THE ULTIMATE RETAIL TECH GUIDE

by Riche Atos / August 24, 2021

Every retail business owner knows the importance of adapting to their consumers’ constantly changing needs. One way to do keep up with them is to make sure we are using the right technology and systems – whether that be through our POS software, e-commerce platforms, accounting and inventory management, loyalty and booking systems, and so many more.

This is why I’ve created the Ultimate Retail Tech Guide to help you decide what your retail business needs in terms of this software, hardware, and apps! This guide talks all about the software and systems you need to up your game in the retail entrepreneurship industry, so you can not only make your customers happy but your staff and yourself as well. 

I’ve compiled links and recommendations as well for easy convenience and accessibility! So sit back, relax and enjoy the episode! 

Episode Highlights:

  • 03:05 Point of Sale (POS) system – the very first piece of software that a retail brand and business owner needs
  • 03:33 What should a good POS software be able to do?
  • 05:39 Hardware that POS systems today will need
  • 08:49 Advanced inventory management system can do a lot more than your normal POS
  • 10:30 Accounting system which allows integration with the POS and able to manage books, daily sales, and purchases
  • 12:57 Shift planning system –
  • 14:11 Analytics software 
  • 15:36 Loyalty system 
  • 17:28 E-commerce platform 
  • 20:04 Reservation system or speciality software system 
  • 21:59 Marketing software systems

Features of a Great POS software system:

  1. Allow you to sell in an easy manner means that your staff and you should not be overwhelmed with all of the buttons on the screen.
  2. Allow you to do customer tracking. It’ll allow you to gather customer information like name, email age, and what are they buying on a day-to-day basis.
  3. Inventory management. Most POS systems these days will do some level of inventory management, which is something that every retail brand needs. specifically, within inventory management, you need to know what you’re buying, when you’re buying who you’re buying it from
  4. And the most important metric is the average cost.
  5. Another component within POS software systems is the ability Ready to do transfers, store transfers, stock transfers, inventory count. All of this also falls under inventory management and is a key part. The process around how to do this is a topic for another time.

Hardware a POS Software System Needs:

  • PC, Mac, or an iPad – I personally prefer the POS software systems running on an iPad because it just opens so many avenues for a better customer experience. 
  • Receipt printer
  • Barcode scanner – I recommend the brand Socket
  • Cash drawers
  • Label Printer
  • iPad stand (optional) – I recommend Heckler

Recommendations for Advanced Inventory Management Software:

Recommendations for Accounting Software Systems:

Recommendations for Shift Planning Systems:

Recommendations for Analytics Software Systems:

Recommendations for Loyalty Software Systems: 

Recommendations for Ecommerce Website Platforms:

Recommendations for Reservation Systems:

Recommendations for Marketing Software: 

Quotes:

“A good analytics tool or business intelligence tool will allow you to make this process really easy because it will do all the slicing and dicing for you. In fact, it will present some amazing dashboards that you can further drill down into.”

 

Thank you for listening! I hope you enjoyed this episode and I’d love to hear your feedback. You can email me at hello@elevatedentrepreneur.fm and help me improve or if you have someone in mind that would be a great guest on the show, feel free to recommend them via email.

If you like my episodes on entrepreneurship, retail, ecommerce, omnichannel, and technology, I appreciate you leaving a review on iTunes as it helps other entrepreneurs to find the show. You can also share the episode via Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram and tag someone who you feel would benefit from the podcast!

If there’s a question that you’ve been dying to ask me or feedback that you’d like to give me, head on over to elevated entrepreneur.fm/speak where you will be able to record a voice message that I can listen to and maybe feature here on the podcast together with my answer.

 

Thanks, and lots of love,

Dhiren Bhatia

  • Episode Transcript
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