The apparel industry has witnessed a lot of changes in the last decade, all majorly related to the adoption of new technologies to enhance the businesses. Retailers are now more receptive to technology than ever before and see it as a competitive advantage in the times of aggressive competition. A lot of new concepts like endless aisle, self-checkout, omnichannel retail, etc. have emerged and been adopted by various retailers to amplify their businesses. One of the recent new technologies, being widely adopted by retailers, is a cloud POS solution to improve the customer engagement and experience.
A cloud POS solution is modern billing software hosted on a secure cloud server, allowing retailers to eliminate the need to install any software or to maintain an on-site server. The greatest advantage of a cloud POS software is its accessibility, i.e. it can be accessed from anywhere at any time. It also brings platform independence in terms of device choice, letting retailers to use the POS on any device as they require, right from a desktop to a mobile phone. And when the same cloud POS is used on a mobile device, it takes up the form of a widely known solution, called the mobile point of sale (mPOS).
An mPOS is a smartphone, tablet or dedicated wireless device that acts as an alternative to the traditional cash register and electronic POS system. For the establishment of mPOS, a business needs an internet connection, a credit or debit card reader, and it can also be integrated with other devices like barcode scanner. mPOS can run on any smartphone or tablet with a special application installed on it. The technology allows the staff representatives to make sale from any point within the store while helping the customers with their shopping decisions. The technology frees the staff from having to stand at the cash counter, allowing them to indulge more with the customers and respond to their needs.
Bringing such flexible technology in India is the ZWING POS solution with its latest cloud technology. Shubham Maurya, CPO, ZWING, says, “We have created ZWING with the intent to bring ease to retailers with an intuitive billing interface along with key inventory management operations on the mobile platforms like stock movement, audit and reports.”
Real-time visibility of businesses is the need of the hour. Many Indian retailers have been quick at adopting cloud technology, while others are in the queue. Business owners seek real-time updates regarding the sales, inventory and an overview of the integrated channels of the business to make right decisions at the right time. With the flexibility of a cloud-based platform, we can collect data from multiple touchpoints, which would have never been possible with a traditional POS system; making customer analytics available on the go. With cloud POS, retailers can now actively collaborate with other businesses like online marketplaces, CRM platforms, omnichannel platforms, etc. to tap into the growing opportunities and expand their reach to the customers.
The online space has seen massive growth in the last decade, and retailers have seen this as an opportunity to strengthen their businesses. All kinds of retailers – FMCG, electronics, lifestyle and especially apparel – have focused on the omnichannel model where they intend to coalesce both the offline and online retail, with an aim to give their customers a unified experience and also to make their operations more efficient.
Modern retailers don’t just rely on their primary business channels for data, but also learn from secondary business channels. Acquiring consumer data from multiple channels allows retailers to recognise their customers in a better way. Customer centricity is being seen as the answer for thriving in such fierce competition, bringing CRM and loyalty platforms into the spotlight that give retailers the much-needed insight about their customers and their buying behaviour, which is being used in further improvement and personalisation of the customer experience.
The POS, being the driving force for all the store operations, acts as the nodal point for all such collaborations. Its technology permits integration of third party business channels, allowing the POS to give the necessary data like inventory and customer details and receiving the information like sales analysis and customer analysis. The cloud POS has made the integration with other business channels a fairly easy task with its open API technology. Rather than following the traditional FTP or database sharing approach, the API integrations save a lot of time and bandwidth, and are also very scalable in nature.
Rishabh Shukla, Founder and CEO, ZWING, says, “Understanding the omnichannel shift, ZWING comes pre-integrated with all the leading OMS platforms, giving a single interface platform for store staff. We want to equip retailers with our retail management solution and our partner ecosystem to allow them to gain insight from different sources and utilise it for their business growth.”
ZWING POS is being used by hundreds of stores across the country, with V-Mart and 1India Mart as its anchor clients.
