Feb 2019, by Julius Abendan
How to Go Digital in Your Retail Store
All you need to do is just identify the areas in your retail store that you want to go digital and you can take it from there!.
Inventory
Inventory consumes the most amount of paper supplies in retail, and it’s only fitting that you upgrade your inventory tracking systems by replacing paper with a digital solution.
Here’s one way that you can pull this off - purchase a dedicated tablet or even a smartphone that your crew can use for your inventory system. What you can then is install an app that uses a centralized database, so it’s easy for your inventory crew to update your inventory information accurately and in a timely manner.
Point-of-Sales
The POS of point-of-sales system is the first part of retail to have benefited from digital solutions. There are now bar code scanners that reduces the time that is otherwise consumed in inputting the bar code manually to the POS terminal.
Improve on the system by introducing a paperless solution. Instead of printing a paper receipt, customers can instead scan a QR code that holds the information on their purchase. You can also choose to send them their digital receipt to their email, provided that they give information for you to use their contact details.
Employee Attendance and Task Scheduling
Employee attendance is one of the areas in offices that has benefited greatly from a digital system. People can now simply log in using a biometric system that also keeps track of their “In” and “Out” times
You can take this one step further by introducing apps that let you micromanage your employees’ tasks. Apps like Time Doctor lets you track progress of any given task both offline and online. In offline tracking, employees simply need to log in their time and submit photos and other documentation as support. In online tracking, they only need to log in to the app and keep it running while working on tasks.
With these apps, you can also schedule tasks ahead of time so your employees are kept abreast of what’s expected of them in any given day. This also gives them a few days’ warning so they can plan ahead and better manage their time, minimizing wasted man-hours.
Loyalty Programs
Managing loyalty programs using a paper-based system is time-consuming and inefficient. It is also very inconvenient for your customers as well. Fortunately, there are now software solutions that let you connect your POS systems to a central database, from which you can efficiently manage the information
With these solutions in place, all your customers need to do is just present a loyalty card that signifies their membership in the program upon checking out. This card goes through the POS reader, where the software automatically calculates the points earned from the total purchase. The information then goes to the appropriate record in the database, based on the information embedded in the card.
Going paperless has one big benefit - it allows you to input and retrieve information from a centralized database. Real-time updating makes sure that your data is accurate by at least five minutes upon retrieval.
In other words, a digitalized system in your retail store makes you more efficient in managing tasks, and lets you look smooth and organized in the eyes of your customers. This makes for a big boost in reputation!
