Your point of sale was built to end the visit
Checkout is the highest-context moment of the transaction, and most retailers aim to end it quickly. This is what POS systems were designed for: speed through the queue. It records the transaction, and if the associate asks, an email address, so a first-time customer looks the same as a customer on their fifth visit, in the system.
Modern clienteling reimagines the point of sale as a retail point of service, so the sales transaction becomes a customer engagement tool that captures greater share of wallet.
A retail point of service carries the relationship forward
Next-gen POS systems can do more than print receipts. Four considerations move retailers toward the transformation from point of sale to retail point of service:
- What the system knows at the moment of sale. The associate either sees the customer’s history, preferences, and open wishlists while the customer is standing there, or reads about it in a report the following week.
- What the sale leaves behind. The transaction enriches the customer record on its own, or someone types it in later from memory, and at their discretion.
- Who owns the customer relationship. The follow-up belongs to an associate or team with access to rich customer profiles, or to a marketing calendar with a generic understanding of the customer.
- Where the transaction ends. When a size is out of stock or the customer leaves without buying, the system has a follow-up action, or that is where the sale ends.
From point of sale to retail point of service, one extension at a time
Very few retailers would rip and replace a functioning point of sale. What can be done instead is extending the capabilities of a legacy POS system with cloud-based extensions.
Pay by link, so associates can complete transactions for customers who are not in the store. The sale takes place within the context of a conversation, giving associates a reason and a channel to reach out again.
Endless aisle to place orders for inventory that may only be available online or in another store location. The visit ends with an order instead of an apology, and the customer trusts that wherever it is, the associate will find what they need.
Mobile checkout to allow customers to skip the queue and pay for purchases with the associate assisting them. The checkout process still happens fast, and it carries the tone of personal assistance that makes the customer feel known.
A retailer who centers its store technology on transaction features alone will buy transaction features. When the transaction is evaluated as a path to enrich the customer record, the point of sale closes gaps between transaction data and the customer relationship. This shift is one we outlined in the future of retail isn’t checkout, it’s connection.
Act on what the store knows with a modern POS
Customer knowledge is earned, one interaction at a time. And the transaction is one of those interactions that every retailer has. Use it to the store’s advantage.
Across seasons of purchases, transaction data shows what a customer buys and what they save for later. What sizes they return and how long they wait between visits. One transaction says almost nothing. Twenty show a pattern that can be used to personalize customer engagement.
The data accumulates over multiple visits, but without a system to consolidate the knowledge into a central view for the associate, it isn’t immediately actionable. Tulip POS brings transaction data and customer context together in one place, and that is what moves the point of sale from a transaction system to a platform that functions as a customer engagement tool.
See how Tulip’s point of sale platform is built for the point of service, or watch The New Enterprise POS for a working walkthrough.
