Comparative Analysis of Zomato & Swiggy 2022 PDF

See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366604354 Immersive Project 2022 Term -VI Final Report Of : "Comparative Analysis Of Zomato & Swiggy Based on Consumer Perception" Details Of The Organisations Under Study Literature Review...

See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366604354 Immersive Project 2022 Term -VI Final Report Of : "Comparative Analysis Of Zomato & Swiggy Based on Consumer Perception" Details Of The Organisations Under Study Literature Review... Research · December 2022 DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.29473.48487 CITATION READS 1 21,776 1 author: Aaditya Jain Indian Institute of Management, Rohtak 3 PUBLICATIONS 1 CITATION SEE PROFILE All content following this page was uploaded by Aaditya Jain on 27 December 2022. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.  Immersive Project 2022 Term - VI Final Report Of : “Comparative Analysis Of Zomato & Swiggy Based on Consumer Perception” Concerned Faculty : Dr Chandra Prakash Assistant Professor In the area of Operations Management Indian Institute of Management Rohtak. Submitted By : Aaditya Jain Roll Number : IPM02074 I  Table Of Contents Certificate Of Originality III Introduction and Brief Background 1 Details Of The Organisations Under Study 3 Rationale 4 Literature Review 4 Research Gaps 6 Scope Of The Study 10 Research Methodology 10 Research Design 10 Nature & Source Of Information 12 Sample & Sampling Techniques 13 Details Of The Tools : 15 Data Handling, Statistical tools used for Data Analysis 17 Data Interpretation and Findings 22 Theoretical Contributions 31 Managerial Implications 32 Recommendations 33 Limitations Of The Paper 34 Summary & Conclusion 34 Reference/Bibliography 35 Annexures/Appendices (Questionnaire used etc.) 38 II  Certificate Of Originality This is to certify that the project titled “Comparative Analysis Of Zomato & Swiggy Based on Consumer Perception” is an original work of Mr. Aaditya Jain, IPM02074 and is being submitted in complete fulfilment of the requirements of Integrated Programme In Management, IIM Rohtak. This report has not been submitted to this Institution or any other Institution earlier and all the already documented research papers and articles used in the procedure of scripting this report as references, have been given due credit and consequently enlisted towards the end of the report. AADITYA JAIN IPM02074 III  Introduction and Brief Background The Indian government announced "Start-Up India" in 2015, with the primary goal of promoting the startup culture in the country and creating a robust and inclusive environment for innovation and entrepreneurship. This plan worked admirably, laying the groundwork for plenty of successful businesses across the country, many of which went on to become unicorns, meaning companies worth more than a billion dollars. According to (Kashyap, 2022), India is currently placed 3rd internationally in terms of unicorn rankings, with 101 unicorns in the country as of June 2022. In addition, with rapid growth of the internet and globalisation of the market, the number of businesses using internet and technology as a crucial tool for their functioning has rapidly grown (Kumar & Ayodeji, 2020). Today majority of the unicorns that India has are technology based startups which use the internet as an essential part of their business functioning as it helps them to reach a large pool of consumers easily. An important factor driving the growth of the online businesses and retail in India can be put down to the growth of internet penetration and increase in technological infrastructure. According to (Statista, 2022), the number of internet users is projected to grow to over 1.5 billion users by 2040 from 749 million in 2020 thus indicating a big market potential in internet services for India. This dramatic increase in the number of internet users in India along with a strong framework for doing ease of business has eventually resulted in the emergence of new business sectors in the country and therefore the focus of this paper will be on one such flourishing market inside the Indian startup space i.e., the online food delivery business. Online food delivery is a service that allows clients to order food online and have it delivered to their door. It involves technology that helps restaurants to accept and manage online orders. While surfing the website from the comfort of their own homes, Indian customers can choose from a vast choice of cuisines offered by various eateries. 1 Online shopping appeals to consumers because it allows them to purchase conveniently, comfortably, and leisurely from the comfort of their own homes (Jiang et al., 2013). Likewise, online food delivery businesses have emerged as a result of urban consumers' evolving buying habits (Chai and Yat, 2019). Due to the rise in the working population and the time-constrained work-life culture in metro areas, the idea of food delivery is swiftly growing (Das and Ghose, 2019). In addition to this, the convenience the online food delivery businesses offer to their customers is an important driving factor of growth for this industry as customers get all their food delivered with a tap of a button within a span of nearly 30 minutes. The Indian online food delivery space is currently undergoing a revolution due to the heavy investments that this industry has attracted in the recent years. According to an article by (ResearchAndMarkets.Com, 2021), the Indian online food delivery industry will grow at a stunning 28.94 percent CAGR from 2020 to 2026, hitting a market size of US $21.41 billion in 2026, up from US $4.66 billion in 2020. This staggering growth in the online food delivery space in the coming years will transform the way this business is done currently and thus bring a lot of innovations in the industry. With more investments in this field, there will be new players who would want to enter this market space and thus it is important to understand the factors critical to success in the Indian market. In India, currently there are only two online food delivery companies namely Zomato and Swiggy which dominate 95% of the market. Although these companies fundamentally provide the same service to their customers, their app services differ in terms of features offered and customer value systems (Raina et al. ,2019). These differences in terms of app services and customer value systems become a deciding factor for the customers to choose either of the delivery service. Therefore, it is important for the current companies to understand the factors that are critical to success in the Indian market and thus improve their services accordingly to offer a better customer experience. Although there have been researches which have identified the factors critical for success in the food delivery business and also have made a comparison between players like 2 Zomato and Swiggy. But, none of the previously done research has focussed on the Indian market as a whole and therefore there is limited literature about the Indian market. This paper will identify the factors that are essential while operating for players in the online food industry and then shortlist the factors that are most important to an Indian customer and should be a focus of new businesses entering the industry with less capital and manpower. In addition, the paper will also identify the