Tikt
The in-seat ordering app for restaurants
As a UX designer for retailcloud, I was tasked with researching, and developing entire product discovery flow for a solution that aims to provide a safer and contactless experience to browse the menu and tip server, all while reducing ordering errors.
Role
Product designer, Interaction designer
Duration
Jan 2020 - 2023
Why we did it?
We wanted to allow guests to order without touching a menu and limiting server interaction.
No more waiting for waitstaff, browse the menu on your phone and order when you want as you want.
Make it easier for guest to “order another round”.
Challenges.
Pandemic froze the flow of customers to restaurants.
Restaurant owners are desperate for a solution to make their customers feel safer.
70%
of all restaurants are single unit
37%
of all restaurants report labor shortages
73%
of diners believe that technology can enhance service
34%
feel safer dining when there is contactless payment
Empathize & Define
Persona
Empathy map
I gathered insights into users’ thoughts and feelings about their current restaurant dining experiences. Observing their actions during visits, I created an empathy map to understand their pain points, concerns, and fears. This revealed areas needing improvement to enhance the overall experience.
Mental modal
Representation of the mental model of a Tikt merchant
Storyboard
I scripted the below storyboard of how a guest can achieve contactless dining using their mobile phone to join a table, see menu, order food and place tip & payment. It helped me to build empathy and understand how a group of people at a table wanted to interaction with Tikt.
Representation of the mental model of a Tikt merchant
Ideation
Identifying the activities involved.
I created the affinity diagram to organise, analyse data and synthesise user research findings about the activities and operations involved in a restaurant and potential actions of the application.
Affinity mapping done by forming different features or ideas into relevant groups.
Finding out activities involving interaction with waiter.
Menu and available varieties
To check about chef's special, available options of item and items as course.
Coursing
To specify item delivery order as starters, entree, or dessert.
Food allergies
To specify not to include allergic ingredient or food item in the ordering dish.
Bill & payment
To request for bill/receipt, make the payment and provide tip.
Custom requirements
For unanticipated requirements, booster seats, cleaning table, hot water etc,.
Key design decisions and iterations.
01
Menu and modifiers.
The initial version of menu was having limitation for modifier options in items and was able to improve the usability and accessibility by redesigning the core menu.
New customers often wanted to know more about food items before ordering, so restaurant owners required a descriptive menu to showcase their chef's specials.
Restaurants were unable to provide combo meals with limitation in modifiers. They wanted to have the ability to add unlimited modifiers to make combination to a single item.
Customers pointed out the difficulty in scrolling through the horizontal modifiers section to find the required.
Item 86ing from restaurant side is now displayed to customers as sold out items.
Restaurant owners were able to provide all sort of modifiers and add-ons to create combo meals.
Customers found the descriptive menu and modifier list view design easy to use. Finding out the required modifiers became effortless.
02
Communicating with waiters.
One of the main concerns of the guest dining at restaurant is the safe and quicker communication with waiter.
With the in-build chat feature with waiters I was able to make the life of waiters and guest easier by creating safe and contactless communication.
Now guest does not need to look for a server, just send the query through the app.
Common query like "Request for water" are pre-build for faster communication.
03
Search for items free of allergies.
Most of the customers interact with waiters for allergy free food items in thier dish.
Food allergies are common nowadays, search in Tikt app helps the guest to search for items that does not include ingredients that common to make allergies.
Guests can now search for items that are gluten free, dairy free, nut free, egg free etc. Each options are represented by emojis for easily recognizing and guest can combine each of them for finding specific items and faster searching.
04
Specifying course for dishes to be delivered.
Waiters usually interacts with customers to take notes about the dish and course.
With in-build coursing system. Customers were able to select course for all the available dishes when added in cart.
Direct interaction with waiters was reduced by providing the ability to choose course and notes/cooking instructions and thus providing a contactless and safer dining experience.
Customers found the flexibility in making decision of the food preparation and delivery as an excellent experience.
05
Making payment and providing tip.
Customers had to interact with waiters or cashiers while checking out in most cases for making the payment.
Including the contactless online payment from customer side made them feel safer by restricting waiter interaction.
Making use of auth payment and card wallets boosted ordering another round by not wanting to enter payment details for each order and helped customer retention.
Waiters received tips easily with in-build tipping feature on checking out for preset and custom amounts.
Prototype
Information architecture
Representation of the Tikt app flow.
Service blueprint
The service blueprint displays the entire process of service delivery, by listing all the activities that happen at each stage, performed by the different roles involved. The vertical axis shows all the actors involved and the horizontal axis shows the steps required to deliver the service.
Service blueprint that shows the actions of guests, restaurant staffs, and technology.
High fidelity prototype
Representation of the high fidelity prototype and interaction with the UI.
Conclusion
How it turned out.
90%
of customers reported being satisfied with the convenience of in-seat ordering.
95%
of customers felt safer using the app for ordering to minimize interactions with staff.
80%
of customers indicated that in-seat ordering reduced their concerns about COVID exposure.
75%
of customers stated they were more likely to visit the restaurant again and recommend to others due to the app.
Thanks for reading.
✉ msmanusankar98@gmail.com
