The POS Software Blog

The POS Software Blog

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

Latest stories

Excited for the preview of an enhanced POS software function

January 23, 2024
1 Min read
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We are about to host a secure and private interactive session about a significantly enhanced part of our POS software. The development has taken many months due to the complexity of the specialised area of business this software will serve.

The scope of the work was developed in consultation with the customers keen for the enhancement. The preview will involve them too. This is another step in our atlas test process, which proceeds beta.

We are excited for the feedback and the opportunity to look further down the road.

As a software company we depend on regularly evolving software to extend the reach of and benefits from our POS software. We are grateful to our customers for being there with and for us.

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Hey news outlets and reporters, not all businesses and CEOs want employees to return to the office

January 22, 2024
3 Min read
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It is tiresome reading news reports claiming that businesses and business CEOs want employees to return to the office – often backed by a survey of CEOs.

Sure, some do. But, plenty don’t.

These stories about returning to the office are often vested interest based: landlords wanting their commercial space to be filled, companies wanting the space they have leased to be filled, businesses needing office-based trade to thrive and consultants serving businesses in these situations.

Think about local retailers benefiting from people working from home, regional retailers too. Force people back to the office and they lose the business they have won.

Landlords, property developers and others wanting people to return to the office for selfish reasons need to stop being selfish.

Smart employees of workers who want work from anywhere want their people to work where they are happiest. If that’s home, let them work from home.

Happy employees are valuable to any business.

Journalists and news outlets need to stop being boosters for the selfish demanding people work at the office and not from home.

Families benefit from more time with people able to work from home rather than losing family time to a commute.

Local communities benefit from people working from home shopping more locally and having mor time for local engagement.

Those calling for people to return to the office think their needs are more important than family time or local community time. They are wrong.

At our POS software company, Tower Systems, where people work is up to them. We actually started on this model in 2019, ahead of the pandemic, and then we escalated it to be companywide. We are lucky to be in a business where work location is not an issue.

We hire people we trust, provide them with resources they need and offer as much flexibility as we can in terms of their work situation. We have some team members saving close to twenty hours a week – that’s money in the bank for them.

Sure, we have a small crew in the office, where the job requires it. We support them. We are also grateful that each member of this crew actually prefers to be there, in the office.

Now, we do have a vested interest in all this. We make software for local small business retailers. They benefit from more people who work from home. So, of course we will support work from home from a commercial perspective. But our pitch makes sense right – happy people = productive people = people less likely to look elsewhere = a more successful business.

We think it all comes down to how you view people working in your business. If you see them as a line item on your P&L, a cog in a big machine that serves a P&L result only, you miss the opportunity to see people working in your business as people, families, members of local communities.

We don’t support the calls for people to return to the office and we wish news outlets would stop being used as mouthpieces for the vested interests making these selfish pitches.

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POS software integrations help improve efficiency and reduce mistakes in local small business retail

January 19, 2024
2 Min read
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Tower Systems offers integrations between its POS software and a range of external apps and platforms to help local small business retailers eliminate double entry of data and thereby reduce the opportunities for mistakes.

POS software integrations are smart in saving time too.

We are grateful for the opportunity to integrate our POS software with a range of other applications and partners, enhancing the solutions available to0 our customers and those considering using our POS software.

Here are some of the POS software integrations from Tower Systems:

XERO (ACCOUNTING)
ABCIS (ACCOUNTING)
WOOCOMMERCE (ECOMMERCE)
SHOPIFY (ECOMMERCE)
MAGENTO (ECOMMERCE)
BIG COMMERCE (ECOMMERCE)
PCEFTPOS/LINKLY (PAYMENTS)
LINKLY CLOUD (PAYMENTS)
TYRO (PAYMENTS)
SMARTPAY (PAYMENTS)
HUMM (PAYMENTS)
ZIP (PAYMENTS)
CENTREPAY (PAYMENTS)
QUEST (PAYMENTS)
MX51 (PAYMENTS)
WINDCAVE (DPS) (PAYMENTS)
RAA MEMBER (DISCOUNTS)
PINPAYMENTS (PAYMENTS)
XCHANGEIT (EDI)
GNS (EDI)
EASTERN DISTRIBUTORS (EDI)
MAXWELL AND WILLIAMS (HAG) (EDI)
KONGS (EDI)
PERMIER PET (EDI)
MASTERPET (EDI)
AIRR / TUCKERS (EDI)
JUST FOR PETS (EDI)
EVERGREEN CONNECT (EDI)
MAILCHIMP (MARKETING)
MESSAGE MEDIA (SMS SERVICES)
BIKE EXCHANGE (EDI)
EPAY (ELECTRONIC VOUCHERS)
TABCORP (REQUIRES EXCHANGEIT) (LOTTERY)
POSTEC (FUEL)
TANDA (STAFF)
DEPUTY (STAFF)
ALLOTRAC (DISPATCH)
TREK (STOCK)
PACSTREAM (EDI)
TITLEPAGE (EDI)
REMOVE.BG (OTHER)
REMOVAL.AI (OTHER)
CHAT GPT (AI)