best player in this industry by comparing the two companies Zomato and Swiggy based on the same set of factors. This comparison will be done from an Indian consumer perspective by asking the opinion of different consumers belonging to different cities. Details Of The Organisations Under Study Zomato was founded by Deepinder Goyal and Pankaj Chaddah in 2008. It is a restaurant search and discovery tool that provides its clients with restaurant locations and menus, as well as photographs of culinary dishes and customer reviews. Initially, the services were offered under the name Foodiebay, but in November 2010, the company's name was changed to Zomato. In 2021 the company decided to go public and had a successful listing with a massive 52.63 percent gain on issue price of Rs 76. Currently, according to the company’s quarterly report the number of orders has grown 93% YoY and 5% QoQ, which is a positive sign for the company and its growth prospects. Nandan Reddy, Rahul Jaimini, and Sriharsha Majety created Swiggy in Bangalore in July 2014. As of September 2021, Swiggy's food delivery services are available in 500 Indian cities, and in addition to food delivery, Swiggy also offers on-demand grocery deliveries under the brand Instamart and an instant parcel delivery service named "Swiggy Genie." However, this paper will solely discuss Swiggy's online food delivery business and will not delve into details about the company's other businesses. 3  Rationale Zomato and Swiggy both have a collective market share of 95% in this sector, similar research about comparative analysis of various food delivery companies based on consumer perspective have been done for particular cities like Ludhiana, Pune and Rajkot. The results of these revealed that Zomato was the leader in this market in the respective cities. In order to generalise the findings for a larger population and determine whether Zomato continues to be the best for a wider range of population or not, I wanted to examine both Zomato and Swiggy in this study without limiting the sample to a single city or state. Secondly, although there have been studies about determining the essential factors to consumers in this industry, there is limited literature about this in India. Hence, my study will contribute to the literature by identifying the factors that are most crucial to an Indian consumer while choosing a particular delivery service. This will help the upcoming businesses to capture the market with less capital and manpower as they would be required to just focus on these crucial factors in the beginning. Literature Review Online Food Delivery Services Pigatto et al. (2017) described online food delivery services as business platforms that offer order services, payment options, and process monitoring but are not in control of food preparation. Yeo et al. (2017) stated that there are two types of retailers who offer food delivery services. The first is the physical retailers. Fast food restaurants like Pizza Hut, McDonald's, Domino's Pizza, Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC), and others are the primary players in this area. The second category is made up of numerous restaurant middlemen who offer delivery services for a wide variety of restaurants. According to Chen and Hsieh (2017), online food ordering has become more popular as people's schedules become busier and they have less time to cook or go out to eat. According to Hirschberg et al. (2016), customers now have more convenience and choice due to the online meal delivery services, which enable them to place orders from a variety of restaurants with just a single tap on their smartphone. Moreover, H.S. Sethu and Bhavya Saini (2016), looked into students' 4 perceptions, behaviours, and satisfaction with online food ordering and delivery services. According to their findings, internet food ordering platforms assist students in better time management. It is also discovered that the convenience of having their favourite cuisine available at any time and having simple access to the internet are the primary reasons for using the services. Comparison of Online Food Delivery Services in India from a Consumer Perspective According to Khalifa (2004), in many marketing methods, the importance of the consumer perception is heavily utilised. It is crucial for every organisation's success and is regarded as a competitive advantage. Yang and Jun (2002) stated that the online retail sector has gone through a number of phases so that it can both retain and attract new clients. To foster client loyalty, it must offer good quality and good service. According to Zhilin (2002), a comprehensive consumer perception survey is crucial for providing better services. In India, there have been several studies that have compared the various online food delivery service providers based on consumer satisfaction; however, these studies are only conducted in one city, making it difficult to generalise the findings across the country. In her study, Vithlani (2020) tried to identify the food delivery application that built confidence in the minds of consumers. Customers who used both Zomato & Swiggy in Rajkot City were used as a sample for this study. Her research on the basis of polls and data analysis concluded that customers of Zomato are happier than those of Swiggy. Raina et al. (2019) used a sample of 162 persons from Ludhiana to identify which online food delivery service is the most successful in the Indian city of Ludhiana. They discovered that Zomato is the most popular online meal ordering service in Ludhiana. Jyotishman Das (2018) in his research, conducted only in the city of Pune with 153 respondents, found out that Zomato was the first preference of customers followed by Swiggy. J. Das (2018) performed a study in Pune on consumers' perceptions of online food ordering and delivery services. According to the paper, Zomato has received a positive opinion from the majority of users in comparison to other service providers such as Uber Eats, Food Panda, and Swiggy, and this is mostly due to their improved on-time delivery and lower rates. 5 Factors that are Essential to Consider in Online Food Delivery Space According to research done by See-Kwong et al. (2017), customers' ability to pay for delivery fees is one of the factors holding back restaurant business owners from outsourcing delivery to third-party internet delivery service providers. Kedah et al. (2015) said that customer satisfaction is greatly influenced by the service quality the online meal delivery services provide. Ahmed Tausif Saad (2020) conducted research in Bangladesh to determine the factors that affect the online food delivery business in his country. He concluded that 8 factors affect the business the most and these are Price, Service Quality, Attitude of Delivery Person, Variety of Restaurants, Delivery Time, Condition of Food, Online Promotions and Delivery Tracking. Kedah et al. (2015) examined the factors that influence customer ordering experiences among Malaysian customers. The factors he found include website trust, customer happiness, and brand loyalty. Research Gaps As it was evident from the literature review, previous studies in India have focused solely on the consumer perceptions from a single city, making it difficult to extrapolate the findings for a wider range of population. As a result, in order to fill this need, this study will not limit itself to customers from a specific city, but will instead collect responses from consumers from varied cities. This would aid in generalising the findings from the sample to a wider range of population and drawing meaningful conclusions from it. Second, there have been very limited studies in India to determine the factors that matter to an Indian consumer in the food delivery industry. All the studies conducted regarding the factors important in the food delivery industry have mostly been conducted for countries outside India such as Bangladesh and Malaysia. For India these have been conducted only for a single specific city, thus limiting the findings to that city itself. To address this issue, this study will adopt the 8 factors that were put into test by Ahmed Tausif Saad (2020) in the country of Bangladesh, as they are an amalgamation of the findings and results from previous literature on this topic. This study will add to the literature in the Indian context by testing all the 8 factors from the lens of an Indian consumer and determining the factors that are valued most by the customers of India. 