The POS Software Blog

The POS Software Blog

News from Tower Systems about locally made POS software for specialty local retailers.

CategoryGarden centre software

If you are a small business retailer and think retail is tough we have a question for you…

March 23, 2018
3 Min read
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Yes, retail is tough.

What are you doing about it?

I’d love a dollar for every retailer who has told me how tough it is in the last few years.  Heck, I’d retire with the money I’d have.

The thing is, retail is tough, especially small business retail like a gift shop.  It’s always been tough for the little guy. I know because I own small retail businesses myself.

I really do think we need to stop saying retail is tough and start challenging ourselves. Hence the question: What are you doing about it?  Put another way…

  1. What are you doing to attract new shoppers?
  2. What are you doing to get your existing shoppers to spend more?
  3. What are you doing to drive down your costs?
  4. What are you doing to improve margin?

These are the four most important things for a retailer to act on. They sit at the core of every retail business failure and success.

Taking small steps in each of these areas can help you weather tough times. These same small steps can help you find success with less effort.

Tower Systems is a software company for small business retailers like you. We’re retailers too. We combine retail experience with tech smarts and a passion for small business to help our colleagues to grow their businesses. We’d like to help you.

Using our Point of Sale software for gift shops like yours we can help you

  1. Attract new shoppers.
  2. Get your existing shoppers to spend more.
  3. Drive down your costs.
  4. Improve margin.

Big claims yes … we have existing customers who will tell you that we do this.

Our system can cost as little as a few dollars a day. Besides great software, hardware you can trust, friendly training and software support, you have access to our business skills, acumen and passion.  We have your back, helping where we can with advice and ideas to help you grow your retail business.

We’re not your average software company.  Tower Systems is a full-service passionate and engaged software company that wants you to succeed. We firmly believe…

In business, through our own actions we make our own success.

I’m the owner and founder of Tower and am proud to work with more than 2,000 small retailers like you. I’d be honoured to help you. So would one of our amazing, skilled and passionate account managers. Call one today…

See the software live. Contact us for an obligation free demonstration: Please call our sales team at 1300 662 957 or email them at sales@towersystems.com.au.

My name is Mark Fletcher. I am the founder of this company: 0418 321 338.

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POS software WooCommerce link helps small business retailer sell online

March 21, 2018
3 Min read
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Tower Systems offers a direct to WooCommerce link that enables selling from the POS software and a Woo Commerce website all from the one inventory database. Making ecommerce easy for small business retailers.

What Is WooCommerce?
WooCommerce is an open source e-commerce plugin for WordPress. It is designed for small to large-sized online merchants using WordPress. WooCommerce is one of the most popular ecommerce platforms because it’s free and open source. This means that there are a lot free or inexpensive extensions available to customise your site.

What Is The Retailer To WooCommerce Link?
The Retailer to WooCommerce Link uses the Tower Advantage Link platform to allow Retailer to connect directly to your WooCommerce webstore. The Tower Advantage Link platform is a subscription-based service that acts as an intermediary between Retailer and the WooCommerce API.

How Does The Link Work?
The link works by using the TALink platform to connect to the WooCommerce API and synchronise your data.

Stock
Retailer is your master stock database. You flag what stock items you want to appear on your WooCommerce store. Descriptions and extended descriptions are added as product names and descriptions in WooCommerce. Newly flagged products are automatically added and if you edit items in Retailer you have field level control over how these are handled in WooCommerce.

Department And Categories
Your Retailer Departments and Categories become categories and subcategories in WooCommerce. If you choose to synchronise departments and categories, your existing structure will be mirrored and managed in WooCommerce automatically. If, however, you decide not link your Department and Categories in WooCommerce, you can allocate categories manually to products once they are added.

Classifications
Retailer’s Classifications are treated as Attributes in WooCommerce. If you choose to link these in WooCommerce your existing Classifications will be mirrored and managed in WooCommerce automatically. If, however, you do not want this to occur you can manually manage your own WooCommerce Attributes.

Prices And Quantity On Hand
You have control over your webstore pricing from within the Retailer Stock Screen. Bulk updates of the webstore prices can be performed in Stock Manager. Once new prices are set, your webstore is updated automatically. Quantity on hand is also managed automatically, when your sell or arrive an item into stock these adjustments are sent directly to WooCommerce. If the quantity on hand of an item drops to 0, the item is marked as out of stock in WooCommerce.

Images
The images you set against stock items in Retailer are automatically uploaded to your website. If images change, the old one is removed and the new one is added. You can upload as many images as you like per stock item.

