Retail trends are constantly evolving, but one consistent demand from consumers is the need for a seamless shopping experience whether they are online or in-store. This growing expectation places significant pressure on retailers to offer unified and harmonious experiences across multiple channels. To stay competitive and meet this demand, retailers require a point-of-sale (POS) system that can quickly adapt and innovate as the retail landscape changes.
Shopify POS has seen over 150 product updates in recent times, focusing on creating superior omnichannel retail experiences. These enhancements aim to unify customer interactions across different touchpoints, making it easier to manage interactions both online and offline. This article will delve into six essential updates from Shopify Editions, the brand’s semi-annual product announcement event, and how these updates turn in-store experiences into omnichannel growth.
1. Email Capture at Checkout
Retail store locations provide an invaluable opportunity for businesses to understand their customers and build long-term relationships. However, without connectivity between in-person and online interactions, customer data often becomes siloed, hindering effective engagement after they leave the store. The email capture feature in Shopify POS provides a solution to this issue, enabling retailers to link in-person sales with online customer profiles.
Since its introduction in May, Shopify retailers have witnessed an average 5.5% increase in retail transactions associated with customer information. This not only aids in acquiring repeat customers but also makes the process more cost-effective. The feature allows retailers to effortlessly collect more first-party buyer data during the in-store checkout process, offering a comprehensive, omnichannel view of shoppers by connecting in-store and online purchases.
When customers pay with a credit card, email capture matches in-store transactions to the Shop app’s network of over 150 million users. Customer emails are populated and displayed at checkout, allowing them to skip manually typing their email address. Customers can then choose to receive a digital receipt in the Shop app and opt into marketing communications, reducing friction and automating the email entry process.
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Access Admin Settings – In the admin panel, go to your Settings in the Point of Sale sales channel.
- Navigate to Customer Receipt Options – Then proceed to Customer receipt selection and switch Customer receipt selection on.
- Enable Email Capture – From there, you can activate email capture for all your locations or choose from your location list.
2. Rebuilt Ship to Customer
Omnichannel customers increasingly demand flexible fulfillment options that align with their preferences and convenience. If retailers fail to meet these expectations, they risk losing sales, leading to negative customer experiences. The ship-to-customer functionality in Shopify POS addresses this challenge by connecting in-store checkout with home delivery options.
In 2023, Shopify retailers generated $850 million in sales using the ship-to-customer functionality at checkout on POS. This feature offers a swift, intuitive workflow that lets staff add, edit, and remove items in a shipping cart directly from the POS checkout. The updated order-routing logic and shipping tools allow store staff to either initiate a shipping order or convert an in-store purchase to a shipping order, enhancing customer satisfaction and increasing sales.
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Complete Shipping Settings – First, go into Shopify admin and ensure your shipping settings are finalized.
- Initiate Shipping Order – Store staff can either start an order as a shipping order or convert an order into a shipping order after adding items to the cart.
- Add Customer Details – Staff can then add the customer and their preferred delivery address to the cart.
- Select Shipping Method – Staff will choose the shipping method. Shopify POS calculates the order total, including shipping fees, and deducts inventory based on your fulfillment logic.
- Complete Sale – The staff member then completes the sale in-store, and the order is shipped directly to your customer’s preferred location.
3. Ship from Store
Ship from store is an innovative fulfillment method included in Shopify POS’s shipping upgrades. This feature enables retailers to make their in-store inventory available to both online and offline customers, maximizing product availability and customer convenience. Ship-from-store functionality transforms retail outlets into mini fulfillment centers, which is a hallmark of effective omnichannel retailing.
Retailers can route online orders to retail locations for fulfillment, reducing shipping costs, saving time, and expediting delivery times by shipping from a store close to the customer. This method not only moves more in-store inventory but also improves staff productivity by empowering them to pick and pack orders.
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Receive Order Notification – When an order is ready to be fulfilled, the Shopify POS app will alert store staff with a push notification.
- View Orders Due for Shipping – Permissioned staff can then navigate to the Orders index to view orders that are due for shipping, including product details and quantities.