6 Factors to be Taken into Consideration for this Research The following 8 decision influencing factors have been directly taken from the findings of Ahmed Tausif Saad (2020), since all of these factors mentioned are an amalgamation of the findings of previous literature conducted in the field of online food delivery and restaurants. A. Perceived Service Quality is the consumers feeling about the overall superiority of the product or service (Parasuraman et al., 1998). In the online food delivery space, the service quality includes everything from the user interface of the application like ease of use, touch and feel, to the ease of reaching out to the customer service in case of any issue. Moreover, according to (Kedah et al., 2015) the perceived quality of service by online food delivery companies has a large impact on the satisfaction and retention of customers. B. Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person is also another important factor which affects the customers decision to choose a particular service. According to (Chandrashekhar et al., 2019) a well behaved delivery person increases the overall satisfaction of a customer receiving the order and thus affects their decision positively. C. According to (Ballantine, 2005), applications which offer a Wide Range Of Options Of Restaurants appeal more to the customers and thus reduce their search time for choosing items to order as it increases the probability of the customers favourite dish being listed on the application. D. On Time Delivery is yet another important influencing factor in this industry as it is found that people perceive online shopping to consume less time since it saves the time of travelling to the customer (Sultan and Uddin, 2011). Therefore, a delay 7  in delivery beyond the expected time affects the satisfaction of the customers irrespective of the weather and road conditions. E. Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food increases the satisfaction of the customers and thus increases the likelihood of reorder (Kedah et al., 2015). F. Low Prices & Discounts Offered is one of the most important factors that shape the decision of an Indian consumer. The popularity of online food delivery services is growing rapidly because of its several benefits, such as bringing food to the doorstep of customers, various payment alternatives, attractive discounts, rewards and cashback offers (MarketWatch, 2019). G. Real Time Tracking Of Delivery and adjustment of time according to the traffic conditions assures clients that they will get their meal timely delivered. These post purchase activities related to shipping and tracking help the customer in shaping their decision (Cao et al., 2018). H. According to (Prasetyo et al., 2021), Online Promotions & Advertisements done by an online food delivery service aggregator influences the willingness of a customer to buy greatly. Objectives Of The Project 1. To determine the best company among Zomato & Swiggy in the Indian food delivery industry through the 8 decision influencing factors from a customer standpoint. 8  2. To determine the most important decision influencing factors for Indian Consumers while they choose an online delivery service. 2.1. To determine whether there is any relationship between the degree of importance of these most important factors and the type of city the customer belongs to. Statement Of Problem The Indian online food delivery business has been majorly dominated by two companies Zomato and Swiggy. This oligopoly in the industry leaves the customers with limited options to choose from and thus are forced to avail the services of only the two available businesses. In addition, this domination by only two companies also reduces the number of innovations in the industry, thus once again affecting consumer choice. Therefore, to battle this, the food delivery business space needs more competitors who are able to give tough competition to the existing two companies and thus offer customers with choice and new innovation. With this paper we aim to take a step to provide a solution to this problem by conducting a comparative analysis of the current two market leaders through the 8 decision influencing factors from a consumer point of view and determine the best company in the space. This will help companies such as Zomato & Swiggy to know about the areas among the 8 factors where the customer feels they lack in and thus improve upon those. In addition to this I will also highlight the factors that the Indian Consumers regard as most important in influencing their decision to choose a particular service. This information will serve the upcoming businesses in the online food delivery industry as they will know exactly what to focus on when they start. Since new businesses often don't have the capital and manpower to focus on everything, my findings will help them target a few factors to focus on and thus create a mark for themselves by capturing the market while also keeping the customers satisfied. Lastly, I will also check whether the degree of 9 importance of these most important factors identified change with the types of city the consumer resides in. Scope Of The Study The scope of this study is that it will be limited to the sample age group of 18-60 and would be distributed to people via email and other social media platforms. The total number of responses targeted is just 147 from varied cities thus limiting the representation from each city. The factors that have been chosen to put into test are the 8 decision influencing factors that are discussed in the paper. The factors chosen are not an exhaustive list, however the paper will continue with these 8 as they are very common and among the essential ones that have also been used in other research papers outside India. The study focuses mainly on the businesses not having their food preparation process or product but provides delivery services of food from restaurants to homes and offices according to customers’ choice such as Zomato and Swiggy. Research Methodology Research Design The first objective of the research is to determine the current best online food delivery company among Zomato & Swiggy from the lens of Indian consumers based on the described 8 factors. To achieve this objective, raw data will be collected by circulating an online