Customers
Customers that purchase off your webstore are added as customers in your Retailer database, allowing you to track what they buy and market to them. Existing customers with an email address will also be added to your web store to facilitate easy sales if you choose.

Sales
Sales are downloaded on a periodic basis and imported into Retailer. They are imported into our Customer Invoice Maintenance facility allowing you to place orders and print invoices if needed. Once sales are imported it reduces your quantity on hand so you maintain accurate stock control. Sales can be allocated to a specific location or merged to your main sales data, giving you excellent control over how you report on your webstore sales.

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Events facilities in POS software help small business retailers in marketing

March 19, 2018
2 Min read
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Our Tower Systems POS software is not a destination. Rather, it is an evolving solution, being enhanced to serve evolving needs.

Customer service is more vital than ever in retail. One way retailers can provide better service is through tracking customer related events. When we started to look at this, however, we found wide variation in what is tracked, how and when. In pet stores where pet details are recorded the needs are different to what we see in jewellery where more traditional anniversaries are tracked. These both different to what we see in produce where an event could relate to the timing requirement for crop support.

We have developed a broad-based set of functions and support for what we call Events in our software. We have sought to cover the above needs and considerably more, to serve the needs we have seen across multiple retail channels.

Our goal is to help high street retailers offer a deeper personal shopper experience, to support a stickiness between shopper and retailer as this stickiness helps encourage the shopper to return to the business over another one or over an online site.

In our world, how we see it, events can be anything related to a customer. There can be any number of events too. Each event has a date or at least an anniversary related to it. This is key since we know that an event is something a retailer wants to track and respond to.

Like any new functionality, how we handle this will evolve over time and based on user feedback.

This new function allows users to add Events to Identities that are connected to a Customer. The Events are based on either a specific date or the date a product or service was or was not purchased. Once this data is collated we can then easily report and market to these customers using methods such as email or SMS.

Using the new events facilities in our software track many occasions and date based customer contacts and activities. You can do this as a customer service or as a return visit generating opportunity.

The events facilities have been developed with considerable flexibility, to ensure they serve the needs

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Awesome POS software connected websites for small business retail

March 14, 2018
3 Min read
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Australia POS software company Tower Systems is proud to offer POS software connected websites developed using Shopify, magento or Woo Commerce for specialty small business retailers in the retail channels in which we serve.

We have developed plenty of websites for different types of businesses in different situations.

we ovvero a one stop shop for POS software and web development.

Not offshore. Our websites are 100% developed in Australia. This is important. There is no middle person. You deal with us before, during and after.

The websites we develop are to your needs, covering the tech, aesthetic and other attributes that are important in your business. We sit with you to learn abut your needs, to ensure we get it right.

We also promise honesty through the process – this is better than promising something that may not be able to be delivered.

We welcome the opportunity to quote on stand-alone web development, where our sole service of your business is the development of a website.

Our POS software integrated websites serve a single inventory database between physical store and online store.

The Tower Systems web development team is skilled in WooCommerce, Magento and Shopify. The company has plenty of sites it can show in a live portfolio of successful e-commerce sites, serving shoppers in Australia and internationally.

Small business retailers can benefit from the retail management experience at Tower Systems experience that helps deliver a more retail focussed solution.

The Tower web team is also skilled at SEO and SEM services that help raise the website rankings in key search engines, ensuring the site is found ahead of others.

But best of all, Tower Systems provides professional advice and guidance to small business retailers keen to build their online presence. Our commitment is honest transparent advice on which any small business retailer can rely.

The Tower Systems web development team is Australian based, working out of the company’s head office in Hawthorn. This is important as many web development businesses are overseas. While you might have a locally based contact person development too often is done overseas, leading to challenges with delivery and usefulness.

Tower Systems is committed to local development for local businesses. Our developers understand retail in Australia and New Zealand. We leverage that to deliver practical and valuable business outcomes.

From simple websites to complex multi business solutions, the Tower Systems web development team for retailers is skilled and capable of delivering valuable solutions.

To find our more about our web development services, speak with a local Tower Systems sales person. They can point you to successful sites from us that are live and transacting today.

Here are some of the store linked websites we have developed:

  1. www.beanieboosaustralia.com
  2. www.popvinylsinaustralia.com
  3. www.willowbears.com.au
  4. www.willowbearsworldwide.com
  5. www.ittybittysinaustralia.com
  6. www.charliebearsinaustralia.com
  7. www.ezitask.com
  8. www.sendmytask.com

This is a selection of sites created by Tower Systems. Our web development skills are diverse. Our SEO and SEM skills are fine-tuned, to help you get the notice for your website.

