Skift Take
Both TripAdvisor and DoorDash continue to pack on the partnerships in 2018, in hopes of attracting more restaurant owners and consumers to their mobile apps.
— Danni Santana
San Francisco-based delivery company, DoorDash, has announced a new partnership with TripAdvisor, aimed at increasing the exposure of its clients through the travel website’s growing restaurant business.
The news follows TripAdvisor’s recent deal with online pizza delivery app Slice, made public on November 7. In a similar quid pro quo scenario, TripAdvisor will introduce new online ordering capabilities for 24,000 listed restaurants that are also DoorDash customers. DoorDash will, in turn, gain access to millions of nationwide consumers looking for delivery or takeout meals.
“We mentioned on our last earnings call that restaurants is one of the fastest growing business units within TripAdvisor,” said Evan Becker, head of restaurants key accounts & reseller partnerships at the company. “We are looking for more ways for owners to interact with customers, looking closely at what drives engagement, and what ultimately puts butts in seats.”
Improving restaurants’ visibility to consumers is core to TripAdvisor’s current business strategy. In part, yes, this is done through dozens of external partnerships. But internally, TripAdvisor offers two paid products—TripAdvisor Ad and TripAdvisor Premium—to restaurants in order to expedite their discovery.
TripAdvisor Ad, launched a little more than a year ago, has quickly become TripAdvisor’s flagship product, providing businesses with sponsored placement on the top of landing pages for searches in their market. TripAdvisor Premium additionally features a slideshow of photos and reviews chosen by the owner, as well as a list of the top three reasons to visit the location.
While TripAdvisor could not speak to the affect established delivery partnerships have on one another, they all “create an ecosystem one-stop shop from a consumer angle,” Becker said. “We want to make sure that in every market we are the player to turn to when looking find the right restaurants.”
DoorDash’s Strategy: The More Partnerships the Merrier
DoorDash now joins OpenTable, Grubhub, and Deliveroo, among other industry competitors, as TripAdvisor partners. The agreement also adds to what’s already been a busy 2018 for the company. Over the summer, DoorDash lured Prabir Adarkar from Uber to become its new chief financial officer.
It also introduced in-store pickup and a no delivery fee subscription plan to customers in August. Not to mention, the near $750 million DoorDash has raised in investment funding this calendar year so far.
Like its counterparts, DoorDash has found that the best way to grow in U.S. market share is through collaboration. Having already inked contracts with the likes of Chipotle and Chick-fil-A in 2018, the company this week also announced an exclusive delivery partnership with Wingstop, adding to such exclusive deals previously established with Wendy’s and The Cheesecake Factory.
“Large brands are buying into the fact that we can take delivery national,” said Toby Espinosa, head of business development at DoorDash.
DoorDash currently has more than 200,000 stores on its platform. The company began in 2013 catering to smaller mom-and-pop restaurants under the name Palo Alto Delivery. In the past 18 to 24 months, however, DoorDash has expanded its coverage to prominent chains, according to Espinosa. “And we still have regional teams catering to local merchants that do the same thing I do.”