questionnaire through Google Forms which will receive 147 responses in total. This questionnaire will explicitly have a section wherein the respondents will be asked to select their preferred choice of company in the online food delivery space to fulfil their needs. These questions will be based on the 8 decision influencing factors that are {Perceived Service Quality, Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person, Wide Range Of Options, On Time Delivery , Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, Price and Discounts Offered, Real Time Tracking of Delivery, Online Promotions & Advertisements} wherein for each factor the respondent will have to choose which 10 company according to them is better in that particular factor. In addition to this section, at the end of the questionnaire to have a conclusive answer to our research objective, the questionnaire will ask the final verdict of respondents about the best online food delivery service according to their choice. After receiving responses to these questions, a descriptive method of analysis will be adopted and the data will be analysed using Microsoft Excel which will help in making visual representations of the raw data collected and thus provide easier interpretation. Accomplishment of the second objective, which is to determine the most prominent factors that affect the decision making of an Indian consumer to choose a food delivery service, will be carried out in 2 steps. The first part of the objective helps to understand the most important factors for Indians customers out of the 8 factors taken for this research, which shape their decision making. In the second part, the aim is to find out about how the degree of importance of these factors changes with respect to the type of city the consumer resides in. For the first part, the same questionnaire will be used for collecting data. The questionnaire will have one section which will have questions based on a 4 point Likert scale in which the respondents would have to answer in “Definitely No, No, Yes, Definitely Yes”. The reason behind keeping a small point Likert scale was to reduce the confusion among respondents in choosing the best answer and help them choose an answer that is either Yes or No without any ambiguity. A four point scale also helps in avoiding neutral responses which otherwise can become an obstacle while data analysis. In this section of the questionnaire all the 8 factors will be shooted onto the respondent and he/she will be asked to answer whether the following factor is important to them while choosing a particular online food delivery service on a 4 point scale. The results that would be received would be analysed using descriptive statistics in Microsoft Excel which would help in summarising the entire data in the form of charts which are easy to understand and interpret. Lastly, the paper will analyse whether the degree of importance of the identified most important factors changes with respect to the type of city the consumer belongs to. This will be carried out by creating contingency tables by capturing the type of city the consumer 11 belongs to, namely Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3, in the rows and the degree of importance of each factor measured by {1 - “Definitely No” , 2 - “No”, 3 - “Yes”, 4 - “Definitely Yes”} in the columns. Further, this data will be analysed by forming a set of hypotheses and then using a Chi Squared Test Of Independence which will help us to reach a conclusion. The Chi Squared Test Of Independence is a right tailed test which will be carried out with a significance value of 0.05, this means that the entire test would be carried out with a confidence level of 95%. Nature & Source Of Information The sources of information for this research are both primary as well as secondary data. The primary data has been collected by conducting an online survey through the Google forms platform. The entire survey was divided into 5 components with a total of 24 close ended questions wherein the first component was solely focussed upon collecting the demographics of the respondent, while the second part focussed on trying to know the frequency of ordering food online of the respondent. The participants who had never ordered food online were not forced to fill the form further as they were not a part of our target sample and their form was automatically submitted. The third section of the survey focussed on trying to capture the mobile applications used by the respondents to order food online, this helped in getting insights for the fulfilment of the first objective. Moving on, the fourth section focussed entirely upon the factors that affect decision making of customers to choose an online food delivery service. This component asked the respondents to answer how important are all the 8 factors to them based on a four point Likert scale. This helped us to get insights about our second objective. The fifth component of the survey asked the respondents to give their preference between Zomato & Swiggy based on the 8 factors and in the end asked for their final verdict between the two. This helped us to make a definitive conclusion regarding our first objective. In addition to the questionnaire to gather data, the paper has also used secondary resources to gather information about the 8 major factors that influence a customer’s decision to choose a particular online food delivery service. Through this paper, the factors that have 12 been extracted from secondary sources will be tested on Indian consumers to determine the factors that influence their decisions the most. Sample & Sampling Techniques According to Kline (1994), the minimum ideal sample size for a research that deals with quantitative data should be 100. Moreover, according to Tabachnick and Fidell (1996), if a research deals with factors then the ideal sample size is 50 + 8K, wherein K is the number of factors. To be aligned with what Tabachnick and Fidell (1996) says, since this paper will delve into 8 factors the ideal minimum sample size would be 50 + 64 = 114. The questionnaire that was distributed to collect data for this paper received a total of 147 responses which is in line with the minimum size of 114. The paper primarily focuses on Indian consumers belonging to the age group of 18-60 years because people belonging to this age group are mostly not dependent on others to make their decisions and thus are capable enough to form their opinions based on the information they receive. Moreover, people who belong to this age group generally have money of their own in forms of pocket money or their own income and thus are the target customers of the food delivery companies. The research aimed to get responses from people belonging to diverse backgrounds and cities so that the results obtained could be generalised for a wider population and not just for one particular city as seen in earlier researches conducted in this domain. Therefore, the survey received responses from people belonging to 46 unique cities in India from different states thus making it easier to generalise the findings of the research. A non-probabilistic convenience sampling method was chosen for this research, which means that the sample was a group of people the researcher could easily contact and reach. The participation was voluntary and all non users of online food delivery apps were excluded from the study at the initial screening process. 