How to Alter Your Business Operations to Limit Exposure During (and After) a Pandemic

As a retailer, you have probably had to scale back your operations to nominal in-person contact, moved operations entirely online or perhaps even entirely closed shop amidst the COVID-19 restriction.

It is hard, we know, but we are here to provide you some useful methods to implement at your company to align with best practices for limiting exposure as you keep operating or in planning to reopen your doorways. As an increasing number of states and countries are beginning to open up, the definition of key company is expanding, and now’s the time to prepare your store for selling again and invest in the resources to keep your employees and clients safe.

The key takeaways are simple: four practices you can implement to ensure a safe environment for the employees and clients, while simultaneously keeping money flowing in and your head above water.

1. Offer contactless perks and applications.

Loyalty rewards and digital gift cards are a terrific way to provide perks with no requirement for a physical exchange. They could be tied into a number or a individual in a client management system; no reason to pass anything back and forth.

If you are still using a card-based rewards program, now’s the time to go electronic. A modern loyalty solution lets you offer incentives and perks to shoppers without needing to use physical stamp cards. All you need is the client’s name, telephone number, or email and you will have the ability to monitor and redeem rewards without difficulty.

2. Communicate with clients digitally.

Now more than ever, digital communication is crucial to remain top-of-mind and current with clients. These communications will need to happen before, during and after the sale to guarantee consistency.

Before the sale, using email and SMS, such as Marsello’s email and SMS loyalty and automated advertising, enables companies to remain in contact with clients on special deals, reopening or phased opening dates, as well as unique ways that you are able to service your clients that maybe you have never done before, such as curbside offerings.

During and after the purchase you are able to utilize a customer database through your shopping cart, POS or Payment Gateway to store and send electronic receipts through email that include a list of itemized goods or services purchased. This is particularly helpful in times like these when purchases may be made before delivery or pick up. For payments made remotely, it is essential to have the ability to supply digital copies of payment authorization and purchases to avoid the probability of chargebacks.

Asking for feedback is another fantastic way to connect with customers after the purchase. Use tools such as ConnectPOS and Marsello to send followup emails inviting shoppers to rate their expertise.

The feedback that you get from the clients can be incredibly enlightening and let you enhance the shopping experience much more.

3. Restrict physical touch points between employees and clients.

Whether you’re allowing clients to come in to make purchases, or are preparing to reopen your doorways, using technology to help eliminate the need for physical contact for both your employees and clients will help minimize virus exposure and keep operations running smoothly.

For your staff that are doing inventory and restocking, using an inventory scanner app can significantly limit the amount of devices and items your staff should touch. ConnectPOS’s Scanner app turns your iOS device into a powerful mobile barcode scanner without the need to use additional hardware. And if you are already using ConnectPOS, you can skip manual merchandise entry by having Scanner automatically replicate your merchandise details as you scan. ConnectPOS + Scanner sync to upgrade counts and inventory records from the device — no more manual uploads.

Cashiers can further prevent touching merchandise by using fast keys for popular items and product lookup, rather than physically grabbing a product off the floor to discover a SKU or price.

4. Implement contactless payment systems

Both staff and clients can feel more secure during the checkout procedure by utilizing payment devices offering a zero-touch experience. Bear in mind that lots of jurisdictions (such as Santa Barbara and Georgia for example) are advocating this as part of the plans to reopen. What does this mean? A Couple of things:

A) Use a customer-facing terminal to make sure there’s not any demand for your cashiers to deal with a client’s card, the payment may be triggered via your POS and the client is prompted to begin payment on the terminal display.

B) Accept all types of payment, specifically contactless payments (believe ApplePay), so a client can simply wave their smartphone or contactless-enabled credit card within the terminal; no need to add or swipe a card and touch the apparatus.

C) Disable signature and reception prompts on the terminal. Signatures are no longer a necessity provided that you use EMV-enabled apparatus to process payments. Removing these measures, in conjunction with a contactless payment method, means the customer never touches the terminal during checkout. You can still email a receipt for their records and you will automatically receive a digital copy, provided that you’re using a competent, integrated payments system.

With reopening strategies and government advice being published daily, it is important to be certain that you are ready to work in the”new standard” to come, so adopting more digital communications and operations with your staff and clients.

Reference sources

1. what-merchants-should-know-about-online-shoppers
2. best-shopify-pos-apps-for-retail
3. top-payment-gateways-for-pos