Abstract:
Online food ordering applications (OFOA) have changed customer-interaction within
the food services industry. The emergence of COVID-19 has influenced the state of
business-to-customer relations challenging how businesses attain success as
customer expectations morph rapidly and markets take on a new dynamic. This
study empirically assessed the influence of COVID-19 on the OFOA customer
journey. In conducting such an analysis, businesses can harness practical
approaches to enhancing customer experience in line with how customers allocate
importance to each phase in their customer journey. A quantitative research
approach was employed by drawing on descriptive statistics and multivariate
analysis (structural equation modelling) to determine how COVID-19 affected OFOA
users. The study yielded interesting results, such as that COVID-19 affected how
customers experience OFOA in the pre-purchase and purchase stages of the
customer journey. Additionally, COVID-19 has positively affected overall customer
satisfaction of OFOA, and the decision customers make on OFOA. The results
revealed that the customer journey could not be isolated as a construct where
customer experience is measured concerning the satisfaction of OFOAs use. Further
themes were presented in describing the influence of COVID-19 on OFOA. The
study has significant business implications as it can assist those in the food service
industry to align their OFOA experience to customer expectation.