13 Summary Of The Sample : 1. Age Wise Distribution Of The Sample Obtained From the graph it is visible that we have 84 responses from people aged between 18-23 and 27 responses from people between the age of 24-40 and 36 responses from people above the age of 40. 2. City Wise Distribution Of The Sample 14 *As we can see from the above graph, the city wise distribution is not equally distributed to represent all cities fairly, therefore to limit any kind of error in our analysis we have grouped all cities into the categories Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3. This grouping will help us to generalise our findings for a particular type of city as the representation for types of city is comparatively better than making a conclusion for one particular city where the representation is not at all adequate. Details Of The Tools : Type Of Questionnaire Used & Purpose Since the research being carried out solely depends upon Indian consumer perception about Zomato and Swiggy as well as their opinion about the factors that influence their decision making the most, there were two choices to collect the data. First to carry out a qualitative method of data collection and analysis wherein the researcher would have to interview a certain set of people and ask them questions pertaining to the comparison between Zomato & Swiggy and the factors that affect their decision making to choose a particular online 15 food delivery service. Once all the interviews would have ended the researcher would have had to find common patterns in the answers of all the interviewees and report the most common answers and patterns as the results. Although this method of research would have given an opportunity to the interviewee to speak openly on each question and not feel any limitation to be precise while answering, but this method of analysis and data collection would have restricted the sample size of the research from 147 to a mere 10-20 participants, which would have not been a true representation of the population we aim to target. Secondly, the answers in an interview cannot be quantified easily and thus it would have been very difficult for the researcher to know exactly how important all the 8 factors are to the participant and rank them accordingly. Lastly, with just 10-20 participants it would have been very difficult for the researcher to generalise the findings of the research to a wider set of population. Therefore, to avoid all these problems the paper has adopted a quantitative method of data collection in which a 5 part questionnaire with 24 questions was distributed wherein each section of the survey focussed on deriving specific data from the respondent for the accomplishment of the objectives of the research. The questionnaire received a total of 147 responses from people belonging to 46 unique cities. The data collected through the questionnaire could easily be quantified as the respondents were asked to rate the degree of importance of all 8 factors on a four point Likert scale, thus these responses could easily be ranked and made use of for analysis. In addition, the data collected could be generalised to a wider population as the responses received are from varied cities and the sample size is also as big as 147. Tools Used for Analysis The data collected from the survey was analysed using Microsoft Excel. First, a descriptive statistical test was employed for determining the best company out of Zomato and Swiggy based on the 8 consumer decision influencing factors. The results were portrayed using charts and tables for better interpretation. Secondly, to determine the factors that are most important to Indian consumers out of the 8 factors discussed, again a descriptive analysis test was carried out which helped to understand the average importance an Indian regards 16 to each factor. Lastly, a Chi Squared Test of Independence was conducted to determine whether there is a relationship between the type of city the consumer resides in and the degree of importance attributed to the identified most important factors from the previous test. For this a hypothesis was formulated and then it was accepted/rejected with a confidence level of 95%, which means that the significance level for the test was 0.05. Reliability & Validity Of The Tools Used The tool used to collect data from people was Google Forms. In the questionnaire distributed there were questions which were based on a 4 point Likert scale. To check the consistency of the data collected and its reliability a Cronbach alpha test was conducted. According to Pallant (2001), an alpha value above 0.6 is considered high reliability and an acceptable index. When the test was conducted for the data collected, it was found that the Cronbach alpha value was equal to 0.61401798. Since the value is greater than 0.6, therefore it can be concluded that the tools used were reliable and are valid. In addition, Google form also allows to collect the emails of the respondents which helps the researcher to cross check the authenticity of the respondent. Administration Of Tools & Techniques The tool used for collection of data was an online questionnaire made by Google Forms. This questionnaire was distributed to all people between the age of 18 and 60 via methods like Email, WhatsApp and other social media platforms. The responses received were administered every second day by the researcher wherein all the insignificant responses and duplicate responses were deleted so that the findings do not get affected by the wrong data. Data Handling, Statistical tools used for Data Analysis Once the data collection was complete, the raw data was exported to Microsoft Excel for analysis and interpretations. To segregate my data on the basis of demographics, I made a small table wherein I counted the number of responses from each age group i.e. {18-23, 17 24-29, 30-35, 36-40, Above 40}. This segregation gave me a clear idea of how my sample is distributed with respect to the age of the respondents. Next I divided my sample according to the city they reside in. After sorting, I saw that I had had responses from 46 different cities, but that the distribution among them was uneven, making it impossible for me to draw any conclusions about any one place because the sample size from each city was minimal. In order to generalise my findings, I divided all of the cities into groups of three, referred to as Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 cities. This enabled to generalise the findings by obtaining a sizable sample size from each tier. Since Zomato and Swiggy dominate the market of online food delivery with a combined share of 95% in India, I wanted to check whether these two companies also dominate within my sample to ensure that my sample is representative of the population in target. To check this, I had created a separate section in the questionnaire which particularly aimed at knowing about the applications that are used by my respondents for ordering food. By filtering out other applications, I found out that 138 out of 147 people prefer Zomato and Swiggy to order their food and therefore this helped me to clarify that the sample I am testing is a representation of the target population where Zomato and Swiggy have their domination in terms of market share. To achieve the first objective, I analysed my data with the help of descriptive statistics. In the survey, the