We are often first with integrations, like our delivery of Linkly Cloud.

We are grateful for the opportunity and proud to deliver a world first – a POS software integration with Linkly Cloud.

That’s right, we have retailers live with our Tower Systems POS software connected to Linkly Cloud for EFTPOS transactions.

Tower Systems makes POS software for specialty retailers in a range of local specialty retail channels.

Linkly is all about Making every payment seamless.

Together, we have delivered a solution that helps retailers save time, cut mistakes and more easily compete with big business.

Local retailers keen for a seamless payee its integration and needing a POS solution that is capable, functional, enhanced and reliable – the Tower Systems Linkly Cloud partnership is worth considering.

Tower Systems integrated EFTPOS, connects your Retailer Point of Sale with your EFTPOS terminal, making it the fastest and easiest way to sell.

When it comes to POS software integrations, here at Tower Systems we analyse requirements, talk with customers and consider whether a proposed integration serves the needs of all stakeholders. Then, if it’s a yes, we get about delivering and awesome integration.

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Shop local: show don’t tell is a strong message local retailers can spend through the decisions they make

January 18, 2024
2 Min read
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If you run a local retail business and have put a shop local post on social media or a sign in your window, take a moment to think about the decisions you have made in your business that lean into the shop local narrative for your business.

Do you by local every time you can?

Take POS software, is your software locally made, locally supported, benefiting the local community.

In the POS software space we have plenty of businesses owned by overseas companies, selling software that is developed overseas and software that is supported overseas. Very little of every dollar you spend with them stays locally. here at Tower Systems, most of what we are paid stays locally, supporting the local community, for which we are grateful.

In the relates EFTPOS payments space, there are local banks and providers and there are international businesses. Given the similarity in fees, choosing the local company would appear to make sense to businesses that themselves call on others to shoot local.

Now, if there is software locally made and locally supported that fist your business needs and is similar in price, why not consider the, local alternative and, when you do, tell people that you are grateful to be able to shop local for your own business.

This is one way to pitch shop local practically in your local business: shop local for yourself and gracefully share stories about this on your social media pages. Without telling customers to shop local you are leading in the conversation by doing it yourself.

Any business publicly encouraging others to shop local has an obligation themselves for each decision to make to first consider the local options. Your actions in business speak to the narrative of your business. You actions on shopping locally will show whether you are true to your word.

There is so much more to a call to shop local than the words themselves. It is vital we understand this and that we live it through the decisions we make in our businesses if we plan to tell others to shop local.

Shop local is a solid message if we walk the walk.

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PUSHING A CASH IS KING MESSAGE IS A FOOL’S ERRAND IN MY VIEW AND HERE’S WHY

January 17, 2024
4 Min read
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Too often we see small business retailers pitching cash is king on social media and shake my head. It’s a waste of time. People will pay how they want to pay, if you let them.

Berating people, telling them that cash is better for you and the economy is an argument not backed by facts.

The cost of handling cash is not dissimilar to the cost of taking cashless payments. especially today with fewer bank branches available for cash deposits and making change.

Retailers are retailers. They are service businesses. If someone wants to pay a retailer money, they need to be flexible in the forms in which they receive this. And, if one form of payment is more expensive than another, consider a surcharge for that and explain to your customers why.

Posting on social media about the cost of card payments and bemoaning money banks make from this is not cutting through. You only have to look at the continued growth in card and other non-cash payments to see that. So why waste time and energy complaining about something that has no chance in going your way. Instead, spend time celebrating what you love about your business.

