By Manan Mehta
POSsible POS Inc.
ISOs and merchant level salespeople are part of an exciting industry shift with mobile payment demands and EMV (Europay, MasterCard and Visa) technology standards adoption. The recent industry changes are prompting a need for additional training and resources, while also providing tremendous opportunities for market growth. Offering a complete solution for operations management from merchant processing services to a robust POS system can foster account acquisitions growth and cross-selling opportunities.
When considering among the many POS solutions to add to your offerings mix, the three primary areas to carefully evaluate are partner support, customer support and product innovation.
As a merchant services provider, you have dedicated marketing efforts and training to establish a trusted brand image, and tying in a solution to your offerings mix can strengthen your company's image, as long as the POS provider practices a high level of customer service and proactively manages its brand reputation.
In considering whether to work with a particular POS company, evaluate the processes it employs to resolve all customer issues as they occur, using service-level agreement standards to prevent downtime. To meet your customers' deployment goals on new orders or upgrades, you should also learn about the POS company's scale of distribution and current reseller partners to assess turnaround times.
Co-branding provides an opportunity to tie your brand's success to another brand that has achieved brand recognition through demand-pull marketing efforts. Inquire about how the POS company can raise awareness of your brand and how it positions its product line in the marketplace to complement and strengthen your offerings with a brand that your prospective customers value.
A co-branded partnership is a strategic relationship that requires ongoing support from the POS provider through training and marketing materials to assist with a merchant provider's marketing and sales initiatives. The POS provider should assign to its partners a dedicated account manager who learns the company's processes, keeps up with its changes and seeks to offer complementary solutions that result in superior customer value.
Beyond the dedicated resources delivered to your entire team, your POS partner should aim to be an extension of your marketing, sales and customer service team from the initial assessment of your business requirements to providing training and ongoing support. To ensure a seamless integration, it should also adapt to your specific business processes. Simply put, it should make the process work for you, thus allowing you to focus on your business priorities.
Providing customer value is not a transaction; it is a process to continuously innovate and exceed customer expectations. Other attributes to look for in a POS provider's offerings are a pre-configured, plug-and-play system that includes free training and ongoing 24/7 customer support and free software upgrades as new technologies emerge in the marketplace. Ideally, the company should also conduct extensive market research with businesses in the verticals you serve. It's goal should be to innovate its POS hardware and software system to stay abreast of emerging market trends to help you remain competitive.
Flexibility is also a quality to seek in a POS provider. It should offer an array of solutions, from a turnkey POS-in-a-box solution to customized solutions across its entire product line. These could include client-based and cloud-based offerings; customer loyalty programs; advanced, centralized reporting; social marketing integration; and other attributes in demand by merchants.
Manan Mehta, Chief Executive Officer of Stafford, Texas-based POSsible POS Inc., attributes the company's sizable nationwide footprint to its ISO and merchant level salespeople partners. POSsible POS is dedicated to integrating its efforts to support its clients' marketing and sales initiatives. To learn more about POSsible's partner programs, training and support, please visit www.possiblepos.com, call 1-800-767-9585 or email Mehta directly at mmehta@possiblepos.com.
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