How to increase Revenue per POS Terminal?
Let us first understand the terminology of Terminal.
A Terminal, more industrially, a Point-of-sales (POS) Terminal, is a customer contact point in any retail store where the billing is done.
It typically includes one or more manned (staff managed) check out desks which enables customers to get their ‘selections’ billed and checked out.
In order for retail staffs to facilitate it, every terminal is facilitated with a system using which they can bill the customers.
The system should consist of the following in order to support basic billing operation.
- A barcode scanner
- A software that acts like a cash register capable of registering customer transactions
Apart from this basic work, the software should support multiple data entry points, but present only one version of truth with regards to the inventory position.
These features would allow the retailer to have multiple POS terminals in the shop, thus reducing the waiting time for customers.
However, such a system would be considered as primitive in the present market conditions. The technological advancements have altered the customer ‘shopping experience’ in a big way.
Their intrusion has drastically affected the ‘power equation’ of a retail shop. For no longer are customers confined to traditional POS terminals for billing.
The average customer, with sophisticated gadgetry at her disposal, is already on the look out for the next big wave in shopping, called the ‘Convenient Retailing’.
A long queue
Convenient Retailing is a form of retailing that puts ‘customer comfort’ in the center, much more than the broader ‘experience’. The customer is being made a ‘king’ not just on the basis of privileges conferred upon him, but on the ‘comfort’ such privileges has had to offer.
Especially in the Indian scenario where shopping is still considered by the major populace as a utility, the next logical step for the retailer would be to make it convenient and comfortable. Only then could one concentrate on the aesthetics of such activity.
Role of Retailer in Convenient Retailing
It is a well known fact that queuing at POS terminal remains one the major pain point for customers, even more than not finding the right product.
- One option is to increase the number of POS terminals in the shop. However, a retailer cannot increase the no.of POS terminals beyond what his shop can support.
- Another option is to invest (rather heavily) in a Mobile POS. However, given their poor processing power in managing high volume of transactions, along with a complete lack of vendor support for the software management, such investments are a bit premature at this stage of market.
- A safer, and more realistic, option is for the retailer to invest in a retail POS solution that consumes lesser time in processing each transaction.
A smarter retailer would then combine options 1 and 3 to derive the maximum revenue per POS Terminal.
GoFrugal, a pioneer in offering retail POS system, is one such option that you can leverage upon for getting ahead in your business. It also offers you a chance to try its flagship product for 30 days free of cost.