4 Ways #UberEATS Has The Youth Eating Their Hearts Out!

In Trends

UberEATS, the coolest on-demand food delivery app, launched by ride-hailing service Uber, has officially landed in SA and youth are super excited. After being around in other countries, and finally arriving in SA, students couldn’t wait to feast on the deliciousness and convenience that comes with having restaurant prepared food delivered to their doorstep.  Wait… What makes this service any different from our usual food delivery services that already exist? We’ve got you covered and we’re about to tell you how UberEATS is getting it right with SA’s youth.

Convenience Is Everything

What do Afrillennials (African Millennials) want? Convenience. When do they want it? Now! They have grown up with technology, understand how easy it has made their lives and their expectations of convenience isn’t slowing down. As part of the movement, youth use their phones for keeping up to speed on everything and the more they can do on their phones that can make life a little easier, the better. UberEATS offers them the opportunity to do exactly that. When you’re on the app you simply enter your details, pick a menu and restaurant you’d like to order from and with a few simple steps to place your order, it’s collected by Uber drivers who then deliver right to your doorstep.

Who even stands in fast food queues anymore? Or goes to the ATM to get cash in order to pay for their order? Things that used to be a normal part of life feel like way too much of an effort now thanks to technology and this is where the wonder of novelty comes to play. UberEATS’ convenience is not just about the fact they promise your delivery will take a little over 30 minutes, but that it works on a cashless system like when you would order an Uber ride. Users can track how far the driver is in real-time, unlike other food delivery services where you could end up waiting for what feels like a lifetime without knowing your driver’s whereabouts.

Find The Problem – Be The Solution

Before Uber’s transport service first launched in SA, getting a cab was quite a mission. You needed to have a contact number for a cab service, make sure you have airtime on your phone, have cash on you to pay for the ride and could end up waiting for a very long time before a driver arrives because they’d struggle to find your location. The same goes for food delivery services, where food sometimes takes long to arrive and customers would be unable to track where the driver is, not to mention the limited options as far as the restaurants you can choose from.  Uber saw this opportunity to present a very simple solution and the youth are loving them for it.

Commenting on the launch of UberEATS Joburg, 21-year-old Lerato said, “Just the other day I ordered food from a popular restaurant and my food took two hours to arrive because it was raining and drivers had to wait for the rain to settle down because they use scooters. My food eventually arrived and it was cold, and wet! I won’t have to deal with these kind of problems now that UberEATS has arrived”. Keeping up with the lifestyle demands of the youth clearly leaves no room to err, and youth will tell brands as much.

Start Small, Get Feedback, Get Better!

Not leaving their idea to chance, UberEATS has pulled out all the stops to make sure their service is flawless. When UberEATS first launched internationally, they established test markets to monitor feedback and react in real time, fixing bugs and responding quickly to diffuse any issues with customers. They are taking the same slow roll out approach in SA, with the app only available for use in the North of Johannesburg for now. Starting small allows them to really monitor the reaction from the market and fix any issues that may come into play when they launch to other markets.

Innovate Or Get Left Behind

It’s clear to us that UberEATS understands that brands need to fit in with the youth and not the other way around and being able to do just that, requires innovation. It starts with listening to the youth, what their gripes are and thinking of ways to help them streamline their lifestyle with the least effort required to do basic things. Why, you may ask? Time is a commodity and with youth being on the edge of their seats trying to consume every new experience in their path, they need to simplify their lives, shorten time spent on the unimportant activities and amplify the time they have for experiences.

UberEATS has identified a problem and solved it with a simple concept which already existed, and all they had to do was innovate it. Food delivery services have been around for decades, but UberEATS has made getting food to doorsteps both easy and exciting, eliminating a myriad of issues that food delivery services didn’t acknowledge till now. Their concept goes to show that social listening for innovation should form a critical part of your brand’s path to find out what your brand needs to keep, lose or create!