OPINION

QSRs Discover Their Voice

🍔 The market value from quick-service restaurants (QSRs), fast food chains, drive-thru establishments and deliveries is estimated to be worth $273 billion. A market that is bound to expand as more people eat out, while many eateries are actively working to meet consumers where they are by offering more ordering solutions and addressing their patrons’ increased appetites for speedy and convenient tech-enabled experiences. McDonald's recently acquired Apprente, a startup building conversational agents that can automate voice-based ordering in multiple languages, in order to bring voice technology to drive-thrus. Domino's, KFC, Pizza Hut and Wingstop have enabled their customers to use in-app voice-activated ordering, while others have integrated with major virtual assistants — such as Cortana, Alexa or Google Assistant — to accomplish that task. According to a PYMNTS Digital Drive Report consumers are most likely to use voice technology to seek out restaurant information, with 53 percent indicating they would like to use such solutions to search for restaurants based on menu information. 49 percent use voice offerings to find information about specific restaurants, and 44 percent use it to find restaurants based on their cravings.

🌮 Obviously there are several hurdles the industry will have to overcome before the trend can be fully adopted. Consumers are used to visualizing their food first and then using their voice to order. It can also be frustrating when misunderstandings happen or you can't place an order, with your specific expectations and wording, like 'leave the onions out' instead of 'without onions'. Strides in voice technology are happening every day, like voice assistants with screens or new skills that understand distinct voices and dialects, or behavioral signals predicting our desires. Meanwhile, software companies are integrating these voice technologies and building dedicated voice ordering interfaces for restaurants, over voice assistants and the mobile, to enable eateries to integrate the technology into their processes fast and cost effectively.

🍕 The bigger disruption will come from what these brands will do with all the voice data they will have collected. Food ordering usually involves a lot of information and feelings, for example how we feel in the moment...hungry, peckish, famished, frustrated, impatient; where we are; what we're doing; and what we crave. For QSR brands, it won't just be an order through the teller anymore, it will be a full conversation where they will anticipate what we'll order, predict what we desire, and suggest completely new products that fit our personality. It will revolutionize how we eat and how we produce our food. 🥤🥤

FROM OUR BLOG

FROM OUR BLOG

Tell Us How You Really Feel

A study by the Association for Psychological Science explored the correlation between human expression and the true feelings they convey. While there is an inevitable link between the two, our deeper emotions linger far below the surface, tucked away from the prying eyes that may be analyzing our face at the time. A simple smile may mask one’s sadness while a forced frown stifles a giggle just simmering behind a set of clenched teeth. Facial expressions can be manipulated when the occasion demands it.
Voice is more complex. It includes the words and the language being used for speech, but it also includes a wealth of other information like emotional cues that make it very difficult to manipulate and control at all times. Feelings like sadness, exhaustion, and anger can be discerned just from the tone of voice, revealing exactly what we feel. We might want to say we're feeling 'fine' but our voice will betray what our mind and body is really feeling.
So why don't you start by telling us how you feel?

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