Spring is a time for growth and renewal. As you may have heard, we launched our iOS Sales app recently, and we’re getting ready to launch an updated user interface soon as well. To help facilitate these changes we’re launching a new Login page, which will look different than the screen you are used to seeing when logging into your MerchantOS point of sale.

Not to worry though, everything functions the same, just with a new and improved look. And we added some subtle flair too… we can’t help ourselves. 

Look for our new login page early next week. Here is a snapshot of what it will look like.

In the last few years we updated and polished the look and feel of our web site and branding but the actual product’s look and feel hasn’t gotten a lot of love from our design team. That’s about to change in major way – we’re working on a significant refresh of the MerchantOS look-and-feel and we want to get your input early and often as we work towards releasing this exciting update to MerchantOS.

Rescheduled to due to illness on Thursday, March 28st at 3pm PST we will host our first online “User Experience (UX) Open House” where you can see an early version of the new user interface, ask questions and make suggestions about what you’d like to see in both this current project and future ones. Sign-up to attend the UX Open House online (25 registrant maximum). Continue reading →

We’re excited to announce our release of the latest version of the MerchantOS Point of Sale App for iOS. The MerchantOS Mobile Sales App allows you to conduct simple sales with your iPhone or iPod Touch. You can add items by scanning barcodes using the built-in camera or by searching by keyword. Additionally you can look-up current stock-levels for any item in your inventory, connect sales to existing customers or add new customers all from the app. We’ve kept it simple to make sure it works quickly and easily and we’ll continue to improve the App as time goes on. Continue reading →

What You Take Out is as Important as What You Put In

By Tim Leaver, The Bike Cooperative

The point of sale software that MerchantOS offers is earning rave reviews from bike dealers across the country.  A number of our Bike Cooperative members tell me how much they like its ease-of-use, reliability, and the amazing support provided by the MerchantOS team.  However, if you want your point of sale to help grow your sales, not just track them, there is an additional feature that’s an absolute ‘must-have’ when making an investment in a new point of sale: the ability to export customer and transaction data.

Here’s why…

When a customer comes in and buys a bike, you enter that customer and transaction into your point of sale. Then what happens to that information? The ability to add them to your email list for your next blast is great. But there’s a whole lot more you can do with that customer and transaction data if your point of sale can integrate a customer loyalty platform, like the one the Bike Cooperative has for its members, Ride Club.

The following scenario helps to illustrate what’s possible:

Joe Customer buys a bike from you, and you enter his address, email address and transaction information into your point of sale. A personalized ‘thank you’ is emailed to Joe shortly after his bike purchase, with an incentive to come back to the store to purchase accessories. In that same email, you ask Joe how he would rate his recent experience at your store.  A few months later, another follow-up email is sent to Joe offering him some additional items he may need.  And when his bike is a year old, Joe gets a reminder to bring his bike in for a tune-up.

This is all realistic when you have a point of sale that can export data into an automated customer loyalty platform.  One of the reasons why we recommend MerchantOS to so many retailers is because it has this capability, and more importantly, the dealers that are utilizing it are getting results. For example, members who have synched MerchantOS with our Ride Club loyalty program to send out individualized communications to customers are getting much better response rates than blast emails – an average unique open rate of 55% compared to the retail industry average of 17%*.  More consistent, relevant communications with higher response rates translates into more frequent visits by customers and more sales of higher margin items like accessories and clothing.

If you’re exploring marketing initiatives to help increase your sales this season, the place to start is with your point of sale system.  Make sure it has the capability to automatically pull customer and transaction data, and send those files to whoever is executing your marketing efforts.  If you’re already on MerchantOS, feel good knowing that an automatic data feed is one less thing you’ll have to worry about this season!

*Source: 2012 Silverpop Email Marketing Metrics Benchmark Study