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Finding optimism in small business retail

February 25, 2018
3 Min read
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Every day can be tough in small business. You can feel like the big competitors are winning and that you can’t climb the mountain to compete. You may not know where to start.

There are green shoots of good news and opportunities in every small and independent retail business. The key is to find these and to leverage them for more success.

A green shoot is a product or a category of products or a supplier performing above average in the business. Often, these successes have gone unnoticed.

We were working with a retailer recently who said business was down by 20% and they did not know what to do. It turned out that the best performing product category in their business was ‘failing’ for six months because they had not replenished stock.

They invested, instead, on new lines that had not gone as well as the successful product.

They, in part, created their own downward spiral and had not looked at their business data to understand that contributed to the problems they were confronting.

Once they realised the situation, they re-stocked the successful range of products and numbers started to improve. More important, their confidence level grew and with this their business decisions improved.

There are opportunities for optimism in every business.

Finding optimism is like mining, you have to look for it, sometimes for a long time. It is there, though, in every retail business.

As soon as you hear yourself talking your business down, STOP. Look at your data, look for the good news. That is what you need to think and talk about.

By looking at your data, we mean looking at year on year, quarter on quarter or month on month comparison data for departments, categories, suppliers or even individual products. Look for growth and once you see growth, think about what you can do with and around the products achieving growth so that you can achieve other growth.

Any product achieving year on year increases in unit sales is a product to be appreciated, nurtured and used to help grow other products that can sell to the same customer.

This is how you grow optimism. Find those small green shoots, leverage them with some small steps and, over time, build more success for your business.

While overall revenue, traffic count and profitability may be down, growth even at the smallest data point, such as for one or two products, could be enough to get you looking at your business differently.

In the Tower Systems POS software, the best initial reports for good news are: Monthly Sales Comparison (department level, category level and / or supplier level), the 10×10 Report, Ranked Sales Report (by units) for one period and then for the comparative period.

We’re here to help you find the good news in your business. Your business data is the key.

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7 reasons Australian retailers should have their websites developed in Australia

February 19, 2018
2 Min read
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While there are many reasons Australian retail businesses child have websites developed in Australia by Australian developer companies, here are the top reasons.

  1. Local knowledge. Understanding how retail is transacted is Australia is vital. From the terms used to the local Aussie style. There are often disconnects when offshore web developers are used and they do not understand Australian nuances.
  2. Easy local access. Being able to talk with a web developer during your office hours and even face to face are factors key to successful website deployment.
  3. Appropriate design. There is an extraordinary difference in the design aesthetic from an Australian designer to an offshore one. By design, we mean the look and feel. You want a website that accurately reflect your business, the look and feel of your business as you see it.
  4. Collaboration. Thanks to easy local Aussie access you can collaborate along the way. With an offshore solution language and other factors make collaboration challenging.
  5. Flexibility. Working with a local web developer you are dealing with a one stop shop. With offshore developers there is often an Australian front business. They translate your requirements. Too often, things are lost in translation.
  6. Tweaking. Once you go live you will want to tweak the site. With offshore developers this is hard because contracts are usually fixed or, sometimes, the company disappears. They are cheap for a reason.
  7. Local jobs. If yours is a local retail business and you want people to shop local to support the local economy. Do it yourself. lead by example.

There are many more reasons. While there is o doubt that offshore web development is cheaper, often that turns out to be false economy.

Tower Systems offers wonderful POS software for speciality retailers from ur POS division and beautiful Aussie developed websites from ur web division.

As an Australian POS software company, we are proud to serve in excess of 3,500 Aussie independent small retail businesses across a range of retail channels. Through our work, we help local Aussie businesses grow and become stronger. This is central to our mission. We believe in small business and Aussie small business especially.

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GARDEN CENTRE SPECIFIC FACILITIES IN THE TOWER GARDEN CENTRE SOFTWARE HELP YOU BETTER LEVERAGE YOUR POINTS OF DIFFERENCE.

February 16, 2018
5 Min read
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Every day is a battle in independent small business, especially where you have a giant of a competitor outspending you on advertising. This is so true in the garden centre space.

We think the best way for any independent garden centre to compete is to leverage your points of difference, at every opportunity.

Software from Tower Systems has facilities designed specifically for garden centres, to enable them to do this, to leverage their point of difference at each touchpoint.

This non-tech article outlines these facilities. It represents business level advice we provide to garden centre owners and managers using our software. It reflects advice in addition to comprehensive technical advice, help and training on our software.

