What are the keys to increase my organisations profits?

To get this result you want to either reduce costs or increase sales. Ultimately you will do both.

What many retail stores do not understand is that having the appropriate POS System (point of sale) you can acheive both.

A good POS System simplifies and automates tasks.

Managing the sale order process including stock requirements and dispatch processes is again all made efficient in a good POS system. All these and more drive down the cost of operating a business increasing profits.

Gift card are convenient and very popular because when you do not know what you buy someone you get them a gift voucher.

Another important aspect is stock control software and managing your inventory. A good POS must manage your stock and make life easy.

What about PC equipment?

This depends on your application. If you are a restaurant or cafe you should consider a touch screen. A touch screen makes the sale process more efficient and means that you do not have the issue of the mouse and keyboard getting dirty or sticky from staff fingers involved in the preparation process.

If you have a more complex sales process then you may be better off with a standard keyboards and mouse.

Touchscreen hardware is part of our lives more at a growing rate. The growth of iphone usage and other touch screen phones has displayed to so many of us how lovely they are to have. Microsoft is also committed to increasing the usage of touchscreens with the changes to Windows and a long term commitment which will see every home having a touch screen.

At the level of the consumer touch screens have also dropped in price. These lower costs touch screens are great for the office desk although they are not robust enough for the commercial environment. Your children will love them especially if you have various education software, as it is so much more interactive and exciting to touch the screen compared to clicking it with a boring mouse!

So what about POS?

There is still a lot of variance in the point of sale market place. If you go in to some of themajor grocery stores you will see touch screen point of sale systems. Then at other retailers such as computer stores and electrical stores you will not see as many touch screens.

Well the touchscreen brings a lot of pluses to volume sales points and where there is fresh produce and integration with scanner and scales. You will also find them in a lot of other food environments such as cafes, restaurants. They are quick and the screen deals much better with “sticky fingers” compared to your traditional mouse and keyboard. A good retail ready unit is normally resistant to moisture and fan-less.

So where is a touchscreen suitable and not suitable. grocery store you scan or weigh the item and move on to the next product and then process the sale. If the store sales process is more complex such as the need to change price, the requirement to access more detailed information on price, margins,, customer accounts etc. then a touch screen point of sale system may not be as suitable. For example in your retail electronics and computer stores there is a lot more to the sales process. People bargain for the best price requiring adjustments to price and rules on margin levels, customer may have accounts. At the end of the day a lot more happens at the point of salePOS which requires data and more complex interaction with the POS system.

So what is my advice when a touch screen point of sale system should be used?

{For a store with grocery items|For a supermarket operation then I recommend the touchscreen as it ensures the sales process is very easy for employees to use.

• If you operate a restaurant, cafe, pizza store or fast food outlet. I also advise a touch point of sale system.
• For a furniture store then I would also say save money and use a normal POS system without a touchscreen.
• If you operate a retailclothing store then it is a difficult choice. If you like the simplicity of the touch screen then go for it, it you feel you have a more complex checkout then stay with normal hardware.

Finally in regards to hardware make sure you go for commercial grade touch screen hardware which includes being fan-less, having the terminal and touch screen as one unit and ensuring the touch screen is resistant to moisture.. You will find a lot of variance in the price dependant on the brand and the warranty.

When it comes to hardware what do I need to think about. Well the choice comes down to budget, brand names and warranty. You pay more for brands like IBM and NCR which have been around for a long time and include a 12 months onsite warranty. Can you do without your touch screen if something goes wrong?

Now in finishing I encourage you to ask the right questions and to consider if your business should consider implement a new touch system. Stay tuned for more updated information including questions on stock control software

1. Related Products

A very important feature of a good point of sale system is the ability to specify items/product related to another product. For example if you sell the hamurger the fries and the coke are related items and the POS system should prompt your staff to mention this to the customer.

The above 2 features alone can take you a long way to boosting sales by 10 or 20% with minimal effort.

A very important feature of a good point of sale system is the ability to specify items/product related to another product. For example if you sell the hamurger the fries and the coke are related items and the POS system should prompt your staff to mention this to the customer.

2. A customer display screen

The above 2 features alone can take you a long way to boosting sales by 10 or 20% with minimal effort.

For more information on a point of sale system with these features check out PBSA POS

A very important feature of a good point of sale system is the ability to specify items/product related to another product. For example if you sell the hamurger the fries and the coke are related items and the POS system should prompt your staff to mention this to the customer.

2. A customer display screen

The above 2 features alone can take you a long way to boosting sales by 10 or 20% with minimal effort.

For more information on a point of sale system with these features check out PBSA POS

So often you talk to retailers who are struggling to manage and control their retail stock. The problems they are having with stock aregenerally

• Stock being damaged
• Stock being stolen
• Stock being lost
• Inability to find where the stock is in thestore or warehouse
• Unreliable stock level data

So what is the solution?

The solution is the right stockcontrol software combined with disciplined stock control procedures.

Recently I was working with somestores who complained about their new stock control software not allowingnegative stock levels and requiring them to receive stock before they couldsell it. Their previous system had allowed them to sell stock even if the stockcontrol software was saying there was no stock or the stock level was negative.

The point is, if you want tocontrol your stock then you need to have stock control software that forces youand your staff to follow the rules. The moment a system allows negative stocklevels then you can no longer trust the system. A good stock control softwareensure you have the tools to accurately manage your stock.