Of course, what you put on social media from and about your business is 100% up to you. The challenge is that anything one retailer in a channel does can speak for more than that one business.

What we want in our business, our prime goal, is more shoppers. Anything that gets in the way of achieving this needs to be considered, and probably dropped. I think the social media posts bemoaning the cost of card payments and calling for people to pay cash are an example of a turn-off social media post. Such posts risk turning people off your business and off colleague businesses in the newsagency channel.

Yes, the payments arrangements in Australia are unnecessarily complex and they do have a cost to our businesses. But, shoppers are flocking to non-cash methods of payment and it is good for our businesses if we accept these with ease and grace.

Instead of waging an unwindable campaign about your preference for cash over card for payment, consider diverting that energy into business improving opportunities such as addressing common expensive management misses that I too often see in local small business retail. Here are low-hanging-fruit ideas I pitch to retailers:

  • Dead stock. A problem not seen is not a problem to too many. In the average indie retail business, dead stock is equal to at least 3% of turnover.

  • Running out of stock. In one business I looked at recently, being out of stock cost the business $15,000 in sales in six months. ordering based on what their software advised would have solved that.

  • Failing the price opportunity. Shoppers are less price conscious than we think they are. Have faith in your business. Price based on the value you offer and not based on fear of competitors.

  • Bloated roster. I often see a bloat cost equal to around 10% of business labour cost.

  • Wrong trading hours. Some stay open too long while others are not open long enough. Either way has a cost to the business.

  • Being blind to theft. Theft in local indie retail retail costs on average between 3% and 5% of turnover. Not watching for it, tracking it and mitigating against it has a cost to the business.

  • Ignorance. No, it’s not bliss. There are insights in software that can guide better decisions, faster decisions, more financially rewarding decisions. Yet, too many in retail don’t want to know.

This is a list of seven action items from which any small business retailer could benefit. Pick any or all of these ahead of spending time going on social media calling for people to pay by cash instead of a card and you will gain more benefit for bottom line.

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Tower Systems helps local small business retailers cut employee theft in 2024

January 16, 2024
5 Min read
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From the data captured from Point-of-Sale software from my software company being used in their business, I was able to show Harry and June that their business was being stolen from to the tune of at least two thousand dollars a week, that it had been going on for two years and that it was only happening four days a week.

We were sitting in a coffee shop near their business. They brought the shop employee roster with me as I asked. There was only one person who worked the days and specific hours indicated by the Point-of-Sale software.

‘It can’t be, they’re family,’ June said looking across at Harry. ‘She’s my niece,’ said Harry, ‘she’s amazing in the shop. Customers love her’. ‘We couldn’t run the business without her,’ June chipped in. ‘Yeah, it’s got to be a mistake,’ Harry said looking at the roster.

Harry had reached out to me a couple of weeks earlier as their accountant had advised him that the business was not making the type of money that it should. The accountant had said to him ‘something’s not right’.

Harry thought there was something wrong with the software. That’s why he called me.

I asked for a copy of their data and did a deep dive into a hidden set of encrypted sales records stored by the software to enable this type of investigation of possible employee fraud.

Having done this type of research many times in the past and having worked with police and prosecutors as an expert witness, I knew for certain that Harry and June were being stolen from by their niece.

They left the coffee shop meeting certain that the problem was with the software. It was another year before Harry and June followed my advice, installed hidden cameras and got the evidence to implicate their niece.

The day they confronted their niece she walked out. They never recovered the money. They feared a split in the family and didn’t pursue criminal charges.

In all, Harry and June lost over three hundred thousand dollars. They sold the business soon after.

Employee theft can be a high cost to indie small business retailers. Different studies in Australia and elsewhere coupled with our own knowledge of theft in indie small business retail indicates that employee theft costs a business around 75% of the total cost of theft.

The quantum of  employee theft is often under considered by small business retailers. We think  this is because of denial. However, given that the amount that can be taken in one hit or in micro amounts over a long period of time can be considerable once toted up.

Employee theft can be traced and as a result of this stopped. Our small business POS software helps retailers do this. We back the theft mitigation facilities in our software with training, advice and even data analysis to uncover possible instances of theft that may have hitherto gone undetected.