We believe that the more you leverage the specialisation in your business the more you differentiate your business from big business competitors. We are in an era where specialisation matters in businesses like yours, and ours.

  1. Special customer orders. This is the ability to order stock from a supplier for a specific customer. On arrival of the stock item, a barcode is printed with the customer name, for placement on to the product. The software can be set to send an alert to the customer by text or email, advising the arrival of the goods into the store. Customers love this personalisation. Better still, pitch an offer to customers prior to ordering from suppliers. Pre-sell. Get a non-refundable deposit. Then place your order.
  2. Share knowledge. On receipts and other touchpoint documents, include local knowledge by product or generally that shows your business as being expert. The more you do this, the more you share knowledge about garden care in your local area, the more you differentiate your business.
  3. Make what you sell. Using the manufactured goods facilities in the software it is easy to make goods. For example, you might put together a plant, a pot and a bag of nutrients as a pack. This is your pack, only available from you. It is easy to setup, sell and manage. This is a valuable point of difference.
  4. Reward your regular shoppers with a coffee card type offer. For example, buy ten plants priced at $15.00 or more and get the 11th plant for free. The software can track the purchases, ensuring your shoppers get their reward if they buy within the rules you establish.
  5. Club / community group deals / pricing. A great way to win new shoppers is through a community group. You can publish a card or voucher enabling members of a group to present this for a discount on each purchase. The software can track the purchases and at a designated time you can give the group a rebate in return for their member loyalty. Consider being flexible of what constitutes a club. It could be that people who like to fish with a particular person are in a ‘club’. The more groups and people you have talking about your business the better.
  6. Instant loyalty rewards. Another way we can help maximise sales is with an instant loyalty reward. This is particularly useful where you see shoppers once a year or quite infrequently as is often the case in fishing and outdoor businesses. Using rules that you control, a receipt can include a voucher offering a specific amount off the next purchase if that purchase is made in a timeframe you set. An average 19% redemption rate for the vouchers with a third redeemed the day of purchase. Male shoppers are far more likely to redeem the day of purchase. This instant loyalty reward facility is another way we serve your type of business. In the software, we call it discount vouchers.
  7. Easily create a quote based on what a customer wants. If they decide to proceed, the quote can be actioned quickly and easily.
  8. Hazardous goods. Include appropriate warnings on documents provided with hazardous goods for the protection of your customers and your business.
  9. As plants in-store grow, report them and increase their sale price.
  10. Label for outdoors. Using our weatherproof labels, confidently label products out on the lot so they can be scanned regardless of weather conditions.
  11. Leverage events. Using this new facility, added Q1 2018, you can market to shoppers based on interests, past purchases, birthdays and other date related events in and around their lives. For example, you could run an email campaign for all who purchased a particular type of plant and offer advice on seasonal care to local conditions.
  12. Sell by weight. This is easy and accurate.
  13. Your marketing group or product suppliers can provide data files for any catalogues in which you participate. You can load these into the software making it easy to offer catalogue prices through the term of the catalogue offer.
  14. Gift vouchers. Sell customers who can’t decide what gift to purchase a gift voucher. Load on to this voucher any amount the customer wants. You set the rules on expiry and other voucher handling.
  15. Supplier comparison. Since you can purchase some items from multiple suppliers, use smart reports in the software to compare the performance of your various suppliers.
  16. Integrated in retailer is this buy now pay later finance option. You are settled quickly by the funder and the costs are like credit card costs. This can work better than LayBy in that you do not need to manage the goods in-store.
  17. You have complete control over how this is setup including the terms, rules and more.
  18. Manage remotely. Plenty of our business owners are not in their businesses regularly. Our software has facilities that enable easy remote tracking and management. Some are obvious while others are hidden and secure, giving you peace of mind that you can leave your business.
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POS software touch points help small business retailers benefit

February 15, 2018
2 Min read
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Tower Systems provides these touch point services to all retailers using its Australian designed POS software. They are services we have found small business retailers appreciate and enjoy. These services are provided at no additional cost:

