If you are an entrepreneur running either a stand-alone salon or a chain of salons, by now you well understood how essential a POS software is for the business. Personally, I feel that a salon POS software is functionally similar to a salon chair. The way a salon chair is designed to give customers exceptionally comfort seating; a POS software must be designed to provide a comfortable foundation to efficiently run the business processes.
Therefore, it is not out to place to state that one must have high expectations from a salon POS software. The way clients expect nothing but the best from the enterprise, the enterprise must expect nothing but the best from the salon POS software. The internet is rife with reviews on multiple POS software listing all the pros and the cons, and by reading as many you may have gained a fair idea to ascertain what to expect or not expect, yet it is important to know the laundry list of must have expectations. Read along to know the non-negotiable features that your business should have from your POS software.
Simple to Use
The popularity of a software is directly proportional with its learning curve. You may design a state of art software, with best in class features but if it is complicated to use the chances of it being adopted will be bleak. The administrative business processes that a team of professional need to execute to run a salon are already complicated. Since each and every team member is unlikely to have the same acumen to grasp technology and use it efficiently, the last thing they would want on their mind is to deal with a POS software that has a steep learning curve. Therefore, it is important to choose a software which has a logical navigation such that it would be hard to make mistakes and add to client wait times.
Speed & Accuracy
The purpose of relying on technology is to speed up the processes. The software must be up-to-date and be able to handle multiple requests without making users wait for long and with 100% accuracy. Considering the requirement, it is natural to expect the software to offer a comprehensive, uncomplicated, and accurate process flow. Whether it is appointment booking and scheduling or processing payments and making relevant accounting entries, all the processes must be done swiftly and accurately.
Security
The use of technology has both benefits and disadvantages. There have been multiple horror stories where businesses have lost crucial and important client data, including bank and card details due to cyber attacks and frauds. Thus, an important expectation from the POS software must be to ensure robust security of the data. Modern day clients are no stranger to the perils of the cyber frauds, and they are likely to patronize businesses more when they know that the enterprise keeps their data completely secure and away from prying eyes. The software should not allow access of crucial data without authorization.
Modular Approach
A good POS software design involves modular approach, where clients can choose various modules within a single software to run business processes. To cite some examples, a software must have calendar module for appointments and schedules, a marketing module to improve customer interaction and sales, a payment & accounting module to record all incoming and outgoing transactions, an employee management module to run payrolls, calculate commissions and tips, and monitor performance. These modules are parts of the same software and come under the single umbrella.
Scalability
Every business wants to grow. You may start your operations from a single store, but dream to have a multi store chain spread across the town and eventually the district. The POS software should be able to support the aspirations of your businesses. The architecture of the software should be such that it can be easily scaled to meet the ever-changing aspirations and requirements of the businesses.
Business Mobility
The demands of present times is for people to be constantly mobile. As such businesses also need to be mobile. While it is not physically possible for a brick-and-mortar store to move along, it is possible for the controls of the businesses to be accessible from any location. This is done by the ensuring that the POS software of your salon doesn’t save the data on local server but on a cloud-based server. With the data being on a cloud-based system, you can access it on the go, and from any device be it a laptop, a desktop, a phone or a tablet.
Life Cycle Support
Tech products and devices are prone to malfunction, and without any prior intimation. Therefore, it is important to ensure that the POS software comes with an excellent tech support. There can’t be anything worse than being stuck with a POS software which has glitches and poor customer support from the developer.
Some of the tried and tested salon POS software in the market, which meet almost all the essential expectations listed above are Zenoti, SalonIris, Schedul, MindBody and Phorest. Zenoti’s salon POS software is a personal favourite because it comes with a remarkably easy learning curve and state of art user interface.
