furthermore, the website has some strategic issues. It is essential for Deliveroo to focus on the strategic UI and UX designing for the improvement of their website., furthermore, the company can focus on the content marketing and in-app promotion process for minimization of marketing costs.