topic Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid in Guest Experience

What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid of it?

Erin — Fri, 16 Dec 2022 00:38:26 GMT

Hi! I asked this in another chain, but didn't get an answer so posting in a separate post in hopes someone can shed some light.

Toast recently launched their integration with Google My Business (so your ToastOO buttons can now show up directly on your google business profile--which is great!).

However, ours is also now showing a "Toast Local" option. Does anybody know what this is? We use our own in-house drivers (the option on the left), but I cannot find any articles about what "Toast Local" actually is. It is showing up under both Delivery AND Pickup on our Google page.

When I click on "Toast Local", it takes me to an error page:

I think this is very confusing for customers, and at the very least does not look professional routing customers to a dead link.

Is anyone else seeing this on your Google Business profile when you google your restaurant?

Also, why is my Delivery Fee showing a range of $0-$4 (on the left option), when our Delivery Fee is a static $4? And why is my Toast Delivery showing 25 minutes, when in reality it's 45 (as the right button shows)?

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

au79teahouse — Fri, 16 Dec 2022 01:17:05 GMT

I think it is just a web version of "Toast Takeout App". It looks nice but buggy. I got an error message when trying to add an item to cart. But it worked fine after I refreshed the page. The "Toast preferred by business" is an online ordering portal by google. I found it can be buggy and does not display menu accurately when you have a "subgroup" added to your items. It does not seem fully integrated with google yet.

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

Erin — Fri, 16 Dec 2022 01:23:02 GMT

We've always had "Toast Takeout App" turned on in our back-end, so not sure why our "Toast Local" button is directing to the error page that was pictured. No matter how many times I refresh, nothing happens.

And I agree that the "Toast preferred by business" User Experience definitely needs work. The modifiers aren't collapsible like they are on ToastOO itself, so it's a very messy ordering experience. I wish we could just direct cusotmers directly to our ToastOO pages which are a much better user experience (at least with the size of the menu at our restaurant).

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

au79teahouse — Fri, 16 Dec 2022 01:57:28 GMT

The Toast Local button is working fine for us. I don't think the configuration of "Toast Takeout App" in the back-end has anything to do with it. I tried to click the toast local button your google business page. It does not work on my end either. My best guess is something is not configured correctly for your business and it requires Toast to fix the setting. The reason I said this is because our online ordering service was out for almost two weeks after a Toast update. It turned out it was our business address (somehow for unknown reason) was not set correctly that caused the problem (We never changed or edit our business address even since we launched). It did take Toast a good 14 calendar's days to investigate and resolve the problem. If the "Toast local" button on your google business page really bothers you, I would suggest you to contact Toast support and ask for a tier 2 agent to help you with the issue.

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

Erin — Fri, 16 Dec 2022 02:24:28 GMT

Your business address within Toast? or your business address on Google My Business?

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

au79teahouse — Fri, 16 Dec 2022 06:07:52 GMT

Yes, our business address with Toast that had something to do with location services (I'm no expert on this. This is what I was told). I want to point out that business address may not be the reason that causes the "Toast Local" button not working on your google business page in your case. I'm simply saying that it might has something to do with the configuration on Toast end based on my prior experience because the "Toast Local" button works on my business page but not on yours. Google ordering is a relatively new feature and what is why I suggest you to contact Toast support and ask for one of tier 2 agents for assistance as they are more experienced and knowledgeable. Or people in the Toast community might have the solution to your problem.

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

josh212 — Thu, 22 Dec 2022 16:52:29 GMT

Google Maps API for food ordering required some sort of application interface to work with.
That is just what they are calling the embedded interface for google

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

chefxc — Wed, 08 Feb 2023 19:51:53 GMT

Erin, my understanding is that the advantage of Toast Local or your own website online ordering link is that the guest data is shared with the restaurant, vs the Order with Google the guest must explicitly opt in for the restaurant to get the guest data. We removed the 3rd party links and now have 3 links, Order with Google, Toast Local, and our Online ordering link as well.

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

Erin — Thu, 09 Feb 2023 23:06:19 GMT

Thanks for that Screenshot! Since I find the customer user experience of both the ToastOO and Toast Local buttons to be horrible (for those restaurants who use modifiers & nested modifiers), I'm going to try adding a weblink (as you have done) to our direct ToastOO URL, and see if that gives a better ordering experience for our cusotmers.

It usually takes quite a while for Google to update, but I'll report back once I have a better idea of how it all flows. If it's better, then I'd prefer to get rid of the ToastOO/Google integration and Toast Local buttons all together. The only thing they're doing now is confusing customers with inaccurate information and a poor ordering workflow.

Toast--- it would be great the Dev team could work on the user-friendliness of the Google integration & Toast Local for those restaurants with more complicated menus.

Re: What is "Toast Local" (as shown on our Google Business Profile), and how do we get rid

Rob — Fri, 10 Feb 2023 15:20:00 GMT

Thanks for this feedback. I will let them know!