respondents were asked to answer according to their experience wherein they were asked to choose the best out of Zomato and Swiggy based on the 8 factors that are Perceived Service Quality, Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person, Wide Range Of Options, On Time Delivery , Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, Price and Discounts Offered, Real Time Tracking of Delivery, Online Promotions & Advertisements. All of their answers were recorded and then summarised in a table. Once the data was summarised in a table, I used a clustered bar graph to represent the data which helped in easy understanding and visualisation of the data and established clear results for the accomplishment of our objective. In addition, I also grouped the preference of customers between Zomato and Swiggy based on the type of city they reside 18 in {Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3}. This gave a clear understanding of the preference of customers based on the type of city they live in. To achieve the second objective of the research, which is divided into two parts, I first targeted to determine the factors that affect the decision making of Indian Consumers the most. To analyse this, I took the data from the questionnaire wherein the customers had to rate the degree of importance they feel for all the 8 factors while choosing a particular food delivery company on a scale of 1-4 wherein 1 was “Definitely No” and 4 was “Definitely Yes”. Once this data was exported into Microsoft Excel, I formulated a contingency table in which the number of responses for each factor from scale of 1-4 were recorded. Now, I used a two-step process to properly analyse this data and identify the factors that are most important to the customers which eventually affect their decision to choose a company. Firstly, a weighted average was calculated for all the factors. If the weighted average was greater than 3, then that factor was considered to be important to an Indian consumer. The reason why 3 is chosen as the criteria is because in the survey 3 was equal to “Yes”, which meant that the respondents agreed the factor to be important to them while choosing an online delivery service. However, if there were more than 4 factors that were found to have an average value greater than 3 then the top 4 values were considered as the most important factors for an Indian consumer. For the second part of the second objective, I wanted to test if there was a relationship between the perceived degree of importance of the identified most important factors that influence an Indian consumers' decision and the type of city they belong to. To analyse the data, I decided to go ahead with a non-parametric test. The reason I chose a non parametric test was because these tests are used for ordinal data and since the data I had collected for assessing the importance of factors was on a Likert scale which is also ordinal therefore I went ahead with a non parametric test. In addition, within non parametric tests I decided to analyse my data through the Chi Squared Test Of Independence as my objective was 19 focussed on assessing whether there is any sort of relationship between the two variables which are Importance Of Factors and Type Of City. Before proceeding further, it was imperative to lay down a hypothesis to conduct the analysis. Since we are testing for the identified most important factors, we would have to form a separate hypothesis for each factor and then test them individually for their relationship with the type of city the consumer belongs to. Therefore, we will have more than one set of hypotheses depending on the number of identified most important factors. Once the hypotheses are formed, to carry out the Chi Squared Test Of Independence, contingency tables for each of the most important factors will be created wherein the data would be grouped based on the type of city the respondent belongs to {Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3} and the degree of importance attributed on a scale of 1-4 for the factor in concern. This means that the rows will capture the type of city the respondent belongs to and the columns will capture their perceived importance for the factor while making decisions on a scale of 1-4. These contingency tables are known as Observed Frequency Tables. Moving on, after having the observed frequency tables in place, Expected Frequency Tables will be created for each factor identified as most important, which will be made (𝑅𝑜𝑤 𝑇𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙×𝐶𝑜𝑙𝑢𝑚𝑛 𝑇𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙) from the observed frequency tables using the formula for 𝑇𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑇𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙 each element in the observed frequency table. The Chi Squared Test Of Independence is a right tailed test, wherein if the Calculated Chi Squared value lies to the right of the Critical value then we would infer that the Calculated value lies in the rejection region and thus would lead to rejection of the null hypothesis. However, if the Calculated value lies to the left of the Critical value then it does not lie in the rejection region and we will be unable to reject our null hypothesis. To find the critical value we first need the degree of freedom and significance level. 20 The degree of freedom of chi squared test of independence is calculated by the following formula : Degree Of Freedom = (Number Of Columns - 1)×(Number Of Rows - 1) Now we need our level of significance, which is basically (1-Confidence Level). Generally, in the field of statistics all the tests are done with a confidence level of 95%, therefore we will proceed our test with the same confidence level and thus our significance level would be equal to (1-95%) which would be equal to 0.05. Therefore, now that we have our degree of freedom and significance level for each table created, we can proceed with our calculation of the critical value. The critical value is found by referring to the chart Upper-tail critical values of chi-square distribution with ν degrees of freedom. Once we have our critical value with us, now the final step is to find out the calculated Chi Squared value and then compare the two of them. To find the calculated Chi Squared value, we will have to make use of both the contingency tables i.e., Observed as well as Expected for each factor. The formula for finding the Calculated Value is as follows : All factors would have different Calculated Chi Squared values, and after we obtain those values, we will compare them to the Critical value to see if they fall inside the rejection region or not. 21 If Critical Value > Calculated Value, we can conclude that there is no evidence to reject our null hypothesis with a confidence level of 95% because our value does not fall into the rejection region. However, if Calculated Value > Critical Value, then our value is in the rejection region, and we can reject our null hypothesis with 95% confidence level. Data Interpretation and Findings 1. Comparison between Zomato & Swiggy from a Consumer Perspective As found in studies of scholars like Raina et al. (2019) and Vithlani (2020), who had conducted a comparison between the online food delivery companies from a consumer perspective for one specific city like Ludhiana and Rajkot respectively and had found that the consumers believe Zomato to be the best among all, likewise from the data obtained in this research, it is evident that Zomato is the most favoured food delivery service among majority of the 147 participants (Fig. 1-a and Fig. 1-b). If we compare the responses of the respondents regarding their preference of an online food delivery app based on the type of city they reside in, then it is found that Zomato is clearly a dominant choice in Tier 2 cities. However, for Tier 1 cities Swiggy is slightly ahead of Zomato and for Tier 3 it is the complete opposite as Zomato is slightly ahead of Swiggy in terms of consumer choice (Fig. 1-c). 