In recent times, the retail industry hasn’t seen a more exciting invention since the invention of cash register. With new and innovative technologies helping shape both online and offline experiences for consumers, the landscape is continuously changing in a way which was unimaginable even few years back. The best part is that there seems to be no end of the innovation, which only influencing the purchase decision of the consumers.
Nowadays the main focus of retailers is to create a safe, engaging, and unique shopping experience for its consumers, its very important for the retailers to understand the importance of Big Data and in-store analytics and adapting to the cloud. With the retail industry at the verge of massive transformation, we are listing out few key trends that everyone needs to know to be successful in the ecosystem that is transforming quickly.
Multi-system Integration
Multi-system integration with various applications gets the utmost priority from top retailers. Most of the retailers list out POS integration with other applications as a key priority alongside the implementation of dynamic marketing content through mobile devices. This is mostly due to the retailer’s interest to store all the customer information and purchase history in a database, which is completely centralized that could be easily integrated with multiple applications. However, in order to do that, a retailer needs to use an ERP database that can handle all these.
Speed
People always look for quick solutions for everything. A clock starts ticking the moment a customer enters, no matter how good the product is, if the process is slow and the attention to details are missing, then customers will leave disappointed. As a retailer, one can not please everyone, but with a modern and efficient POS, the service can be improved. A modern POS simplifies the communication between various departments and can save a lot of time for both the retailer and the customer respectively.
Managing Stocks
Keeping and managing inventory is a nightmare for most of the retailers, and its quite natural. Managing inventory is a never-ending task and takes a lot of effort, time, and manpower. However, it is quite important to manage inventories when it comes to long-time survival. An efficient POS system always makes the process of managing the inventory much easier. The best part of a POS is, one can monitor the status of stocked items, shipped products, and new orders anytime. This is a huge time saver for a cumbersome and a tedious process, and eventually help retailers to focus on other important aspects of running the business.
Customized Experience
With POS systems, retailers just need to provide personalization that scoops out every shopper. Every passing year, retailers are adapting to personalized technology solutions, that allow an interactive user experience. Thanks to the emergence of all new mobile POS technology, now retailers can offer its customers more choices to accommodate their shopping habits by letting them to complete transactions anywhere in the store. Now with the invention of improved POS marketers and customer service teams can contact the buyer at each point of their purchase decision. With so much data retailers and consumers can have better customer service, quicker payment processes and access to better offers and real-time personalization.
Promotions and Marketing at its Best
Nowadays with the advent of digital technology, marketing involves maintaining a digital presence as well. A POS can integrate all the advertised offers with transactions, making it easier to keep track of all the campaigns. Additionally, it can integrate with CRM and track customer behavior. When an offer gets popular among the masses, then the retailer will see it in his transaction data.
Usage of Big Data analytics
In order to compete with e-commerce, retailers are now taking the help of Big-Data and in store analytics just to have a better idea about what’s happening inside the store. Big-Data analytics helps retailers to track how frequently a specific item moves from shelf to shopping cart allows retailers to know the trends that are dominant in the market. Analytics helps the retail industry in a big way to better understand consumer purchase pattern and behaviors.
Keeping Track of Employees
To run a business smoothly a retailer, need few people. A POS system enables to manage them with great accuracy. With a Point of Sale system in place, employees can sign on or off easily and the system will automatically log their work hours and break hours.
Security
Above all, a POS system offers great security protections that help keeping customer data safe. Retail stores and businesses are always prime targets for Cyber Criminals, and a data breach is not good for a business. So, by using standard encryption and firewall, businesses can be secured from cyber attacks and customers can swipe their cards with a peace of mind.
So, here we have listed out few of the POS trends, that will shape the future of the retail industry. As we look ahead, these trends will be on focus for both retailers and customers. The main advantage of an advanced POS system is greater efficiency and optimization, it links all the departments together which eventually allows to have better control over the inventory, better profitability, and to manage processes in an efficient way.