  1. Small Business Support. Through a range of creative and management services we help small business in myriad ways including marketing, supporter, planning and more. Our experience in a range of retail channels, including as owing small business retail shops ourselves, positions us to offer these pro bono services to help.
  2. Theft check. A business data assessment and analysis to determine if employee theft is occurring in the business. We have people who have been used by police and prosecutors to testify as expert witnesses in successful prosecutions.
  3. Business check. One of our senior analysts researches the data being cultivated by the software for the business. A report is prepared on what can be seen in the data. The goal of this assessment is to provide insights the retailer might otherwise not have seen for themselves.
  4. User meetings. We host two cycles of user meetings each year – in the first and second half of the year. These are in capital cities and major regional centres. The user meetings provide free training and an open Q&A session. They are always attended by senior management from Tower Systems.
  5. Online training workshops. These are held for all Tower customers. Access is free. They can connect and participate from anywhere in the world.
  6. Tower Systems has a structured approach to escalation of any issue about which a customer may be unhappy. This facilitates getting the issue outside the help desk and in front of the leadership team for more independent assessment.
  7. Supplier engagement. Tower Systems has a structured approach to working with suppliers to facilitate seamless connection when it comes to business data. This process sees many suppliers already participating.
  8. One-on-one training. Up to two hours of personal individual training each year.

Tower Systems is grateful to the support of its 3,500+ customers that enable it is provide these and other services in support of small business retailers. This is what we do. We love it!

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Small business retailers love discount vouchers

February 9, 2018
1 Min read
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Tower Systems has been a champion of discount vouchers for years. From launch to regular innovation, the benefits delivered have been valuable for small business retailers.

Through our work with the newsXpress gift, toy and newsagency marketing group we have produced channel-speficvi training. Here is a new video we shot last week outlining the benefits of discount vouchers from a business owner perspective. We share it here today to shine a light on the business support and management resources we produce for customers.

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Previewing 2018 at our small business POS software co

February 7, 2018
1 Min read
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We appreciate the feedback from our POS software user customers about the preview we provided to the year in this video we shot in house. In addition to introducing some tech innovation coming early this year, the video  also reflects our human and personal approach to software development, it underscores that we stand behind what we sell.

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Garden centre software: Helping you help local gardens grow.

February 3, 2018
4 Min read
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Helping you help local gardens grow.

Neil and Alison responded within minutes of getting the email. They pre-ordered $500 worth of new season roses, months before they would be available in-store. As rose collectors and lovers they wanted to be sure they had the new varieties for their beautiful garden.

Back at the garden centre office, emails were coming in thick and fast. Each one was an order.

The campaign was a success because the manager of the business knew the rose lovers in their customer community. They sent a thoughtfully targeted email to announce pre-orders for new season roses. This was before they had finalised their own orders.

By the time they did order stock, they had substantial deposit funds, backing customer orders. They could order with certainty.

When the roses arrived, months later, their software automatically emailed customers with the news. It also printed labels for the roses, with customer details. This ensured that everyone received what they ordered.

While being able to tell this story in your own garden centre business would take time, the financial rewards are worth it.

The facilities in the specialty garden centre software from Tower Systems described here are a small part of a beautiful suite of software designed here in Australia for Australian garden centres.

There is more to this software than marketing. An asset of your business is that you are a local expert on all things garden related. You can share your expert local knowledge through notes on receipts. These are automatically included on each receipt, along with care instructions for plants purchased in a transaction.

Automatically, receipts, invoices and delivery dockets can include locally relevant information you provide. This free information pitches your business as different to an online shop or a big business that is less focussed on personal service.

Another way we help maximise sales is with an instant loyalty reward. This is particularly useful where you see shoppers once a year or quite infrequently. Using rules that you control, a receipt can include a voucher offering a specific amount off the next purchase if that purchase is made in a timeframe you set.

An average 19% redemption rate for the vouchers with a third redeemed the day of purchase. Male shoppers are far more likely to redeem the day of purchase.

Our garden centre software also offers:

  • Quotation facility where you quote ahead of winning business.
  • Reporting on hazardous goods when these are supplied.
  • Group discounts, where members of a local group loyal to you save money.
  • Easy loading of electronic invoices from your suppliers.
  • Linking to a website for online sales.
  • Easy customer reminders for seasonal plant care.
  • Linking to Xero to cut bookkeeping and external accounting costs.
  • Rewarding loyal shoppers with points and / or cash off their next purchase.

See the software live. Contact us for an obligation free demonstration: Please call our sales team at 1300 662 957 or email them at sales@towersystems.com.au.

This software is affordable. You can purchase the software outright, lease it or rent it. You can use it in your business loaded on local computers or in the cloud. How you purchase and access the software is 100% up to you.

Supported by humans, in Australia. Our help desk is in Hawthorn, Victoria. Everyone who works on the help desk has experience in retail. To access the help desk you can call, email, post a Facebook message Tweet or text us.