Here is some of the small business retail theft mitigation advice from our POS software retail experienced team:

  1. Track your stock. Receive all stock into your business through your computer system so you know exactly what sock you have.
  2. Scan everything you sell.  Do not use department keys as this makes it easier for employees to steal since they know there is no trackback to stock on hand. Using department keys is an invitation to steal.
  3. Track every sale by employees. Give your employees a card with a unique barcode or have them enter a code – to track every sale they make back to them. Change the code every six months or so.
  4. Do your end of shift through your software and have a zero-tolerance policy on being over or under. Reconcile banking to your computer software end of shift. One business where this was not done was being skimmed regularly for $200 a day.
  5. Do spot cash balancing. Unexpected checks can uncover surprises. One retailer needing to do a banking during the day uncovered a $350 discrepancy that lead to discovery of systematic theft.
  6. Change your roster. Sometimes people work together to steal. One retailer found a family friend senior and their teenage daughter stealing consistently.
  7. Setup a theft policy.Put this on a noticeboard in the back room. Get staff to read it and sign up to it. See the last page of this advice.
  8. Keep the counter clean. An organised counter reduces the opportunity for theft. It makes detection easier.
  9. Have a no employee bags at the counter policy. This makes it harder for them to hide your cash.
  10. Beware employees who carry folded paper or small notepads. These can be used for them to keep track of how much cash is in the register that is theirs – i.e. not rung up in the software.
  11. Advise all job applicants that you will require their permission for a police check. From the outset this indicates that you take your business seriously. In many situations applicants who have been asked for permission to do a police check advise they have found a job elsewhere.
  12. Do not take cash out for your own use in front of employees. If they see you take cash for a coffee or lunch some will see this as an invitation.

At the start of a new year is a good time to take a close look at whether employee theft is an issue in your retail business. We’d love to help you with that.

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Retailers unhappy with Lightspeed POS software EFTPOS and related fees are welcomed at Tower Systems

January 15, 2024
2 Min read
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Tower Systems is grateful to welcome retailers switching from Lightspeed POS software to our Aussie made and supported POS software for specialty retailers.

Whether we are a good fit for your business depends on your business needs. This can be discussed in a personal demonstration where you review our software and see whether it does things the way you want.

When it comes to a Lightspeed comparison, we have some differences people tell us about:

  • You are not required to use any specific payments platform.
  • Our software rental charge is not tied to your sales revenue.
  • There is no penalty charge from us relating to your sales revenue.
  • We have increased our rental fees twice in five years and even then it was a lower than CPI increase.
  • You can talk to any of our leadership team direct and without having to top through a gatekeeper.

One way to compare is our Tower Systems POS software pricing page. Compare the different price-point levels of our software and see where what we offers fits compares with your situation today. We’;re confident we are competitive. better still, we are reliable, and viable.

As multiple Lightspeed earnings calls have revealed over the last year, growing Lightspeed Payments revenue has become a key commercial activity for the Lightspeed business. On our opinion, this pitches them as like a road a tolling business, making a clip from each transaction processed by retailers using their Lightspeed POS software or their Vend POS software.

We don’t care what EFTPOS or payments platform our retail customers use. Our POS software links with all the major Australian banks – there is no extra keying of transaction amounts on credit card machines, no extra keystrokes. Our integrations are good, secure and fast.

We don’t charge a penalty based on the EFTPOS or payments platform our retailers use.

We think retailers need to be able to make the decision as to the best payments platform with which to partner based on factors that matter to them.

If you are a Lightspeed POS or a vend POS customer and are looking for an alternative to Lightspeed Payments, consider Tower Systems. Tell us about your needs. If we can help, we will. If we cannot help, we promise to say so.

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Excellent POS software for charity shops, op. shops and community owned enterprises

January 11, 2024
3 Min read
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Here at Tower Systems we are grateful to serve plenty of local op. shops, charity shops and community owned and run enterprises with POS software that suits the needs of these businesses.

Our charity shop POS software is made to serve needs unique to charity shops, op. shops and community owned enterprises where the day to day workforce is often volunteers who may only do a few hours each month.

Our software is easy to learn and suitable for a variety of settings common to charity shops, op. shops and community enterprises. For example, it’s easy to track sales at a high level buy product type to a next level down based on size / colour / style or a mix of these, down to individual item level. Using our POS software these organisations can learn more about what they sell, when they sell and how products sell.