22  Fig. 1-a Fig. 1-b 23  Fig. 1-c 2. Determination of the Most Important Factors to an Indian Consumer It is evident from Fig. 2-a that, with the exception of Online promotions and Ads, which has an average value of 2.70, all other factors such as Perceived Service Quality, Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person, Wide Range Of Options, On Time Delivery , Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, Price and Discounts Offered and Real Time Tracking of Delivery have average values greater than 3. Since 3 and 4 stand for "Yes" and "Definitely Yes," it may be concluded that all factors—with the exception of online promotions and advertisements—are important to Indian consumers. 24  Fig. 2-a Perceived Service Quality, On Time Delivery, Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, and Real Time Tracking of Delivery are the 4 factors that are absolutely crucial for an Indian consumer because they have the highest average values out of all of these factors. Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person, Wide Range Of Options, Price and Discounts Offered are relatively less crucial for an Indian customer (Fig. 2-b). Fig. 2-b 25 3. Relationship between Important Factors and Type of City As identified from the previous section, there are 4 most crucial factors for Indian Consumers that are Perceived Service Quality, On Time Delivery, Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, and Real Time Tracking of Delivery. Therefore, we will have 4 sets of hypotheses for this part of the objective. Factor 1 - Service Quality Hₒ = Importance of Service Quality for Indian consumers is independent of the type of city the consumer belongs to. Hₐ = Importance of Service Quality for Indian consumers is dependent on the type of city the consumer belongs to. As it can be observed from the tables below (Fig 3-1-a, Fig 3-1-b, Fig 3-1-c), the Calculated Chi Squared value of 5.103 is less than the Critical Chi Squared value of 12.592, therefore we can say that our Calculated value does not lie in the rejection region and thus the null hypothesis cannot be rejected at confidence level of 95%. Observed Frequency Table Fig. 3-1-a 26 Expected Frequency Table Fig. 3-1-b Other Variables Fig. 3-1-c Factor 2 - On Time Delivery Hₒ = Importance of On Time Delivery for Indian consumers is independent of the type of city the consumer belongs to. Hₐ = Importance of On Time Delivery for Indian consumers is dependent on the type of city the consumer belongs to. As observed from the tables below (Fig. 3-2-a, Fig. 3-2-b, Fig. 3-2-c) the Calculated Chi Squared value of 2.072 is less than the Critical Chi Squared value of 12.592, therefore we can say that our Calculated value does not lie in the 27 rejection region and thus the null hypothesis cannot be rejected with a confidence level of 95%. Observed Frequency Table Fig. 3-2-a Expected Frequency Table Fig. 3-2-b Other Variables Fig. 3-2-c Factor 3 - Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food Hₒ = Importance of Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food for Indian consumers is independent of the type of city the consumer belongs to. 28 Hₐ = Importance of Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food for Indian consumers is dependent on the type of city the consumer belongs to. From the figures below (Fig. 3-3-a, Fig. 3-3-b, Fig 3-3-c) it is evident that the Calculated Chi Squared value of 2.570 is less than the Critical Chi Squared value of 9.488, therefore we can say that our Calculated value does not lie in the rejection region and thus the null hypothesis cannot be rejected at confidence level of 95%. Observed Frequency Table Fig. 3-3-a Expected Frequency Table Fig. 3-3-b * The following factor is an exception in forming contingency tables as none of the 147 respondents answered “Definitely No” for this factor when asked for the importance of Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food. This means that the column of “Definitely No” is empty for this factor and thus while making the contingency table for this factor the first column has been ignored. 29 Other Variables Fig 3-3-c Factor 4 - Real Time Tracking Of Delivery Hₒ = Importance of Real Time Tracking Of Delivery for Indian consumers is independent of the type of city the consumer belongs to. Hₐ = Importance of Real Time Tracking Of Delivery for Indian consumers is dependent on the type of city the consumer belongs to. From the figures below (Fig. 3-4-a, Fig. 3-4-b, Fig 3-4-c) it is evident that the Calculated Chi Squared value of 1.888 is less than the Critical Chi Squared value of 12.592, therefore we can say that our Calculated value does not lie in the rejection region and thus the null hypothesis cannot be rejected at confidence level of 95%. Observed Frequency Table Fig. 3-4-a 30  Expected Frequency Table Fig. 3-4-b Other Variables Fig 3-4-c Looking at the test results of all the 4 factors we can say that since all the Calculated Chi Squared values lie outside the rejection region, therefore with a confidence level of 95% it can be concluded that the degree of importance of the 4 factors under analysis is independent of the type of city the consumer belongs to. Theoretical Contributions The research contributes to the existing literature in many ways. From the Indian context, all the research about determining the best food delivery company from a consumer perspective had been done for a specific city. This study conducted the research by taking into consideration consumers from 46 unique cities divided into Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3 and determined the best company among Zomato and Swiggy from a consumer perspective based on the described 8 factors. The results showed that majority of Indians believe Zomato to be better in terms of all the factors that are Perceived Service Quality, Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person, Wide Range Of Options, On Time Delivery , Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, Price and Discounts Offered, 31 Real Time Tracking of Delivery, Online Promotions & Advertisements. In addition, it was found that people who belong to Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities prefer Zomato over Swiggy, however people who belong to Tier 1 cities such as Mumbai, New Delhi, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Pune prefer Swiggy over Zomato. Secondly, in India all the studies about determining factors that are important to Indian consumers while choosing a food delivery company were again done for a specific city and all the other studies about determining the factors were conducted outside India. Therefore, this research adopted a list of 8 factors from the paper of Ahmed Tausif Saad (2020) and tested these factors on Indian consumers belonging to varied