CategoryCustomer Service

www.findit.com.au, a free marketplace for local independent small business retailers, is helping local Aussie retailers attract shoppers in-store.

Free to Tower Systems POS software customers, the FindIt marketplace is like a live catalogue, an online catalogue, a place where shoppers can find what they want the local retailer who stocks what they want.

There is no cost for retailers and nnjo cost for shoppers. This is genuinely a free platform through which the thousands of retailer susing the Tower Systems POS software can find shoppers for themselves.

FindIt has been live for just under a year and already retailers are reporting success with new shoppers attracted as a result of finding products they want through the FindIt local marketplace platform. Just last week a retailer told us of three new shoppers attracted to their business thanks to the FindIt listings we provided for no cost.

  

While the actual cause of the Optus outage on Wednesday has not yet been detailed, the outage itself encourages us to work on our businesses, to ensure we are better protected.

1. Check your network. Make sure routers are current. Talk to your ISP about a more current replacement.
2. Check your computers. Dust is a killer. Power off, remove the cover, take it outside and use a can of air to clean.
3. Document your computer’s and network. List everything you have and who is responsible for each. We often receive support calls for items not supplied by us and not known about by us.
4. Check your backups. Get the most recent one restored to ensure it is backing up everything you need.
5. Use a cloud backup service for in-store and offsite storage.
6. Have a plan. If your network, computer system or EFTPOS is down, what’s your plan? Document it. Train all staff. Make sure everyone knows the plan and where to find it.
7. Consider redundancies, like a mobile phone on a different network in case your main network is down, a secondary EFTPOS box for payments should that be down.

First responders are good at what they do because they plan and drill, such that responding is muscle-memory. What happened with Optus is a reminder to be prepared in local retail so you are less impacted.

This advice was first provided to Tower Systems POS software customers in a customer support email. It’s good advice any business could / should follow at the very least. We kept it brief to ensure it’s read and actioned. We kept the language simple to ensure it is accessible to all.

For sure we have no real idea what caused the Optus outage. But we do know that following this advice we have shared will better prepare local retail businesses for tech challenges they may face themselves.

The best time to prepare for a disaster, no matter how big or small, is well in advance of the disaster. The steps we have outlined here are simple to follow and achievable in any business regardless of technical skill set.

We are experiencing no impact here because of the Optus outage today. Our phones are up and running as are all of our online access points.

While it’s a public holiday our after hours crew is here for urgent calls.

At our website, www.towersystems.com.au, once you choose your marketplace, you can watch a recent software demonstration immediately, without providing any of your details.

Alternatively, you can, with one click request a personal demonstration lead by the needs of your business.

We believe in easy to access customer service, pre sales, and post sales.

Just as retail is personal, POS software support is personal.

The number of clicks and the amount of information you have to provide in order to watch a POS software demonstration says something about the ease of access to help with that software. See for yourself.

While we love talking with our POS software customers and take hundreds of calls for advice, training and support every day, plenty of our customers are loving the enhanced self-serve facilities through our website where many day-to-day queries are answered instantly, without the need to call or email.

The advanced tech behind this innovating is delivering terrific POS software support content to our customers, helping them to get more from our software instantly, when they need it.

Customers using this self-serve access to help desk advice free our people to handle more complex queries on how yo use our POS software.

Our help desk team members don’t follow a script. Each call is a conversation, free flowing, in pursuit of valuable and appreciate answers for our POS software customers.

We are grateful to have published plenty more POS software training videos to our free to access training library. Each video is on a separate topic and compact in time – to get to the point, cover it and provide customers an opportunity to try for themselves.

We have found these short videos to work very well in training local retailers in the use of our POS software.

Here are some of the new videos we have published:

• Monthly Sales Comparison – the best report for ay retailer looking to understand and grow their business. 
• Ranked Sales Report – so many options for discovering what’s working and what’s not.
• Installing Retailer Updates – how, when, where and what.
• General Stock Listing Report – for those who like old-school.
• Supplier Stock Listing Report – when you want to hone in on a supplier.
• Sales Transaction Log – the guts of sales history.
• Detailed Takings Report – everything you want to know.
• POS Touch Screen Advanced Settings – make your POS screen your own.
• How to access and find knowledge base articles (including using F1) – the easy way to get help when you want it.
• Access Support – Understanding Priority and Logging Support Tickets – tips for the best customer service experience.
• Importing a Supplier Stockfile – we make it easy, and certain.

These videos and the many others released this year are designed to help you get more from the software for your business. We are grateful for customer feedback on the videos.

POS software training can be a challenge in a retail business with a staff turnover or a roster of casual staff. Our video training library with, now, around 70 new videos offers a resource set that retailers can use to ensure staff are well trained to get more form their Tower Systems POS software.

In publishing this list of most recent training videos produces by us for our POS software customers, we are showing our commitment to customer service. It would be easier to tell, but we prefer to show. facts matter and this list of training videos is real and fresh training content that our small business retailer customers are telling us they love, and we are sincerely grateful for that.

Okay so today is a public holiday for the Queen’s Birthday. We’re taking a break – but fear not! If you have an urgent query our after-hours crew is there for you.

We are grateful to have hosted another meeting of users of our software. This was done yesterday, via Zoom – a platform plenty of our POS software customer prefer.

At this meeting we previewed our next software update, sought feedback on some development plans in the pre-planning stage. We also had plenty of time for questions, which is the real value of meetings like this for plenty.

We know that being accessible is important to our local small business retailer community. It’s why we do these sessions regularly, and why they are open to all customers, and why there is no cost whatsoever.

To ensure we can answer as many questions as possible we had people there from development, support as well as senior management.

Back in the day, decades ago, in-person user meetings were a key feature from engages software companies. They still are today, but online, saving everyone time as well as travel costs.