Training is personal. We come to your business and train you in the software. The training is tailored to your specific needs. Like I said, training is personal. Long after we install, you have access to one on one training, at no additional cost.

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Small business retail advice: how to cut shopper theft

January 22, 2018
2 Min read
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Here are seven steps we suggest to cut the cost of shopper theft in your retail business. While there are other steps you could take, these seven are most valuable from our years of working with retailers.

  1. Look at people as they enter. Make sure they see you see them. Eye contact is key. Ideally, say hello to them. The more they think you have seen them the better.
  2. Have a screen near the entrance / exit so people can see that you filming them with your security cameras. The more people think they will be caught they less likely they are to steal.
  3. Work on the shop floor. This puts you or your employees among shoppers and heightens the chance of detection of theft.
  4. Walk the floor. Every so often, do a circuit. Be present. Talk to people.
  5. During peak shopping periods, station someone outside the business looking. Ensure they are trained on appropriate action should they see misbehavior.
  6. Bring in a security guard on a casual basis during your most busy periods.
  7. Have a no receipt no exchange or refund policy.
  8. Use your POS software. Spot stock take. Understand the cost off theft. In our experience the evidence is that items being stolen are bot those you think are being stolen. Data is key here. hence our advice to use your POS software.
  9. Act on the evidence.
  10. Ensure all who work in the business are in on this project.

The more likely people are to be caught the less likely you are to experience shopper theft.

Tower Systems has many years of experience in helping independent small business retailers mitigate em ploy theft and shopper theft. We leverage this experience for our customers through excellent POS software, free training, group training workshops, data analysis and expert witness support for authorities in specific cases.

Our advice to retailers is that you can cut the cost of theft if you manage your business to achieve this goal. Sadly, too many small business retailers do not do this because they do not see theft until it is too late. We say be on the front foot, manage to cut theft even when you cannot see it.

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How to choose the best POS software for your retail business

January 17, 2018
3 Min read
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Choosing POS software for a retail business is a daunting task. The software companies usually make it difficult to compare.

Tower Systems is a software company. Our goal is to make it easier for you.

We don’t want you to choose our software if our software is not the right fit for your business.

This is why our first advice is to make this decision about the software first. Make sure that you compare what each software package does. However, before you do this, ensure you know what you want out of software for your business and the amount you are prepared to pay for what you want.

Knowing what you want is as important as is knowing what you are prepared to ay for what you want.

The reality is there are cheap POS programs out there. You get what you pay for, every time. The cheapest product is the cheapest because they have either not invested as much in the development of the software or because they do not back the software with the same level of service.

Yes, you get what you pay for. This is why you haver to be realistic about the amount you are prepared to invest.

In considering software, start with the functionality. Look at each software package. Compare how it works against what you want from software you purchase.

Once you have a list of software packages that do what you want, dive deep into support coverage. Look carefully at how support is delivered, how you can access this, the training opportunities and how your business can be helped with the training and support.

If you are not sure what to look for in support, consider this wish list:

  1. Easy access on the phone, through human to human conversation.
  2. Locally based. i.e. not offshore where people don’t understand your business.
  3. Help beyond the software. Is there an accountant you can talk to or a retail business specialist.
  4. Regular free group training.
  5. Easily accessible personal one on one training.
  6. Regular updates but with you controlling when to install these rather than having them forced on you.
  7. An escalation process if you are not happy.
  8. The contact details for the owner of the business.

Ultimately, only you can know the best POS software for your type of business and your business. The value of the decision  you make will reflect the approach yo7u took in making the decision. The old maxim of measure many times and cut once is true here.

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Xero POS software interface helps small business make more money

January 16, 2018
2 Min read
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Small business retailers are in business to make money for it is money that feeds the family, allows the business to support the local community and adds to the value of the business when it is time to sell.

It stands to reason that small business retailers want to take steps appropriate to the business making more money.

This is where the Xero POS software link from Tower Systems helps. It helps small businesses make more money. By money, we mean bottom line profit.

How we do this is through wonderful software that provides a seamless, safe and structured flow of data between the in-store POS software and Xero and through training and advice on what a small business retailer can leverage from the data that flows through the link.

Tower Systems is not your average software company. We are retailers too. We use this software, including the POS software Xero link, ourselves, in our won retail businesses. We can speak from experience when we help. We can guide in a way that a usually POS software company cannot.