In service of the valuable work of charity shops, op. shops and community owned enterprises we offer our POS software at a significantly discounted price. This is part of our own commitment to give back where we can, to help support the good work of these enterprises.

We have traditional Aussie op. shops using our POS software, community owned enterprises in the nursery / garden space, church related charity shops, community owned enterprises in other spaces too.

Charity and op. shops are unique and loved businesses and our software covered unique needs like:

  1. Easy to learn. We have found that in community enterprises easy to learn / easy to use really does matter. Volunteer turnover makes this essential. We can record training specific to your needs and make these videos available for future volunteers.
  2. Easy shopper loyalty.  While the software offers a loyalty points system, we have found the cash-off approach in our loyalty tools works better in local retail. People understand money. A receipt showing an amount they can save on their next purchase gets, usually, at least 20% of people spending more that visit.
  3. Manage inventory your way. You can sell by barcode, products code, department, category within department, price point. You can sell, measure and report at the level point appropriate to your needs.
  4. Secure. You can lock down parts of the software to secure them for management access only.
  5. Check and balances. This software guides processes. It also provides hidden tracking so you can investigate should the need arise.
  6. Club / group marketing and support. Leverage clubs and community groups with offers and pricing just for them.

Our Australian made and supported charity shop, op. shop and community owned enterprise shop POS software does more than what’s on this list.

We understand the importance local community groups to the local community.

  • Local matters. Community groups contribute to local communities and families. Our software helps you leverage your localness through many touchpoints.
  • You are a key asset. Only your business has your people. You can leverage them through facilities that share your knowledge of what you sell.
  • You can encourage loyalty. Our loyalty facilities are tuned to charity shop opportunities.
  • The unseen can reveal opportunities. Data, good data, is evidence on which you can expect to make better business decisions, decisions like what can be placed with what to speed sell-through.
  • Not every shopper will walk past your door. A seamless connection between your software and a beautiful website can reach them.

Tower Systems offers local charity shops, op. shops and community owned enterprises exclusive special pricing as part of our community outreach and support commitment. This is something we have thankful to have been able to do for decades.

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Is a website right for your shop? Come on, let’s explore that …

January 11, 2024
2 Min read
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It’s easy to say no to a website if you don’t have one because you don’t know what you don’t know. It’s also easy if you had one in the past and it failed.

Most websites don’t work. Smart people use a failure to do better next time.

Core to website success is filling needs and wants. While needs and wants are quite different, they compel good online business.

Here are the top reasons why we think every retail business needs a website:

  1. Capture sales when you are closed. Typically, more than 50% of online purchases are then the brick and mortar business is closed.
  2. Engage when you are closed. Use chat to answer questions from anywhere, or you geek-out and have an AI chatbot do this.
  3. Reach people not currently shopping with you. Typically, 75% of sales are from people located nowhere near your shop.
  4. Have a second outlet for quitting stock.
  5. Have a place where you can experiment.
  6. Playing with a plan Bin case your shop finds itself in choppy waters.
  7. To learn. A website, especially your first website, teaches you so much: What people want. What they could pay. Haw awful some people are.
  8. To get you out of a rut. If you’ve been in your shop for ages and are mailing it in each day, a website could put a spring in your step.
  9. To make your shop more valuable. Having a website can make your shop more appealing when you decide to sell.
  10. To find a secondary brand. Could be the first step in a shop rebrand.
  11. To drive traffic to the shop. People will find products on your website and visit as a result, for sure.
  12. To give you another source of revenue that is completely unrelated to anything you do in your shop.
  13. To harvest email addresses. Email marketing from Shopify is a breeze.

Having a website gives people a landing page from your Facebook, Instagram and TikTok posts. This is important.

Tower Systems makes Shopify and Big Commerce POS software connected websites to help retailers find new shoppers, sell 24/7, drive in-store traffic and run more valuable retail businesses.

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Tower Systems provides easily actionable POS software use advice to local small business retailers

January 9, 2024
2 Min read
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Each week we provide our customers with easy actionable advice on easy to use the POS software we make to run more valuable local retail businesses. here is advice we provided our customers last week:

Good morning. Grab a coffee or tea and spend 5 minutes with us:

Open Retailer. Go to Reports. Select the last option, Insights Dashboard. Click on What’s Not Selling. This tab will list products not performing. You can adjust settings to suit your specific business.

