How POS technology can gain you a competitive edge

In today’s cut-throat market, smart decisions can make the difference between success and failure for your business – so astute leaders employ technology to help inform the decision making process. Used wisely, point of sale technology is one such tool that can be utilised to great effect, providing precious data on all aspects of your business as well as improving efficiency through streamlined operations. Here’s how turning to POS technology can gain you that all-important advantage over competitors in your field.

Speeding up transactions
When shops and restaurants get busy, it’s great news for your bottom line – so it’s important to take advantage of your busy times by serving customers as swiftly as you can. Using the right POS technology, such as iKentoo, you can maximise your efficiency by speeding through the queues as quickly as possible.

Contactless payments using cards and mobile phones enable queues to move faster.
Online ordering through the POS allows customers to place an order ahead of time, with all the information being processed integrally within the system.
Wireless technology can send orders instantly to where they need to be processed – cutting out human error and speeding up service.

Streamlining operations
If you’re always searching for new ways to gain an advantage over your competitors, you’ll know the importance of streamlining your operations – changing your activities to make your business as efficient as you can. POS technology can be an intelligent and invaluable aid in making changes to streamline your system.

Stock control is simple if you use an integrated back-office system connected to your POS. You’ll have a detailed overview of your stock, including data on wastage, and can control stock and create purchase orders all in one place.
Table turnover can be streamlined using precious data from your POS. If you run a restaurant you can feed in the data from your transactions (all sent from the POS to the back end database) to find out how much you make on each table. You’ll be able to rearrange your seating plan to offer the most profitable layout.
Business intelligence is vital to provide a clear picture of how your business is performing. With visual data to illustrate performance and compare it to projected forecasts, POS technology can provide at-a-glance data to help inform your future decisions.

Positive impact
Integrating intelligent point of sale technology into your business doesn’t have to be difficult with today’s user-friendly interfaces – and the potential returns are great. As well as the obvious operational advantages POS technology can offer, it also brings the chance to provide a more tailored service to clients and customers, building up a picture of their individual preferences and offering personalised loyalty rewards to keep their custom. Depending on your trade, different add-ons and apps can be integrated into your central system; online booking systems, loyalty schemes and mobile payment apps can all be added to the mix. However you tailor your POS, one thing is certain – its introduction will bring positive impacts for both business owner and customer.