Hey! Taxi businesses are the frontline beneficiaries of technological advancements. Not sure how? Here is all you need to know. With constant technological innovations, taxi services have become popular and affordable. In this blog let us discuss the on-demand service venture of taxi businesses and why you should develop a taxi booking app.
What laid the foundation for the popularity of on-demand services?
Compared with traditional taxi services, on-demand taxi services are far better in every aspect. From users’ standpoint, taxis can be booked easily from their smartphones and avail of the services promptly. For business owners, managing the entire operations and transactions have become simple. Let me point out some of the advantages of on-demand taxi booking services.
- Passengers can book taxis and even select the taxi type all from the app.
- The app lets passengers track the appropriate location of their taxis.
- One of the ultimate features of these apps is the estimation of the fare for the ride.
- Of all, passengers can define the time in which they want to travel.
With on-demand taxi apps proffering this much sophistication, the reception among users is definite. In this sequence, we shall proceed with the development of taxi apps like Uber.
Need to develop a taxi booking app like Uber
Uber is more synonymous with on-demand taxi services. But, why? It is because Uber was the first to introduce ride-hailing and ride-sharing services. Many taxi business giants were awestruck by the success of Uber’s business model and developed taxi apps. In that sequence, Lyft and Ola deployed their taxi services but infused some unique offerings.
Entrepreneurs who aim to venture into the taxi business, idolize Uber’s business model. To your surprise, Uber’s business model is the most flexible model ever. If you are not sure of what a flexible business model is then here is all you need to know.
What is a flexible business model?
A business model is said to be flexible when it can cope with the contemporary situation thereby optimizing the services. As said earlier, Uber is well-known for its flexibility in adapting to situations. Recently during the pandemic, the company came up with some of the innovative strategies that any business could think of.
Some of the strategies adopted by Uber in recent times
- Screen separators between drivers and passengers in taxis.
- Well-sanitization of taxis on a periodic basis.
- The company has restricted the number of passengers traveling at the same time.
- Other safety measures like a safety checklist that both passengers and drivers have to follow.
With these points, you can vouch for the reason behind how Uber is getting accreditation from users. As a next step, we shall drill into the types of services available in taxi services.
Ride-hailing
Ride-hailing is a popular service, where users will book taxis, avail, and make the payment.
Ride-sharing
Ride-sharing is where passengers will share their ride with co-passengers. Initially when ride-sharing services were introduced users considered it as an affordable service. But later users felt that with ride-sharing safety might become out of the question. Companies like Lyft don’t offer ride-sharing services taking into account the safety of passengers.
I hope that you are eager to kick-start your venture in the taxi business. Let us now look into the components or features present in Uber-like taxi booking apps.
Must-have Features In Your Taxi Booking App
Schedule rides
As said before, the scheduling feature is gaining more fame among people, as they can pre-book their rides. Users will choose the scheduling option, enter the location (both source and destination), and then click “schedule”. Drivers will reach out to users’ places at the mentioned time.
Track taxis
The ability to track taxis is one of the best technological improvements to date. Using the app, users can find out the place in which the taxi is moving currently.
Geolocation
The geolocation feature is beneficial for both passengers and drivers. For passengers, they can know the exact direction or location in which they are traveling. For drivers, they can reach the users’ location in the appropriate route. Also, the geolocation feature will send alerts to drivers whenever they enter a wrong route.
Payments
Making payments is made easy with integrated payment gateways in the app. Users can pay for the ride either before or after availing of the service. It is one best practice to give away offers and coupon codes to users that will increase their interest in your service.
Automatic fare calculation
The app has a fare calculating algorithm that will estimate the fare for the ride and will send it to users. The fare calculation will happen based on the distance traveled in km or mile, and some specific industry norms.
All of these features are some of the latest and most beneficial ones. While developing your taxi app, insist your developer to include these features so that you can offer an unmatchable ride experience to users.
Let me presume that you thoroughly understand the benefits of developing the taxi app. Now, let us get into the cost involved in app development.
Cost estimation
Generally, developing an app involves many complex processes. The app developer will get your requirements, convert them into a fully working model, add features, and launch the app. When it comes to estimating the cost of the app development, there are some factors to be taken into consideration. They are as follows.
- The type of platform you want your app to be launched. If you go with native app development you can deploy the app is only in any of the App Stores (either Google Play Store or iOS App Store)
- The front-end and back-end development will definitely influence the cost of app development. It’s basically the level of personalization you prefer.
- Other factors include the location of your app development company, their business standards, etc.,
However, if you choose clone app development, you can cut off a considerable amount of development cost.
Conclusion
If you are all set to invest in taxi app development then the Uber clone app is the right choice. The app will be beneficial for your business in every means right from features to the cost of development. Therefore, it’s high time to develop and launch your taxi app. Break a leg!
Author Bio
Jennifer Atkinson is a growth hacker and business advisor who helps new entrants in the business world to adapt to the changing circumstances in the business world. She also helps the firms to best adapt to the current digital transformation and help them setup their digital version of the company.
