The Small Business Guide To POS Reporting
Point of sale reporting tools can help you grow your business and simplify your day-to-day operations. Our guide gives you examples of POS reports and the best vendor options.
POS reporting is one of the most important features of the best POS systems for small businesses.
The most essential POS reports for your small business are:
- Sales
- Payment
- Employee
- Inventory
- Customer
Maverick Tip: Did you know your POS system might already offer some (if not all) of these reports? Check out your insights, reporting, or general menu tab, and you’ll find them ready to be used or updated.
Table of Contents
What Is POS Reporting?
A POS report is a collection of data your point of sale system gathers. Because modern POS systems can track item sales, credit card transactions, employee hours, and more, they can also generate a variety of reports on a weekly, daily, or monthly basis.
The biggest benefit to POS reporting tools is the ability to show trends, such as popular items or busiest times, that can feed into making crucial business decisions like what inventory to buy, when to schedule more employees, or when to push sales to make up for a natural annual decline.
How Does POS Reporting Work?
At this point, POS systems have grown far beyond a simple solution for an outdated cash register.
No longer does your POS system handle only in-person sales. Your POS, whether locally installed or cloud-based, can be a hub for every aspect of your small business.
A good POS system will deliver reports based on data it has collected automatically each day. This data includes (but is not limited to) sales, inventory, employee time punches, and register balances. Your POS can also collect information from online orders, customer reviews, marketing results, and more.
There are even some POS systems that integrate with technology that allows you to count your store’s foot traffic. There’s almost no aspect of your business that can’t be measured and turned into a report.
POS reports can be accessed via the POS terminal, a web portal, and/or a dedicated mobile app, depending on the POS system.
Are Some POS Reports Better Than Others?
Like anything in the world, one POS report is going to be better for some small business owners than another. It depends on personal preference.
That being said, some standard features will make one POS report better than the next. Readability, the complexity of the data, and the way a POS report is accessed (terminal, portal, app, etc.) will all impact a user’s satisfaction.
If a report has too much granular information and is displayed on a small screen with a complicated UI, it’s going to be useless to most business owners.
You may also find certain POS reports more useful than others based on your unique business needs.
For example, suppose you’re especially worried about the cost of labor. In that case, employee time reports are going to be more important to you than a report of the social media metrics from a marketing campaign.
5 Essential POS Reports
Now that you know more about POS reporting, we can discuss the 5 most important point of sales reports.
How To Choose The Right POS System
It can take some time to find the perfect POS system for your small business. You’ll need to consider the features you need, how much a POS system costs, hardware options, and more to be sure you’re making the right choice.
Check out our article on choosing a POS system to learn more!
The Bottom Line On POS Reporting
At this point, most POS systems offer some kind of basic reporting. If you find one that doesn’t, it might not be a good choice. Reporting is crucial for business owners to stay up-to-date with their business, employees, and customers and keep everything running smoothly.
We understand that some industries need more specific features along with great reporting. Whether you need a POS system for your bar or the ability to set appointments on your POS for service-based businesses, there is a perfect fit for you.
Don’t settle for a second-rate POS system just because it has some of the features you want. Find the unique and customizable solution that’s perfect for you, your business, your employees, and your customers and has all the features you need.
Happy reporting!