Stock that is not selling is dead stock, capital tied up, space tied up.

Once you know what is not selling you have the opportunity to act in a targeted way to quit the dead stock and not order it again.

Many retailers ignore looking at dead stock. Some don’t want to know while others are scared to discover it and others don’t think it is important.

In our experience, a retailer looking at dead stock for the fist time will discover that around 20% of their total stock on hand is dead. In a business with $120,000 in stock, that’s $24,000 in capital at risk. Can you afford to have $24,000 doing nothing for your business?

Listing dead stock is one way you can make more money from your business by using your Retailer software.

The Insights dashboard provides easy access to actionable insights into your business. It helps you make more money.

Do it now: Open Retailer. Go to Reports. Select the last option, Insights Dashboard. Click on What’s Not Selling.

If you’d like help doing this or understanding, please reach out. Also, our knowledge base offers an awesome video about the Insights Dashboard.

…

The feedback from our customers about this and other advice encourages us to each week provide ready to use advice to our customer community. Since we only serve local small business retailers, our approach is targeted. Their needs are similar across the various retail channels in which we serve.

Now, in our advice when we refer to Retailer we are referring to our own POS software. That’s been its name for 27 years now. We changed the name in 1997.

We’re not your usual POS software company. We are grateful to offer practical retail management help and advice beyond what its usual for software companies.

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Almost every survey of local small business retailers lists cashflow as their #1 challenge

January 8, 2024
3 Min read
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Having access to the cash you need when you need it is critical in business.

Here are some obvious but too often ignored hacks to help improve the cashflow position of a business.

  1. Quit dead stock. In every retail business we work with we find that at least 20% of stock in the business is dead. That’s cash, space and time being wasted. Identify it. Quit it.
  2. Buy better. Buy stock based on evidence from your POS software. This will result in less dead stock and less out of stock situations – a third of all retail businesses we’ve looked at lost revenue by not having in stock products when shoppers wanted.
  3. Compare suppliers. If you have multiple suppliers for a product category. Compare their performance and act on the evidence. POS software can make this easy. We did this in two of our own shops last year and added $25,000+ in high gross profit revenue to each.
  4. Make shopping easier. Do this and people will spend more: make navigating the shop easier, use signs sparingly – ensure every sign is helpful, offer bundles of products to make occasion purchasing easier, include how to sheets with products as appropriate.
  5. Roster to revenue. Labour is usually the second or third highest business cost. Have your best people selling. Make sure every costed hour adds value to the business.
  6. Pass on actual EFTPOS costs. Use your POS software to auto-calculate the actual cost of a card presented and surcharge this per transaction. Shoppers have been educated now to accept this.
  7. Know the cost of theft. Between 2% and 5% of turnover is the cost of theft (shopper and employee) in indie retail in Australia and New Zealand. Use your POS software to know your stats, and act to reduce this.
  8. Attract more shoppers. Yes, this sounds easier said than done. But … a stunning and unexpected front window or street display will catch attention, fun social media posts will catch attention, a relationship with a community group will catch attention, being online will catch attention.
  9. Get current shoppers buying more. A smart loyalty program with the right settings for your business should achieve this for you. Too often local retailers run points-based loyalty that does not differentiate their business.

This list is a start. There is no one thing you can do to improve cashflow. It takes discipline – we learnt that ourselves for our own shops.

We make POS software used by thousands of local retailers. We use our own software in our own physical shops and our consumer-facing websites.

We’re not your average POS software company. To discover more: email sales@towersystems.com.au or call 1300 662 957.

We make software for bike shops, garden centres, jewellers, gift shops, pet shops, landscape supply businesses, repairs businesses, bookshops,
fishing and outdoors shops, newsagents, produce / farm supply businesses, fabric shops, sewing shops, music shops, computer shops, firearms dealers, charity & op. shops, community enterprises and more.

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Small business retail management advice: greeting customers

January 4, 2024
2 Min read
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The sales clerk asks Can I help you?  You answer No thanks, I’m just looking. You wander ar=round the shop and the sales clerk goes back to what they were doing.

It’s a fail in retail.

If you don’t ask a shopper if you can help them, they don’t have an opportunity to say I’m just looking thanks.

