Skip links

Comparing Point of Sale Systems: What’s Best for Your SME?

As the world accelerates through our technologically advanced era, our business practices must keep up. To satisfy a wide array of payment demands, point-of-sale systems are quickly becoming the technology of choice.

These systems have expanded to cover the entire retail supply chain, including inventory, logistics, marketing, customer loyalty, and overall business information, in addition to managing in-store transactions. To avoid ending up with a solution that limits your progress, careful consideration is required.

To help SMEs on their journeys, we previously covered what to look for when choosing a POS machine. In this article, we are diving deeper to explore the many choices of POS systems and some key considerations on how to choose the best one for your business:

How to make a Point of Sale systems comparison

Choosing the right POS system is critical – firstly, because it is a crucial tool for your company’s growth; secondly, because it creates a solid operational foundation to build on. It is your primary interface with customers and a barometer for monitoring customer feedback and in-store sales.

Now that you know what benefits a POS system can deliver, you’re ready to choose a solution for your needs. Where do you start? It may help to first outline your business’s requirements by asking yourself some key questions:

1. Where are you on your business journey?

There is no uniform approach to choosing a POS system, as different companies have different needs. For example, if you are just starting your company, you’ll want something efficient and straightforward to use. But suppose you are scaling up your SME. In that case, you’ll want to upgrade to a POS system that includes software that can help manage your growth with detailed sales reports, analytics, a customer relationship management environment, and loyalty programs.

2. What are your main business challenges?

Every SME is constantly chasing growth opportunities. Often that means that one-size-fits-all solutions are not a native fit for all environments. Choosing a basic POS system to tailor to your needs and subsequently adding features as you grow is a preferred approach by business owners as they scale.

The ideal POS system for a growing business should not only be affordable and easy to use, but it should also serve as a software and data gathering hub for tools like sales, cash flow. It should also help synchronise sales with back-end accounting platforms, credit cards, and payment processors to channel funds from sales to your company’s bank accounts. Working with a partner like Trust Payments that offers 24h support is essential – this way, you can resolve any problems with your POS device quickly and ensure continuity for accepting payments.

3. What features should your POS have to cover the needs of your customers best?

Often SME business owners are jacks of all trades as they’re trying to fill in roles that range from Managing Director to Sales Manager – this means they often have little time to spare for evaluation and optimisation.

With the right POS system, you can automate accounting, payroll, inventory management and timesheets. Additionally, your POS system can help evaluate your sales performance, saving you hours in the process. You can get access to charts, graphs, and heat maps for your sales processes. This information will give you a baseline against your competitors and help you map your progress against market benchmarks. Moreover, having real-time access to all your online and POS payment transactions helps you monitor and inform future decisions so you can maximise revenue and minimise costs.

If you are selling online, consider buying a POS solution that integrates with your other channels so that you can track and manage all your sales in one place – whether through an e-commerce store, an online marketplace or social media.

Additionally, partner with a POS solution that has a wide range of card acceptance types in addition to the standard Visa, MasterCard, and AMEX cards. Our Tru SME solutions support cards from JCB, Diners, Discover, UPI, as well as Apple and Google wallets. Broadening payment options will allow you to increase your revenue by meeting your customers’ payment preferences.

4. What pricing model can you afford?

Cloud-based POS solutions typically have a tiered pricing model, with costs based on the number of stores, customers, products, terminals, and features. Other providers take a percentage of your turnover. Examine each level to see which one provides the highest possible return on investment and ensures that you’re equipped with the right tools for the job.

Conclusion

While there are a lot of options for POS systems, asking the right questions before choosing one will ensure the best possible fit. Good choices will reward business owners with significant time savings and a clearer picture of their company’s journey. A reliable partner to your growth, the ideal POS system will help you keep track of all aspects of your business and even assist with occasional necessities like seasonal inventory and how to stock up to make better sales. In other words, selecting the right POS system for your SME can make or break your growth journey.

Security statement

Security is our top priority at Trust Payments and we strive to ensure that all data is kept secure at all times We keep all customer data safe with AES256 encryption, SSL Certificates, and a minimum of TLS1.2, between your website and our datacentres.

Our systems are scanned quarterly using the Qualys PCI Platform, an independent Qualified Security Assessor (QSA) and approved vendors – Omnicybersecurity (UK) & Forgenix (US) – to ensure compliance with the security requirements of the card schemes.

We follow a number of rigorous security procedures on a daily basis including, but not limited to, continuous monitoring of our perimeter, dark web monitoring, and internal checks to ensure that CIA triad is maintained at all times.

Keep up with the latest in payments!

Fill the form below to sign up to our mailing newsletter.