We are grateful to the customers who joined in yesterday and those who watched later on video. Feedback from sessions like this is vital to our future.

Tower Systems offers easy access to quality POS hardware suppliers, POS receipt rolls, POS labels and more through its consumables POS hardware and supplies online shop.

Anyone can shop at the online shop, regardless of the POS software you use.

Online at this POS supplies, hardware and stationery shop, retailers can purchase plenty of items, including:

• Receipt rolls.
• Weatherproof barcode labels.
• Sheets of barcode labels for laser printing – for low cost barcode labels.
• Jewellery barcode labels. These are specialist multi part labels made specifically for jewellers. Beautiful quality Long lasting.
• Zebra printer thermal transfer ribbons.
• POS hardware. This includes receipt printers, UPS power supply, screens, printers, barcode scanners, printers and plenty more.
• Mobility devices for more efficient retail operation.
• Computers and terminals for a variety of retail business settings.

The Tower Systems online shop offers 24/7 shopping access to hardware, printers, barcode labels, receipt printers, receipt rolls POS hardware computer terminals and specialty POS stationery and other supplies.

The website is totally self-serve with easy access, helping retailers stay on top of their stationery and POS consumable requirements.

You can pay by credit card, including American Express as well as Afterpay, Zip and more. we make it easy to choose what you need, pay and then organise shipping.

The Tower Systems POS software stationery, hardware and barcode label shop also makes it easy for retailers to purchase POS software training.

Buying receipt rolls, barcode labels, printer ribbons and other POS software consumables is easy through this Tower Systems retailer services website. We offer this as part of our one stop service for local small business retailers, to help them have the stock of what they need on time to serve that need.

We do so at a modest cost, using products and offering products that we use ourselves in our own retail businesses.

We know that retailers want reliable printer ribbons, barcode labels, receipt rolls and more for the safe and easy running of their business. We do our best to ensure that we have what people need, when they need it and to a quality that they can trust to provide good customer service for threat local retail businesses.

We are grateful for the feedback on our latest Tower Systems POS software customer print newsletter. It’s our third for 2023 and across the pages it is packed with practical advice on how to leverage our POS software for more value in each business using it.

The print newsletter is part of a comprehensive comms strategy in serving of our POS software user community. It covers emails, calls, Zoom meetings and personal connections.

The print newsletter is for those who love to hold paper in their hand and read without needing batteries.

We are glad for the opportunity to communicate with our customers through the old-school print medium.

We have announced details of our first POS software user meeting to our POS software user community.

Hosted on the Zoom platform, any of our customers will have access to this session live, as well as after the event via a shared video link.

The session will preview the latest software update and a couple of surprise announcements about updates to follow.

We will also discuss some requests made by our POS software customers as well as opening the meeting to discuss any topic.

Like all of the user meetings we have hosted in the past, this meeting in the next few days will be open, transparent and as valuable for us as it is for our customers. we will have the right people in the room including help desk colleagues, representatives from software development as well as our leadership group.

back in the day, in the 1980s and 1990s, user meetings like these were hosted by all software companies, in all capital cities and some regional centres. Ofer time, however, they have faded. Not here at Tower Systems. They continue to provide terrific value to us and, we think, to our customers. we say that based on the good engagement with the meetings.

Toop many POS software companies today put tech ology and other barriers between themselves and their customers. We think that is a mistake – especially when it comes to developing POS software for retailers.

Retail is personal after all.

There is tremendous value to be found in face top face free-flowing discussion. That’s what we find at least. We can work on a topic, explore it, consider various sides and make progress in one of these live meetings more so than the cold and faceless approach to connection that some software companies demand today.

yes, our approach to software user meetings is old school. It works we find. Our customers like it. we can point to good value achieved from the sessions we have hosted over the years.

The only difference today is the use of Zoom. This works for us and our customers as we cal all participate without as much in travel costs and time.

We are proud to offer our first POS software user meeting for 2023. Let’s get started!

Aussie made

Before we get into our advice, we note that backup is one of the most least considered activities in a local retail business, yet it is one of the most vital for the business.

The time backup of your data matters most is when it is business critical.

The best way to backup is in the background, seamlessly, to the cloud, with a safe local backup and a backup to the backup … and a tech approach that allows easy restoring to a moment in time.

This approach to backup is best as it does not require human trigger or action, it happens, in the background, as you trade, and after.

Tower Systems customers can backup the way they choose, the way they prefer. This includes choosing to use another external commercial backup service. There is no requirement that Tower Systems customers use the Tower Systems backup service.

The safe Cloud backup service

The Safe Backup service from Tower Systems is a cloud-based incremental backup service to help you store your valuable data more efficiently and with greater security. Using the specialist backup software created by Storagecraft, our service backs up your entire MAIN computer to your in-store NAS (a local storage device). These backups are then uploaded to a secure cloud location.

There is no need for a daily backup. There is no need for you to remember to backup. The processes is automatic once setup.

What does it cost?

If you are using Windows 8, 10 or 11 the cost is $50 per 30 days.

If your main computer is using Windows Server edition, the cost is $100 per 30 days.

The cost of the 2TB NAS drive is $450. This includes our Setup and Configuration support, and delivery to your business.

There is also the option to backup a second computer in your business if you would like that done.

If you are not sure what you need please ask at support@towersystems.com.au.

Once you have completed the sign-up process we will send you the NAS. When you receive the NAS device please contact Tower Systems bookings to arrange a suitable time for setup and configuration of the service. This takes 15-20 minutes to complete and requires your computer to be restarted. Once setup, your cloud backup service is up and running.

Humans answer the phone at the Tower Systems POS software help desk.

We launched a Boxing Day sale offer for our POS software customers, helping them save on some everyday items.