Dive Brief:

• DoorDash added several new features to its merchant product suite as part of the company’s largest app update in its 10-year history, the company said during a media event Tuesday.
• Merchants have access to personalized growth recommendations, store rewards to offer loyal customers and enhanced Storefront features.
• Earlier this year, DoorDash launched a Reporting API to allow partner restaurants to access data about sales, operations and finances. Last year, it added access to discounted employee benefits for operators through partnerships with several companies.

Dive Insight:

According to DoorDash’s latest economic impact report, 76% of merchants were satisfied with DoorDash’s ability to attract new customers, which is what these latest products are mainly focused on.

“DoorDash was built to be a catalyst for growth for local merchants of all types and all sizes,” Chantal Leonard, head of merchant product, said on Tuesday. “DoorDash is doubling down on that promise by unveiling several new features that empower them with a choice of more ways for them to flexibly grow their businesses online.” 

Restaurants can now offer various deals to customers that order through DoorDash, such as $5 off when spending $50. Merchants can create these rewards through the solution center in the merchant portal without any additional marketing or commission fees, Leonard said. 

The rewards feature came about after customers asked for the same perks that they get inside a restaurant while also ordering from DoorDash, Rajat Shroff, DoorDash’s head of product, said on Tuesday.

Additionally, DoorDash will offer curated experiences for restaurant partners by offering personalized growth recommendations, which was made possible by soliciting and addressing feedback from operators in the last decade, Leonard said. 

“Born from machine learning, analyzing hundreds of thousands of stores on DoorDash and building upon our reimagined merchant suite launched last year, restaurants are now able to access bespoke recommendations within their merchant portal,” Leonard said. These recommendations could include menu optimization by adding photos, improving order accuracy or signing up for additional products like sponsored listings or DashPass. 

DoorDash has enhanced its commission-free Storefront product, which it launched during the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to help restaurants set up an e-commerce platform quickly. DoorDash estimated that 40% of restaurants lacked an e-commerce platform at the start of the pandemic. The latest features include enhanced customization, such as fonts and color personalization, smart buttons to allow casual restaurant browsers to place orders, and the option to set up sites to allow customers to use DoorDash account information to log in and order, Leonard said. 

“We're also enabling restaurants to showcase thousands of item level ratings that already exist on DoorDash’s marketplace to better enrich their store page, all to create a more cohesive, more seamless and more intuitive online ordering experience to convert more customers,” she said. 

Smart buttons are expected to boost conversion rates for browsers and will pop up as “Order Now” buttons to channel customers to the online ordering page. Operators who have already added these buttons have seen an average 30% increase in online order sales, DoorDash said in a blog post.