- Pick and Pack Order – Staff complete the task by picking and packing the order, printing the packing slip, and purchasing the shipping label.
- Mark Order as Fulfilled – Staff will then mark the order as fulfilled, and the order is ready for carrier pickup.
4. Return Rules
Returns are a common aspect of retail, but without well-defined policies, they can become costly and even prone to fraud. Efficient return policies that apply uniformly to both online and in-store purchases allow retailers to manage returns without significantly denting their profits. Shopify POS introduces return rules to help retailers enforce clear, strong policies for in-store returns.
These return rules help staff quickly ascertain whether a product is eligible for return and provide clear reasons for customers if it’s not. This reduces overheads and uncertainties for staff and guards against potential revenue losses due to fraudulent or out-of-policy returns.
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Access Policies Settings – Go into your Shopify admin > then Settings > Policies.
- Manage Return Policies – In Policies, you can manage your return policies by turning return rules on.
- Configure Return Rules – You can then set up the rules to match your return policy.
5. Discounts
Crafting effective discount strategies is pivotal for driving revenue and encouraging higher purchase volumes. Shopify POS now includes unified discount features that streamline the discount process across in-store and online platforms, ensuring a cohesive customer experience. A consistent discount strategy across all channels prevents situations where customers find different discounts online and in-store, thus maintaining customer trust and satisfaction.
Shopify POS introduces three new discount updates: Buy X, Get Y; stack discounts; and discount functions. These updates allow retailers to customize their discount promotions more effectively and enable omnichannel discounts, ensuring that the same promotions apply both online and in-store.
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Create Customized Discounts – Retailers can create customized discounts in the Discounts section of the Shopify admin.
- Select Discount Type – You can then select the type of discount you want to create, such as Buy X, Get Y.
- Generate Discount Card – Using the Create Discount action, you can generate a Discount creation card. There, you can input the discount name, quantity or purchase amount, the value, eligibility, active dates, and combinations.
- Activate Omnichannel Discounts – You can create omnichannel discounts by selecting the channels where you want to activate the discount. For POS, you would select the Point of Sale channel.
6. POS UI Extensions
Shopify POS stands out for its extensibility, allowing retailers to tailor the POS system to their specific business needs using POS UI extensions. These extensions enable high-performing, customized POS app enhancements that look and function like native Shopify workflows, ensuring a seamless user experience for both staff and customers.
POS UI extensions are developed using the Shopify CLI, a command-line interface tool that simplifies generating, building, and deploying extensions. This approach leverages a comprehensive set of components to ensure the extensions are cohesive and perform efficiently, loading faster than other technical solutions.
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Use Shopify CLI – UI extensions are built on the Shopify CLI, a command-line interface tool, which allows developers to generate, build, and develop extensions locally and deploy quickly.
- Utilize Shopify Components – UI extensions are made using a comprehensive set of components. These components help you create a custom app extension that looks, feels, and performs like a native Shopify workflow.
To configure customer receipt options in your Point of Sale sales channel, follow these detailed steps.
Access Admin Settings: Begin by navigating to the admin panel. Once there, look for the settings specifically in the Point of Sale (POS) sales channel. This is where you will manage various aspects of your POS system, including receipt configurations.
Navigate to Customer Receipt Options: Within the settings, identify the section dedicated to customer receipts. You’ll need to turn on the option for customer receipt selection. This feature allows you to dictate how and when receipts are provided to customers, whether as paper copies, digital formats, or both. Enabling this setting gives you control over the receipt process, ensuring your business meets customer preferences and operational needs.
Enable Email Capture: The next step involves setting up email capture. This functionality allows you to collect customer email addresses across all your physical locations or select specific ones based on your operational strategy. Activating email capture is beneficial as it lets you streamline communication with your customers, send digital receipts, and build a valuable customer contact list for future marketing efforts.
By following these steps, you enhance your POS system’s flexibility and improve your customer service by offering them more receipt options. This not only makes transactions smoother but also aids in maintaining organized records and fostering a better customer relationship through personalized communications.