Zomato makes it easy for every restaurant to have its own app

Restaurant search service Zomato has launched Whitelabel, a platform that lets businesses create and manage their own iOS and Android apps with no technical expertise necessary.

Restaurateurs will be able to set up custom apps with up-to-date information, photos and offers at their establishments, push notifications to users about upcoming promotions, accept delivery and take-away orders, display reviews from their Zomato pages and track downloads and usage.

The service is available to restaurants in all 22 countries where Zomato is present, including the US, Canada, UK, Brazil, Australia, the UAE and India. Whitelabel apps take about three weeks to build from start to finish.

Zomato says these dedicated apps won’t detract from the experience users have with its service: it believes that people will continue to use it to find and discover restaurants, while the apps will help loyalists interact directly with the few restaurants they frequently visit.

Whitelabel will cost restaurant owners $200 a month per location, along with a service fee levied on every transaction made through their apps. Zomato says it’s working to add features like table reservations, payments, check-ins and photo uploads in the near future.

It’s an interesting premise, especially for businesses in emerging markets like India that are slow, reluctant or unsure about how to build a digital presence.

By offering a single convenient dashboard to manage their app and Zomato listings, the company will likely have loads of restaurateurs eating out of their hands.

➤ Zomato Whitelabel