Zuppler, a global software and services company focused on empowering solutions for the food services industry, today announced the general availability of its AI-powered marketing services as part of the Menu Anywhere online ordering platform.

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As well, the company is pleased to announce automated abandon cart notification and order experience enhancements to its online ordering platform.

Smart Upsell is an AI-based tool that generates real-time recommendations based on what customers have added to their online cart. It also allows restaurants to upsell specific items, which can be especially useful for the introduction of new menu items to customers.

Zuppler uses machine learning algorithms to evaluate all the orders from customers and then generates recommendations based on what items are frequently ordered together. Recommendations constantly improve as the restaurant receives more orders, which helps the food provider increase transaction averages.

For example, when a customer orders a Sandwich, the system will query the historical order database, which indicates 200 people ordered Chips together with Sandwiches and would recommend Chips as the suggested item. If a customer adds Chips to the cart, the system would then check what items are ordered together with Chips and Sandwiches to provide the next suggestion. These suggestions are intelligent, continually improving and based on the merchant’s historical order data.

“Consumer adoption of online food ordering has grown exponentially in the past 24 months, and as a result, more consumers are visiting the websites of restaurants looking to order food for pickup and delivery,” states Shiva Srinivasan, CEO of Zuppler. “The challenge for restaurants is that fewer than 5% of visitors to online menus will complete their transaction online, or a loss of 95% of potential transactions. Zuppler continues to address this challenge and aggregated data shows a 13.3% higher ticket average for restaurants that use our upsell functionality.”

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Visit this article – Smart Upsell — to view how recommendations will appear in the menu.

Additional industry stats:

1. 60% of U.S. consumers order delivery or takeout once a week.
2. 34% of consumers spend at least $50 per order when ordering food online.
3. 20% of consumers say they spend more on off-premise orders compared to a regular dine-in experience.
4. Digital ordering and delivery have grown 300% faster than dine-in traffic since 2014.
5. 70% of consumers say they’d rather order directly from a restaurant‘s website, preferring that their money goes straight to the restaurant and not a third party.

In addition to a long list of product updates in the last quarter, the company has added an abandoned cart email notification that alerts customers to complete the checkout process when items are added to the cart but not processed in a defined period of time. Automated survey and feedback emails can also be configured to be sent automatically via the Zuppler Customer Connect functionality.

Finally, to increase on-page conversions, Zuppler has added fully customizable images, banner advertisements and other dynamic promotions that are directly integrated into the branded online ordering menu. In combination, these enhancements will assist restaurants and other food operators in creating an amazing online ordering experience that is simple, efficient and intuitive.

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