What are some of the reason customers become disatisfied and how can you use your point of sale system to avoid this?

We all know that some customers are just trouble no matter how hard yuo work to please them. However these type of people represent the minority, so we will not focus any time on these types of customers. The question we need to ask though is what turns a normally happy customers in to a disgruntled customer and then when we understand this what steps can we  take to avoid these. Also as this is a blog focused towards the retail and point of sale topic, how can we use our point of sale system to help minimise these issues.

As retailers we need to be aware that a customer who has a good experience may tell 1 or 2 people, a customer who has a bad experience will tell 8 to 10. For this reason we need to all that we can to minimise bad customer experiences through utilising our point of sale database.

 The first point to think through is times when we have become unhappy with the service provided by a retailer. When you think about retail sales the issues all revolve around either the quality of the product or the suitability of the prodeuct to meet the requirements of the customer.

First of all if we first assume that the quality of the product is fine an issue can arise if your staff recommend a product to a customer which does not meet the needs of the customer. For example a customer is going camping and is looking at sleeping bags. Now it is important that the retail staff in this situation find out from the customer their budget and the climatic conditions they plan to camp in. This information is either available via brochures or as a minimum needs to be accessible in your point of sale system so that your staff can advise the customer. Now if your staff advise the customer to purchase a sleeping back rate for 5+ degrees celcius and they go camping and it gets to -2 then the customer is likely to be very unhappy with your business. The problem is not with the product but it is with the non suitability of your product for what the customer needs. Also now because the customer has had a sleepless night, shivering in the cold they will be very unhappy and will come in seeking a refund. This situation could have been avoided if your staff receieved the appropriate training and also knew how to access the information in your point of sale system on the product. In some cases the product information is not available to your staff, so you as a business owner need to ensure you get this information in to your point of sale systems which should have support for an extended description.

Lets now deal with the second scenario when you have a defective product. Despite the best quality control provisions sometimes a product is faulty and so we need to make the process of a customer return as painless as possible for the customer while ensuring we have policies in place to protect the business from abusing our processors. First of all you need to have a clear policy for the return of goods that makes the process straigth forward for the customer to understand. You also need to be aware that this policy cannot remove the customers basic rights under common law and the laws of your state. The next step is that you need to be able to track the customer return in your point of sale system including the followon supplier return. This ensures that the customer cannot ask for more refunds than they are due and that you ensure you get a replacement from the supplier. So many retail businesses are very disorganised in the area of the supplier return which affects their profitability. Another important function is your point of sale supports this functionality is to record notes in the original sale or at least the sales return  on the reasons for the return and any other details that will help in the management of your customers. Another very helpful feature I have seen in some point of sale systems is an event log where you can record the the details of all commuinication in the customer management centre. The number of times having this log of communication can resolve a customer issues is amazing. A customer is complaining and you are able to go and read back to the customer all the steps that have been followed and what the customer has agreed to on a previous occasion soon reminds the customer who has forgotten what has happened in the past or is just being difficult.

Another method where your point of sale system can help avoid problems and help you provide better service is in the area of the customer profile. If you can quickly view purchase history and attribute on the customers interests this can help your staff be more aware of the customers requirements. It also is nice for the customer to get the impression that you know about them and are interested in what they are interested in. This is acheived in your point of sale by having tools to quickly view customer history and to be able to record attributes about the customer in their customer management area.

I hope you have been encouraged to review your point of sale system and think about how you can better use is as a tool to manage your moments of truth with a customer. A moment of truch is how well your business as in your staff deal with every interaction with a customers. The better your systems and the way you use your systems such as your point of sale system the better you manage these moments of truch and the more your business will grow.

Have you ever walked into a cafe or fast food store and gone up the counter to place your order and seen the kaos that was happening?

We all remember the times when our order has been lost and after waiting half an hour we have to wait another 30 minutes.

How can you manage your sales and your preparation areas better

The key to a more efficient sales and preparation process is systems. When I talk about systems I am not just referring to computer systems alone but also preparation systems.

So often you see stores where the sale is done on an old cash register, then after the sale the order has to be written down and past through to the kitchen. The order then has to be passed around the various preparation areas. This creates confusion and increase the potential of lost orders and poor customer service.

So what is an ideal simple approach

1. Get yourself a touch screen computer with good touchscreen point of sale software

The reason is that sofwtare provides greater control over the sales process and also provides tools for workflow management. If you can control all the buttons on the touch screen POS and also have orders printed in multiple locations subject to what is in the order then you are positioned to improve your customer service dramtiaclly

The benefit of the touch screen is that  you do not have a mouse and keyboard cluttering the desk and getting ruined by sticky fingers. In additoin a nice touch screen with large buttons makes the sales process so easy and simple.

Additional things to look for in the work flow process is support for phone orders and deliveries. The key aspects you need is a touch screen pos that allows you to track the preparation, the dispatch and the payment status of each order. If you have a high volume of phone orders you may need a dedicated touch screen for this process.

These are just some of the things to consider to improve your customer service. Stay tuned for more tips.