We help small business retailers make more money through:

  1. Lower operating costs, especially lower bookkeeping and accounting costs.
  2. Less mistakes. Mistakes are expensive for businesses.
  3. Better quality business decisions. Thanks to easy access to more up0 to date data.
  4. Less theft. With less human intervention in data there is less opportunity for employee theft.
  5. Greater confidence. Confidence comes from having easier access to accurate data sooner. While this sounds like a marketing pitch line, it is a fact. The flow of data from there POS to Xero means you can access business decision making data days and weeks ahead of when you might have with other processes in place. This boosts your confidence.

Tower Systems provides business management advice to back its software. This can see small business retailers gain more from a Tower relationship than they might have through a relationship with another POS company. We have accounting skills, at CPA level, in-house. This enables us to provide advice and guidance beyond that is unusual for a POS software company. We call this the Tower Advantage.

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Welcoming new POS software customers to Tower Systems

January 15, 2018
2 Min read
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We are thrilled to welcome new customers using our small business POS software. We have a welcome page on our website, which is part of our structured approach to welcoming new customers.

The welcome is sincere and personal:

Welcome to Tower Systems. This page welcomes new customers to our business, small business retailers switching to our POS software.

Thank you for your business, for your faith in our software and our services. We appreciate it.

Our goal is to help you make your business more valuable and more enjoyable through your use of our POS software.

Here in our website you have access to a knowledge base, available 24/7, which contains excellent advice and articles about how to use the software. It is like a live and evolving user manual – but searchable. Log into the customer side of the site and you can immediately access the knowledge base.

Our help desk is based in Melbourne Victoria. There we have a team of skilled IT professionals, with good retail experience, available to help with your queries. You can contact them through our national help line – 03 9524 8000 – of through your local Tower office number or by email: support@towersystems.com.au

We release software updates every few months. We announce by email when these are available. You choose when you wish to install each update. This gives you control.

If you have suggestions on changes you would like to see in our software, please use our Software Ideas page on this website. Through here other customers using our software can vote on your idea.

Every week we will send you a customer email with tips, ideas and inspirations. This is another touch point designed to help you get more from the relationship.

As a customer, you have access to free training. To schedule free one on one training, please email bookings@towersystems.com.au.

Welcome as a new customer of Tower Systems. Our motto is we’re here to help. Please, let us know how we can help your business.

Thank you for reading.

Mark Fletcher
Managing Director
0418 321 338

There is also a video welcoming our new customers:

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Small business retail management tip: embrace the opportunity of hiring older employees

January 14, 2018
2 Min read
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Older employees can being terrific value to a retail business that is keen bring change to the business. Young employees cost less and this is a common appeal among retail business owners.

An older employee could bring more value to the business, they could leverage a better return on labour investment for the business. Here are other benefits that can be available depending on the background, skill set and work interest of the older employee:

  1. Maturity. An older employee understand work.
  2. Appreciation. If they have been to of work for a while they are more likely to appreciate then job and could therefore invest more in it.
  3. Experience. An older employee could have experience in a field from which the business can benefit. I am not thin king here about retail experience. rather, they may have business management skills, special interests or experience that you can leverage as you change the business.
  4. Flexibility. With less focus on establishing themselves and a social life they cold be more available and this could help the roster.
  5. Communication. An older employee is more likely to be better with oral communication given they has less tech when they were younger. While this is a rash generalisation, I’d back it to be likely.

When you are looking to fill a vacancy or a new role in the business, consider older person for these and other reasons you can think of. The could bring to the business skills and interest the you can leverage more valuably than the skills and interest of a younger lower cost employee.

Of course, the value of any employee depends on your hiring, training, management and motivation of them.

The post of this post is to suggest that next time you hire you think about an older employee.

Note: The federal government jobactive restart program can help Australian businesses that hire older employees financially:

Restart is a financial incentive of up to $10,000 (GST inclusive) to encourage businesses to hire and retain mature age employees who are 50 years of age and over.

Older employees can bring new insights and energy to a business. The right hire could be just want the business needs to explore new traffic opportunities.

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Xero POS software link helps small business retailers compete with big business

January 10, 2018
2 Min read
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It can be tough for a small business to compete with big business. Those who do so successfully have access to excellent quality up to date business data. They leverage this to fuel quality business decisions.

The best business data is that which flows immediately between POS software and accounting software. Tower Systems provides to small business retailers a beautiful, easy to setup and easy to use link between its POS software and the cloud based Xero accounting solution.

The Tower Systems Xero POS software link is ideal for small business independent retailers. It helps small business retailers compete through:

  1. Timely access to accurate business data.
  2. Data that is operational and financial.
  3. Data that is not manipulated.
  4. Data you can trust.
  5. Data that flows from the shop floor to the accounting function without impediment.

