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ProphetLine POS has been our lifeline for seven years in our four retail stores. The software is robust and offers many more functions and ...
Read MoreI can’t remember how many times I have had calls from customers using ProphetLine POS Software that have had employee theft from the front counter to the back office. They then have to reconstruct a time line those employees have been dipping into the till, stealing goods or embezzling funds. The diligent employer should be proactive and have security tied to that employee’s position with the company. Only give them access to those areas that are relevant to them performing their job at a high level. Every day the employer should print an exception report for all employees that would indicate if they are performing their jobs satisfactorily. If one employee is always discounting, marking down, voiding or doing functions outside realm of a normal full retail sale, then you can spot this trend immediately with an exception report and make the necessary changes. Good POS Software will give you the advantage to spot the areas that give you the most concern and get a better nights sleep.
Choosing the right point of sale software is only one step in achieving retail success. Learning to properly implement procedures and then learning to manage and react to the information provided is every bit as important as finding the right features in your system.
Without exception, studies show that customer satisfaction with POS Software is directly related to the quality and quantity of education. One study a few years ago determined that upon completion of training, a customer retained at most 80% of the training. In many cases, it was closer to 50%. If that trained person leaves the organization and trains a replacement, the new employee has only 25%-64% true knowledge of the system. A new employee who has to learn the POS Software by guessing may have less than 30% knowledge of the capabilities of the system! Because training is so important, ProphetLine offers training for now and for later.
Therefore, selecting the proper method and amount of training is one of the most important parts of your decision. The training services we provide with ProphetLine POS Software will provide your company with the tools and knowledge needed to understand and utilize your new point-of-sale system to its full potential.
ProphetLine Remote Training offers in-depth training in the convenience of your office or home. This non-traditional training method allows the new customer the opportunity to devote smaller increments of time to learning the system. A customer might participate in a two-hour class and then be able to work on building and implementing that part of the system while still being able to address normal daily business requirements. This is the most efficient and cost-effective way to train on ProphetLine POS Software.
Alan Fisher, President, Retail Business 101
What is the most important statistic your POS Software system can give you for your retail business? The most important statistic in all of retail is the Stock Turn Rate (STR) and you should hear the Hallelujah Chorus in the background when these words are spoken. The STR measures how many times an invested dollar is sold over a year.
To simplify the understanding of this, let’s look at the life of one solitary item in a fictitious golf shop. The buyer selects a supposedly great shirt that costs $25 and she (since most great apparel buyers are female) intends to sell it for $75 (a planned margin of 66.7%). However, that shirt sits untouched in the shop throughout the entire year until someone comes in on Christmas Eve and buys it as a last minute gift for an unloved relative. On the gross margin report, the buyer can pat herself on the back about how it earned that planned $50 and 66.7% profit. Since STR is not a part of her POS Software system reporting, it looks good for profit percentages.
However, a second buyer bought the same shirt for her shop and, after four months, decided that the shirt was a mistake. So she reduced it to $40 and was able to sell (unload) it. However, this shop was able to pocket $15 in profits and reinvest the original $25 into some product that had a higher likelihood of selling at a reasonable profit. So the second product sold at $60, earning another $35 in profits and giving the shop the opportunity to reinvest a third time. At the end of the year, this shop actually looked worse on the gross margin report because it only earned 53.1% in profits. However, there was $85 in profits instead of $50. The second shop had a STR of roughly 3.0 while the first shop had 1.0.
This is the same concept as investing in the stock market. As soon as you realize that your investment is not going to earn the return by the time you need it, you dump it and reinvest in something that can accomplish both the time and the return. Your POS Software and your stock turn rate go hand in hand.
When retailers don’t simplify their technology needs, they will limit the motivation and creativity their employees need to grow the business. If the employee task becomes difficult and unmanageable because all the applications don’t work well together, the software implementation will fail. Empower employees with technology that will make their work rewarding, easy to accomplish and watch your bottom line grow. An example of this would be, a good customer walks in and you go to the point of sale station and immediately have all that customer’s past purchases, preferences and buying habits in front of you. This is impressive and will create a simplified one-on-one selling experience.
ProphetLine POS/Inventory Management Software is a complete package that manages all crucial tasks seamlessly from front to back. The next time your employees complain the POS Software and store technology is to complicated, maybe they are right.
Value Village thrift stores in the Atlanta area, managed by J & T Management, are currently installing a new point-of-sale software solution from ProphetLine that can integrate with their existing reporting system. The difficulty in finding a new solution, according to J & T Management, was that they wanted to install software that had a SQL Server backend, was affordable, would integrate with existing systems and could be installed by the chain’s management. Visual ProphetLine, a multi-tiered, client/server, unified retail and POS, e-commerce and back- office management system was the perfect solution. Read More
ProphetLine Web’s unique capabilities make it perfect for ‘click-and-brick’ retailers and users of ProphetLine POS Software. ProphetLine integrates seamlessly with your web site and is controlled from the point of sale software. Adding items to display and sell on the web is as simple as checking a box within ProphetLine for Windows. The system will then transmit the images to the web site. Web orders are downloaded automatically into your ProphetLine POS Software for fulfillment. Customers are shared, so you always know who they are and what they are buying. Quite simply, this is the easiest and most comprehensive way to get your business on the web!
A well run web store can add an additional 10% to your sales in the first year. This figure represents a small portion of your overall sales and pouring in excessive dollars is senseless. Because you have a minimum investment with the ProphetLine Web Store, a smaller sales result can still mean big profits.
Small retailers are always faced with the problem of creating more revenue out of the existing square footage they occupy. Information gathered with POS Software is a way of determining which department is generating what portion of the store’s overall revenue in relationship to the dollar value of the inventory. Too much inventory that is not turning is as bad as not enough inventory in fast turning departments. The reports you generate from your POS software must be precise accounts of your customers buying habits in the past, an accurate projection of their future purchases and the inventory levels required to satisfy their needs. Buying more inventory than necessary or purchasing the wrong piece selection is a formula for disaster.
Prior to purchasing extensive amounts of inventory or investing in new fixtures or equipment, a store must review their sales performance by department and by vendor and formulate a sales plan or revise an existing plan. Based on trends, the sales plans are adjusted upward or downward so that the right amount of investment is made in each department. The retail stock ledger and a good open to buy plan should accomplish this. If your POS Software has the built in retail stock ledger and open to buy, then developing a good plan should take minimum amount of your time.
Small retailers are coming under more and more pressure to bring their pricing in line with the big box retailers. This is a sure fire plan for disaster and will do nothing except give the buying public a negative perception of your business. You have to differentiate yourself by better service, unique product lines and an atmosphere that makes a customer comfortable doing business with you. Making the customer comfortable is giving them a pleasant environment, knowing them by name and having the ability to quickly identify their product preferences. This last part can be accomplished by having POS Software that is intuitive and robust. Not surprisingly, the point of sale system has become the focal point of the retail operation.
Today’s point of sale software has become instrumental in gathering customer data to use in the four major marketing decisions that store managers must make: product, price, place, and promotion. These are the variables that can be worked with to attract and retain customers.
