A PoS system is essential for any retail or hotel, restaurant, and catering (HoReCa) business. Effective PoS solutions operate not only as payment proceeding software but also unites many other features that businesses may need to work efficiently.
Point of Sale development provides users a solution to cover all their supply chain and order processing needs. So, what capacities do custom PoS systems have? Let’s look through the main features of this type of software.
Billing and Order Processing
Billing and order procession is the main feature of PoS software, so it’s worth starting with. PoS systems simplify the purchasing process significantly for both sides—clients and sellers.
- PoS systems allow clients to choose their preferred payment methods. All PoS software accept cash, credit card, and mobile payments like Apple Pay or Google Pay.
- PoS systems help business establishments proceed with purchases made via counters quicker, track every transaction made, and make accounting more manageable.
At the same time, you may also add order management features to PoS systems. If clients want to buy a certain product that is not available on a given day, you may enter this order into the system. When stocks are refilled, you will get notified and provide the clients their desired items.
Omnichannel Capability
Nowadays, purchases don’t happen exclusively in brick-and-mortar stores. Customers have gotten used to different order and payment channels and models. They can buy stuff online using their laptops, mobile phones, and tablets. Their purchases can then be shipped to their homes or picked up from the store.
Given the varied purchasing and order fulfillment means, your PoS solution should be able to accommodate this reality and customers’ expectations. Ideally, the software should connect purchases made in different locations—your store, online, your mobile app, through social media, and so on.
An omnichannel PoS system allows customers to interact with your establishment in any way they find comfortable. But at the same time, you don’t need to spend additional resources to organize data, keep track of thousands of tables, and clarify if you have enough inventory to cater to all customers. The united system synchronizes all channels and ensures smooth operations, ensuring the best customer experience.
Inventory Management
Inventory management is another feature you should root for in PoS software. PoS systems reduce the number of mistakes related to inventory management, as they have a great capacity for stock level monitoring.
Through barcode scanning, you will be able to count every item you receive and compare the actual number to your planned inventory. That way, you will know if there are any problems with inventory management (for example, employee theft, big losses, etc.). At the same time, the count will also be dynamic and updated automatically after every purchase processed by the same PoS system.
Such structured data will also help you better understand how your products are performing and which are more popular and successful than others.
Employee Management
Your PoS system can also keep track of your employees. Multiple people may be working in the same location or store, and PoS software can help you automate a significant part of your employee management.
First, thanks to user accounts, your employees can log in and out and mark the start and end of their shifts instantly. All of their activities will also be recorded by the system, so you will get a lot of data for tracking employee performance and punctuality.
Shift scheduling can also be done through PoS software. It also ensures that planning is done right and there are no overlaps or mistakes in scheduling that are normally seen when it’s done manually.
Loyalty Program Tracking
PoS applications can power up custom loyalty programs if you haven’t implemented one yet. The software lets you create custom profiles and store each customer’s purchasing information. You can even expand its functionality if you integrate the PoS systems with customer relationship management (CRM) software.
By collecting the aforementioned data, you can better understand customer needs and create personalized offers and marketing campaigns. You can also launch discount programs and grant regular customers some pleasant bonuses.
Another interesting idea is customizing receipts to contain informative data (customer’s name, company logo, etc.) and some fun inscription like predictions or wishes for the day.
Reporting and Analytics Functionality
As you can guess, PoS systems are excellent sources of data about your business performance. So, why not use it efficiently?
PoS software usually includes reporting tools and dashboards. Here are the main aspects that you can get analytics for:
- Inventory reporting
- Employee reporting
- Customer reporting
- Accounting reporting
- Sales level reporting
Basically, custom PoS systems allow users to set up any type of reporting they wish to see. Even if some users often neglect this feature, it’s really helpful to run an evaluation of your business, detect problems, and identify areas of possible growth and development.
—
As you can see, PoS solutions are powerful tools. They can do various tasks, improve company efficiency, and improve sales and customer services.
