Best Practices for Switching Point of Sale Systems

I've likely covered this before but it never hurts to keep the following in mind should you ever need to upgrade or switch point of sale systems.

1. Make sure that you have full access to all of your data (inventory information, customer information, history, vendor information, employee information).
2. Ensure that all the information is backed up and accurate (good time to perform a physical inventory if you haven't done one in awhile).
3. Ask what the options are related to importing all your inventory, customer, supplier, and vendor information in to the new system - usually this can be done for a nominal cost.
4. Depending on your situation, you may not be able to transfer any historical information. Don't panic!  What you need to do is make sure that you can run your old point of sale system for another year or so to access any historical information (eg: customer comes in and whats to buy exactly what they bought 8 months ago).
5. Make sure that you have all the financial data and reports needed to account for the last 7 years
6. Take time to learn and use the new system - there is likely a good reason why you upgraded or switched systems do get the most out of your hard earned dollars!

Those are the basics - Please visit my contact page for information on how to reach me.

Pains and Gains Data - Introducing Gormim

Some of the newer mobile (and even older computer-based) point of sale solutions don't offer a lot of detailed reporting options leaving some users with limited information. A new company, Gormim, has come up with a way to provide more detailed information to help identify different sets of data in an easy to view dashboard format.

I had a chance to meet with Gormim and there are several things that are noteworthy:

1. This is a solution that can be added to multiple different types of POS solutions 
2. Gormim actually goes beyond basic information like daily sales and average sale amount to show you, in an easy to view format, "pains" and "gains" information. This pains and gains information helps the store leadership quickly specific areas of strengths and weaknesses within the store without having to run multiple reports.
3. Gormim has both a free version and a more advanced version with a low monthly fee

Gormim is also interested in talking to multi-location retail stores to see what sort of data their current point of sale system isn't providing.

You can learn more about Gormim by visiting http://www.gormim.com/

Are you  in the US and in need of no cost retail point of sale advice?  I'm happy to help and can be reached on my cell at 208-340-5632 (I am on Mountain Time) or via email at kevinantosh@gmail.com. There is also a contact form to the right that can be used to reach me.