For those of you that thought only Domino’s delivered pizza, Analyst Lead, Tristan Burns’ presentation on day two of RetailEXPO uncovered the real truth, that other pizza delivery options are available. Pizza Hut has a dedicated digital business unit which exists to support the restaurants and franchisees, born in part out of rude comments made a few years ago by Domino’s that it had no delivery capability.

Out delivered by Domino’s

The comments hurt because in truth, digital initiatives were left to individual franchises so the offer was inconsistent to say the least. Once Pizza Hut started delivering against on line orders via web and app, the challenge very quickly became, and still remains, to make a profit from a high volume of low value orders. Pizza Hut soon discovered that you can get people to trade, but not enough so volumes go down. It could fix the basics, including less friction in the buying process and site load speed, but the real breakthrough was in how the company discovered that two classic success measures could reveal new value.

AOV and CRV work together

By comparing average order value against conversion rate hour by hour, it was possible to see customer behaviour and therefore how to sell to them. For instance, where promotions are generally applied across a whole day or week, suddenly it made sense to stop promoting to people who are prepared to pay full price, as opposed to offering deals to those that wanted low prices. Simple really, except that these two measures are not normally run together.

Enough already with the pop ups

The company also does a lot of testing, because it matters where any appeals to upgrade are placed; too soon, and they are lost once the customer reaches checkout and either forgotten or seen as a reason to abandon. Pop ups are annoying, best to keep people on their chosen page and promote within that.

And deals may seem like nothing more than giving money away, but some are so popular, they generate a lot traffic from loyal customers who will shop at full price at other times. Whilst it is not ideal that currently 100% of orders are deliveries, the learnings should prove invaluable.

Watch the full webinar, with further insight from Tristan Burns, on demand, here: https://www.retailexpo.com/virtualconference