The most effective ways small business retailers can compete with big businesses and online is through efficient operation, accurate data and customer service touch-points that add appreciated value.

Tower Systems only sells its POS software to small business retailers.

We believe in small businesses, their importance to local communities and their broader economic value.

Through our software, our personal in-store training, 24/7 human and locally based help desk service, regional user meetings, weekly online workshops and other touch-points we help small business retailers beyond what is usual for POS software companies.

Our company motto is we’re here to help. We take this seriously. Everyday, out motto challenges us to help our customers in ways they do not expect, ways beyond the software itself.

Founded in 1981, Tower Systems has evolved as technology has evolved. The software we sell today is generations away from where we started. We are proud to have served some of our customers for decades.

More than 3,500 specialty small business retailers in Australia and New Zealand use our specialty POS software.

To us, a specialty retailer is one that offers services unique to the channel, services that define the business.  We embed in our software for each retail channel facilities that serve needs unique to that channel. We take pride in doing this and enhancing these channel-specific facilities as the needs evolve.

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Xero POS software interface helps small business retailers cut mistakes

January 7, 2018
2 Min read
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Mistakes can be expensive in small business retail, especially mistakes made in accounting.

The Tower Systems POS software Xero link helps small business retailers cut mistakes. The link eliminates tasks by automating the flow of data from the POS software where data is received into the business in the form of invoices for inventory, returns notes for products going back to suppliers. sales data, LayBy data and plenty more.

Capturing this data at the source, at the point of sale, and flowing the data without additional human intervention to Xero, to the right part of Xero, eliminates time, cuts mistakes and provides small business retailers with more control.

Every error made in accounting has a cost. In fact, there can be multiple costs – labour and financial. This is why it is better to get it right the first time.

The Xero integration designed by Tower Systems, working with the folks at Xero, makes it easy for small business retailers to cut accounting paperwork and thereby tap into time and money saving benefits.

We use our Xero integrated POS software ourselves. This enables us to provide practical advice on how to benefit the most from Xero and our POS software working together.

Our customers have access to our in-house CPA, to provide a professional accounting perspective on the link and how to get the most from it.

Setting up the Xero link is easy. You map the data flow from invoice entry through to the chart of accounts managed by Xero. Once this is done, supplier invoices, sales, credits, LayBys and other everyday business transactions flow from the POS software to Xero.

This makes business accounting easier, more certain, less expensive and more useful to the business.

By cutting mistakes we help bring certainty to business reporting and management. This posts confidence.

Tower Systems is keen to help small business retailers cut mistakes. We know the more we can do this the more our customers will appreciate the practical benefits a relationship between our businesses can deliver. With our software support being optional we know that our customers can switch any time. The best way for us to keep them is for us to deliver practical benefits at each touch point.

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Xero POS software interface from Tower Systems helps small business retailers cut costs

January 4, 2018
2 Min read
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Managing operating costs is a key goal for small business retailers in this world of greater competition.

The Tower Systems POS software Xero link helps small business retailers cut costs. It does this in a range of practical ways that small business retailers can leverage without having to spend more money on software or professional services.

Thanks to the Xero POS software link retailers are able to eliminate bookkeeping work and have accounting data flow through accurately from the POS software where data originates to Xero where it is accessed for key business accounting functions.

Developed with careful oversight of CPA qualified accounting experience as well as current small business management accounting experience plus insights from experienced bookkeepers, this link is a true cost saver because of the accounting steps it eliminates and the mistakes it avoids. Both of these have costs to any small business. Eliminating them is a bottom line cost benefit for any business.

Setting up the Xero link is easy. You map the data flow from invoice entry through to the chart of accounts managed by Xero. Once this is done, supplier invoices, sales, credits, LayBys and other everyday business transactions flow from the POS software to Xero.

This makes business accounting easier, more certain, less expensive and more useful to the business.

Your BAS is easier. Your P&L and Balance Sheet are more up to date. This is a big win for any small business retailer.

Tower Systems uses the Xero POS software link itself for retail businesses it owns in the gift and homewares spaces. By using our software, especially the Xero link we are able to draw on broad practical experience when providing advice to our retail business owner customers. It means that our help desk advice is based on us walking in your shores more than is usual for a POS software company.

Tower Systems is keen to help small business retailers cut costs. We know the more we can do this the more our customers will appreciate the practical benefits a relationship between our businesses can deliver. With our software support being optional we know that our customers can switch any time. The best way for us to keep them is for us to deliver practical benefits at each touch point.

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