The change in the way customers now buy and the emerging advancements in technology have changed the way people conduct business over the years.

The industrialization process that started in 1930s changed the way people live and do business. The next major change came with the Communication revolution with the advent of internet that totally revolutionized the whole world.

The ever-increasing trend of online selling shows that the trend resonates with the people as the social trends are changing. The people are now experiencing a fast-paced lifestyle which causes a change in their previous patterns of shopping and consuming goods.

This creates a need for the business to upgrade, because gone are the days when people used to wait in long queues for the goods or services to be provided. The upgrade that is required comes in the form of an online store, platform or anything that can give the customers whatever they want from wherever they want.

Online selling – the new avenue for the businesses to grow Typically organizations start with an eCommerce store to meet the growing demand from the customers to buy goods and services from the company in the comfort of their homes or workplace.

However, soon they find out that managing an eCommerce webstore is a much bigger task that they have every thought. There is a constant need to add new items, remove the discontinued or out of stock items, update images, change prices, manage product catalog, download order for shipping purposes and update the shipment information on the eCommerce webstore.

It is not only costly to maintain an online store in terms of increased cost of payroll since it requires a person or team to constantly keep an eye on the online store and keep updating it on a regular basis. In addition, there is a huge risk of human error which may end up selling items at wrong prices, accepting orders when goods are not in stock or putting wrong product information.

All these costs can be avoided and risks mitigated by using the most powerful tool that an organization has, its own ERP system. Company’s ERP system has many of the information required by the webstore. In addition, it is also where the orders downloaded from webstore are entered.

Integrating ERP solution with your eCommerce solution not only reduce the cost of extra staff but also eliminate the costly mistakes and delays which can end up costing dearly to the organization.

In an ERP, integrated eCommerce system, Product Catalog is maintained in the ERP system allowing you to move the product around without touching your webstore, add or remove items or just reclassify them, automatically change prices and quantity discounts for some or all customer groups, update available quantity, mark or temporarily remove the items not in stock.

With an ERP, integrated eCommerce system like x2x eCommerce, you can integrate your shipping methods and payment gateways to your ERP system, download orders directly in your ERP solution and update the shipment information on the webstore just like you update the items description, quantities, images and specs, product catalog and a lot more.

About x2x-eCommerce

x2x-eCommerce is an add module developed for Dynamics GP which extend the functionality of Dynamics GP to make it compatible with the eCommerce platform and integrate the enhanced Dynamics GP with the eCommerce solution thereby eliminating the need to maintain the eCommerce store manually.

What features should you look for in a POS system?

When a retail store grows beyond the basic needs of just checking out and needs to progress to a better system that can respond to customer demands and manage inventory and pricing, it is time to move from a cash register to a Point of Sales (POS) system.

Retailers with knowledge of the benefits of the POS system, start directly with a dependable and powerful point of sales solution, rather than with a cash register.

There are a few things that you must consider when considering which POS solution is best suited for your business, including:

Inventory and purchasing management

•  Track and manage inventory.
• Inventory replenishment and PO creation
• Handling multiple inventory types like standard, kit, lot, matrix inventories
• Handling unlimited number of items and pack sizes
• Supporting multiple vendors for the same item, their prices and lead time

Find more detailed information about inventory and purchasing management at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/microsoft-rms-store-operations-so-inventory-and-purchasing-management/

 Transaction processing

•  Speed, especially for high traffic business like grocery stores
• Ability to access item prices, promotions, discounts, quantity discounts etc.
• Handle multiple tax rates and currencies
• Ability to put a transaction on hold and recall
• Ability recall transactions for returns
• Offering customer specific prices and discounts

Find more detailed information about transaction processing at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/microsoft-rms-stores-operations-transaction-processing/

 Payment card processing

•  Ability to connect POS directly to service providers
• Connect to the service providers through the internet directly from POS terminal
• Ability to process multiple type of cards like Visa, MasterCard, Amex, Discover etc.

Find more detailed information about credit card processing at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/microsoft-rms-store-operations-payment-card-processing/

  Sales and Promotions

•  Ability to discount individual items or whole transactions
• Multiple discount types like Buy X, get Y free, mix and match, price schedule etc.
• Assign customer specific price levels
• Loyalty programs
• Automatic enable/disable discounts on predefined date and time

Find more detailed information about sales and promotion at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/microsoft-rms-store-operations-pricing-sales-and-promotions/

 Customer Management

•  Setting up customer specific pricing and discounts
• Ability to reprint invoices and recall transactions for return
• Setup customer information, family members and important dates
• Send promotions to customer based on their birthday/anniversary dates
• Sending customer statements and generating customer emails
• Provide revolving credit facility to the customers

Find more detailed information about customer management at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/dynamics-rms-store-operations-customer-management/

 Marketing

•  Instant access to purchasing, payment and account information
• Remind customers who forget items they normally purchase
• Use customer data to help create mailings targeted directly to customers’ special interests.
• Broadcast Net Display Channels to customers waiting in line, including pre-selected websites, web pages, and ads.

Find more detailed information about marketing at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/marketing-features-in-microsoft-rms-headquarters/

 Reporting

•  Extensive and relevant reporting
• Customizable reports
• Form customization to put logos, addresses and other information on invoices, POs etc.
• Preview, print, or export data in multiple formats.
• Filter, hide, sort, and group data the way you want.

Find more detailed information about reporting at:
http://www.accsoft.ca/microsoft-rms-store-operations-reporting/

About AccSoft Business Solutions:

AccSoft provides POS software, hardware and setup for single and multi-store retailers. If you are looking for any help with your POS, please feel free to reach us at the contact information below:

solutions@accsoft.ca
http://www.accsoft.ca/retail/
Phone: 1-877-927-2927 / 416-222-7638