Consider changing your opening with shoppers, ditch the old script of opening by asking how can I help?

Consider a welcome greeting of it’s great to see you today or thanks for stopping by or even simply hi. You could try more active engagement like we just got this in, or have you seen this, it’s really cool while showing a product.

Too often in retail team members are trained in scripts to use and requested to follow them by rote. Scripts dehumanise human interaction, they can make what is meant to feel like conversation shallow, useless, noise.

We think it is critical retail team members are encouraged to ditch scripts and be in the moment when engaging with shoppers. It is important all team members feel trust from the business in their ability to engage.

Oh, and who are we? We’re Tower Systems, makers of POS software used by thousands of local small business retailers, and we are retailers ourselves – have been since the 1990s. We’re not your usual POS software company.

One way to make opening conversation with shoppers on the shop floor easier is doing more work on the shop floor, moving tasks there that may otherwise be done in a back office or at the sales counter.

You can nurture conversation skills in the shop by engaging with the team in active conversation.

Now, if a customer does say they are just looking, a simple no worries is a good response. Certainly, don’t follow them around or try more questions. Leave them be.

Years ago, retail staff were told to engage with shoppers, pressured even. It was as if staff engagement was the key to sales success. While, for sure, it can play a role in some settings, there are many other factors that drive sales: the right products, a well laid out shop, a happy shopping environment, compelling offers and happy team members to name a few.

Shoppers who are looking are wonderful to have, much better than no shoppers at all.

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How do you know you can trust a POS software company?

January 3, 2024
2 Min read
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This is a good question from any small business retailer: How do you know you can trust a POS software company?

The answer can be found in the evidence available for any POS software company you consider.

Transparency = trust. A POS software company that trusts its products and support enough to publish the owner’s direct contact details, phone and email, has to be a company you can trust.

Of course we would say that. It’s what we do at Tower Systems. Our owner’s contact details are on this website, all of our customer emails, all of our customer newsletters and plenty of the marketing that we publish.

It’s rare. Check out other POS software comp ties and most do not publish this. In fact, most do not provide direct contact details for most of their leadership team. It’s like they don’t want you top contact a decision maker in their business.

We do it because we trust our software and we trust our help desk team. Also, we trust small business retailers and enjoy serving them.

Now to be clear, here are the details: Mark Fletcher. 0418 321 338. mark@towersystems.com.au.

Personal service is a key differentiator in local small business retail. The same is true for businesses serving local small business retailers. We know that personal service matters. This is why we make it easy for people to contact not only our owner but all members of our Tower Systems community that serves small business retailers.

Whether it is by phone, email, online chat, WeChat, Zoom, Loom comment, social media comment or in some other way, we are accessible and in service of small business retailers using our POS software.

Ease of contact is a useful comparison point when considering different POS software solutions for your business. You want to be sure that if you have a query it will be responded to in a time efficient way, and by the person best positioned to answer the query. Here at Tower Systems we have a triage approach to ensure that we get your query in front of the person most skilled to answer it for you.

Transparency does equal trust when it comes to comparing POS software for your business.

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If your shop is quiet this week here’s a perfect use of spare time: reduce the dead stock weighing you down

January 2, 2024
2 Min read
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We showed a retailer that more than 25% of the stock in their business was underperforming to the point that it was seriously loss making. There’s a tab on our insights dashboard that shows this.

This first week of the year is a good time to check it, to see if you have dead stock in your shop.

You don’t have to run a report or analyse data in any complex way. Click on the tab and it’s there for you, good or bad.

In the business mentioned above, the dead stock represented more than forty thousand dollars, $40,000, sitting, waiting, doing nothing, failing.

Tower Systems is not your usual POS software company. Sure, we show how to use the software. But, we also offer advice from a business management perspective – how to use the software to drive value for the business and its owners. We do this from the position of being retailers ourselves. We can speak to our experiences in our shops.

We own and run shops where we use our software ourselves.n We provide practical advice to our POS software customers based on our own experiences.

That’s what we do in this dead stock situation. Plus, we draw on decades of practical help to other retailers.

Our advice is to look at dead stock / the age of stock every 3 months. You soon learn the value of buying based on data evidence in the business and being cautious when exploring new product lines.

Your software can guide you to make decisions more likely to work, and less likely to result in dead stock.