What are the key components of agood stock control software system?

A.      A. Easy to use comprehensive product managementtools

This includes flexible pricing,category/department classification,  supportfor customer specific pricing and powerful re-pricing tools to make themanagement of your margins as simple as possible

 B.      B. Purchase order generation and management tools

Whether you have a small or large productrange tools that show stock that has hit re-order levels and other stock leveland purchase order integration tools are vital in a good stock control softwaresolution.

 C.      C. Incoming goods

Ability to select the linked purchase order,support for back orders and purchase order adjustments are all important.Another great feature in the PBSAPOS stock control software solution was theability to adjust the fixed retail price via the incoming goods screen. Therealso needs to be support for supplier returns.

 D.      D. Stock take and stock adjustments

As stock is lost or damaged or movedbetween locations you need tools to make the stock adjustments to ensure yoursystem remains accurate.  In addition asimple to use stock take module is imperative in any good stock control softwaresolution.

 E.       E.Stock Reports

It is imperative that you have reports onstock movement, stock sales margins, stock that needs re-ordering, stock takereports, stock that is expiring (vital for fresh produce stores) and stock thatis not moving

 These are just some of the importantfeatures you need to consider when you look at stock control software.

 The other aspect is that no matter how goodthe stock control software it is the user who has to manage the system. Thisrequires discipline. Good software control software should not allow negativestock levels but it still requires the users to input stock adjustments, toinput movement of stock between locations and incoming goods procedures toensure that what was ordered actually arrived. This is your responsibility.

 I wish you all the bets of success withmanaging your inventory through using the above details to evaluate your stockcontrol software.

For further details go to http://www.pbsapos.com.au/stockcontrolsoftware.aspx or http://www.pbsa.com.au

It has been a lot of hard word but PBSA POS is ready for the next version with many state of the features.

This includes

• The new PBSA POS customer display and promotion module 
• Upgrades to the debtors statements modules
• More enhancements to reports
• Increased customer relationship Management tools

It has taken a lot of work but the point of sale and touch screen pos delivers some very powerful features.

People should consider going to http://www.pbsapos.com.au and requesting a demonstration to view first hand the latest features.

When you look at your average customer today you will find that they are more informed and demanding in regards to quality of goods and services. In addition to this, today's customer wants to be recognized and appreciated for their patronage.

So as a business how can you respond?

The response lies in the need to design and implement a loyalty program that recognizes and rewards your customers. Rewards programs today are highly accepted by customers with 80 – 90% of individuals in some kind of loyalty or rewards program. A well designed and applied loyalty program can play a significant role in:

Acquiring New Customers

Growing your business means finding new ways to reach out to potential customers in a way that distinguishes your business from others. A loyalty program can help you attract and also recognize a new customer, and apply the right strategies to make them return time and time again.

Customer recognition

One of the biggest benefits of a loyalty program is that at the point of sale your staff are able to identify the customer by scanning their card. This enables them to address the customer by name and also view the customer profile in terms of sales history and other details. This then provides further information to staff which will assist them to provide a personalized service to the customer including opportunities to up sell and cross sell related products.

Keeping Your Competition at bay

A rewards program including exclusive member only sales, rewards points, discounted products or services may provide you with the edge you have been needing to distinguish your business from the competition.

Improving Your Profitability

Most people know or have heard about the 80 20 rule. This rules states that for many businesses 80 percent of your business comes from 20 percent of your customers. What a loyalty and rewards program provides is the ability to identify and then reward these customers to ensure they stay as your customers and that they purchase more goods and services.

Any business that is able to store data on customers address, email, phone and then track their contribution to the business and spending behaviors is going to be positioned to boost sales. This customer profile provides your business with the power to create low cost targeted marketing campaigns directed towards loyal customers.

So how do you implement a loyalty program?

The most important aspect of loyalty program implementation is the ability to have the program fully integrated into your point of sale solution. Many loyalty programs work separate to the point of sale process which creates an administration night mare.

What you need in your point of sale system (POS) is the ability to:

Store customer profiles information: The customer profile including contact details, email, phone and also notes and customer attributes is very important to assist targeted marketing campaigns.

Produce a customer loyalty card that includes a bar code: This enables your staff to quickly scan the card which will bring up the customer information your staff can then use to personalize the service.

Set the point earned and point required for each product: Each products has different margin levels so it is important that for each product you can set the number of points a customer earns on purchasing a certain product and how much they require to purchase that product. This ensure that you maintain your margins and profitability. Without this feature a loyalty program can become very expensive. This approach also allows empowers you to encourage your customer loyalty and rewards members to purchase products with high margins.

Complete a purchase with multiple payment options including the rewards program points: To implement a loyalty program it needs to be simple and easy for customers as part of the check out to pay for goods via loyalty points.

Getting back to Customer Loyalty

If is all about collecting information on your customer needs and then using this information to provide customer with what they need. The better you do this the more your business will grow.

Darren is an experienced presenter to small business across Australia and speaks on the topics of customer service, customer loyalty, customer profiling, data base segmentation and the power of targeted marketing campaigns to boost sales. If you want to boost sales and manage your business then Darren has a great deal of experience and recommends PBSA POS as a powerful customer loyalty and marketing point of sale system. Go to www.pbsapos.com.au/loyalty.aspx for more details or email darren@pbsa.com.au.