cities. According to the findings, Indians attribute most importance to factors such as Perceived Service Quality, On Time Delivery, Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food and Real Time Tracking of Delivery while choosing a particular online food delivery service. The least importance is attributed to Online Promotions & Advertisements by the Indian consumer while making their decision. Lastly, it was important to check if the importance of the 4 crucial factors determined changed with the type of city the consumer belonged to. The results showed that the importance of all the four crucial factors, Perceived Service Quality, On Time Delivery, Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food and Real Time Tracking of Delivery, was independent of the type of city the consumer belonged to and thus these factors are most crucial to consumers PAN India. Managerial Implications From the findings, it was found that Zomato was the most preferred company when compared with Swiggy based on the fulfilment of all the 8 factors from the eyes of the consumer. Therefore, it is important for Swiggy to focus more on these factors and improve their services in order to capture more share of the market and give a tough competition to Zomato. For Zomato, it will have to focus on impressing the consumers of Tier 1 cities as according to the findings Swiggy was a dominant choice in Tier 1 cities. In current times since only Zomato and Swiggy are the two dominant companies in the food delivery space in India, it is imperative for more companies to come in and contribute to the industry by breaking the oligopoly of the two firms. The entrance of new companies would force the 32 current two giants to innovate their services and come up with new products in order to sustain in the market. This innovation and competition would be great for the customers as they would not be forced to buy from only the two existing companies. Therefore, for new companies which will enter this food delivery industry, it is important for them to focus on a few very essential factors in the beginning which are important to Indian consumers and cannot be compromised by these companies. These factors would help the new businesses in making a mark for themselves in the industry and offer customers with new choices. The most essential factors identified in the research are Perceived Service Quality, On Time Delivery, Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food and Real Time Tracking of Delivery. Lastly, it is important for the companies to know whether the importance regarded to these factors by the consumers changes with the type of city the consumer belongs to. The findings of the research found that the importance of these factors is independent of the type of city the consumer belongs to and thus these factors are regarded as most important PAN India. Recommendations Through this research report, I would like to recommend all newly established companies in the food delivery sector to put their initial attention on the four factors of Service Quality, On-Time Delivery, Fresh, Well-Cooked, & Packaged Food, as well as Real- Time Delivery Tracking, as these are the factors that are crucial to Indian customers and with which they may not be willing to make concessions. This does not imply that the other 4 factors covered in the research are not significant. All eight factors are necessary for a successful business in the food delivery sector, but since a business's initial resources are insufficient to focus on all eight, it should only pay attention to the four most crucial ones. 33  Limitations Of The Paper The limitations of the study are that the sample size of 147 for the age group of 18-60 from 46 unique cities cannot be accurately generalised for the entire customer base of India using online food delivery services, however the studied sample can give a good idea or direction to the upcoming businesses about the perceptions of consumers in India to prosper in the Indian online food delivery industry. Second, the research doesn’t have an equal representation of all age groups and is highly dominated by respondents belonging to the age 18-24 with 84 responses out of 147. Third, the research could not cover every city in India to get an in-depth idea about the perceptions of the entire country as a whole, however the research has covered 46 unique cities divided into Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3 groups. Last, the list of business parameters that the paper focuses on through the questionnaire is not exhaustive and the operation of a business includes various other parameters, but the parameters chosen are directly picked up from other secondary sources and are the most common factors that directly affect the consumers decisions. Summary & Conclusion This research aimed at finding out the best online food delivery company in the current market space from an Indian consumer's perspective. The comparison was mainly done between Zomato & Swiggy as they dominate this industry in India with a combined share of 95%. The second objective of the research was to find out the decision influencing factors which influence the decision of Indian customers the most when they choose a particular online food delivery service to fulfil their needs. 8 factors were put into test in this research, and these 8 factors namely – Perceived Service Quality, Proper Flow Of Communication By The Delivery Person, Wide Range Of Options, On Time Delivery , Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food, Price and Discounts Offered, Real Time Tracking of Delivery, Online Promotions & Advertisements. In addition to this, the research also wanted to test whether changes in the type of city {Tier 1, Tier 2 , Tier 3} affects the degree of importance the consumers attribute to a factor. To achieve all of these objectives, a questionnaire was distributed to people wherein the target sample was people aged between 18-60 from diverse cities. The questionnaire received a total of 147 responses 34 from people residing in 46 unique cities, thus helping the researcher to generalise the results to a wider set of population. The data collected for the first objective was analysed and showed that the majority of people prefer Zomato over Swiggy for every factor in concern and thus it could be concluded that, in the current market space Zomato has an advantage over Swiggy and thus is the best company in the food delivery space as of 2022. Upon continuous analysis for the second objective it was found that the factors that were most important to Indians were – Service Quality, On Time Delivery , Fresh, Well Cooked & Well Packaged Food & Real Time Tracking of Delivery. Lastly, I aimed to test whether the degree of importance of these most important 4 factors change with respect to the type of city, i.e. Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3, the consumer belongs to. 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Sethu, H.S. and Saini, B. (2016), Proceedings of the Seventh Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences (AP16 Malaysia Conference), Kuala Lumpur, 15-17, July 2016. Paper ID: KL631, ISBN 978-1-943579-81-5. Annexures/Appendices (Questionnaire used etc.) Link to the Questionnaire Used → https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdc33kkpzfB27JlagG1lvDRmYYceUWud3- R-pkQvHZydv3idQ/viewform 38 View publication stats