We have been working with retailers for many years and continue to be surprised at the disinterest of many retailers in the extent and cost of dead stock in their businesses.

When we bought a retail business a few years back we had written into the contract a cascading discounts for existing stock based on its age beyond 6 months. In that business, more than half the stock had been there for 6 months.

Dead stock costs the business today, and when you come to sell.

In our POS software and thanks to our personal training we help retailers reduce the cost of dead stock in their businesses.

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POS software for Papua New Guinea retailers

December 27, 2023
2 Min read
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We are grateful to supply POS software to retailers in Papua New Guinea.

Each of our specialty retail POS software solutions is available for independent retailers in Papua New Guinea. We support them via our Australian based help desk and they have access to our full suite of services including training, support, access to our knowledge base and access to our self-paces video training curriculum.

Our service of retailers in Papua New Guinea with POS software is current with our most recent engagement just a few weeks ago.

Thanks to cloud based services and our easy to access customer service team we are able serve PNG customers easily.

Jewellers, pet shops, bike shops, garden centres, gift shops, tourist shops, music shops, bookshops, toy shops and produce businesses in Papua New Guinea can all rely on our Tower Systems software and the backup service that we provide.

We make contact with our crew easy to use tech tools like Zoom, Loom, Teams, WeChat and more. This, of course, is in addition to email, chat and other contact pathways.

We don’t only serve retailers in Papua New Guinea with our POS software, we have plenty of customers in New Zealand as well as customers in the Cook Islands and Fiji.

It is the specialty retail facilities in our POS software that local small business retailers in these near countries like. Facilities such as repairs tracking and management, product serial number tracking, smart loyalty tools, dispatch management, integrated EFTPOS, business KPI tracking and comparison, retail theft mitigation, Xero integration, roster management integration and e-commerce sales via Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce and Big Commerce, to name a few.

Tower Systems POS software caters specifically to the needs of independent local retailers, including those in Papua New Guinea, offering user-friendly tools, valuable insights, and easy to access support to help them manage their business efficiently and grow their customer base.

  • Affordable pricing: Offers competitive pricing plans to suit different budgets.
  • No lock-in contracts: No long-term contracts, so you can switch if needed.
  • Secure and reliable: Data is stored securely in the cloud with regular backups.
  • Pay as you go.

We are grateful to serve retailers in Papua New Guinea with our POS software and look forward to welcoming more in 2024.

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Helping local small business retailers win with a Boxing Day Sale

December 26, 2023
3 Min read
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Here are 5 good reasons local small business retailers should embrace the Boxing Day Sale opportunity even if Boxing Day Sales are not a thing in their part of the world.

  1. Marketing costs nothing since you can ride on the coattails of the big retailers promoting their Boxing Day Sales.
  2. You can quit items you no longer wish to stock.
  3. You can free up cash on the items you have long since paid for.
  4. Customers love an opportunity for a bargain.
  5. A successful sale gives you an opportunity for a retail reset, which can be refreshing, motivating and decluttering for the shop space.

There are no rules about what you should sell in a Boxing Day Sale. The only rule, my made-up rule actually, relates to value – you have to price items such that they represent genuine value for shoppers, give them an excellent opportunity to save money that they quickly understand.

Fill the front half of your shop with deals – no matter what type of business you are in.

Don’t spend any money on promotion. rather, email your customers, put a notice on social media. Put signs in your font window. Keep it simple. Announce the sale.

In terms of pricing, keep it simple too. Know what your customers will understand. Some will prefer half price over 50% off or two for one. Others will gravitate toward tables at a fixed price such as $10, $25, $50 etc where the items on the tables are market at prices two times the price point of the table.

Now, if you are closed today, December 26, start your sale tomorrow. It’s easy. Don’t be worried about the technicality that tomorrow is not Boxing Day. Jump on the bandwagon. Declutter, clean up and make some money.

Now, our POS software makes it easy for you to prove items for aa Boxing Day Sale, our POS software can run a catalogue for you, offering sale prices for items you select, and for the period of the sale in your business. Our POS software also helps with reporting on the success of the sale.

And, with a Boxing Day Sale, when you use our POS software you can. Give shoppers a voucher with some money off their next purchase – to bring first-time and infrequent shoppers back into the business. That’s a bonus from running a Boxing Day Sale, the opportunity to bring those new faces back into the shop.

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