Businesses of all types are learning about the advantages of the cloud in today’s competitive and data-driven economy. If you’re the manager of a restaurant franchise with several locations, organizing all of your sales, labor, and other data from all of your restaurants can be a burden.
A smart point of sale (POS) solution with cloud-based reporting, such as Milagro, can make these tasks much easier.
The Importance Of Collecting Actionable Business Data
Most businesses recognize that collecting actionable customer data is critical for making sound business decisions. However, most businesses do not use this data to their advantage. Needless to say, it defeats the purpose of collecting data in the first place.
Using business analytics tools such as Milagro SmartPOS to generate point-of-sale reports (POS reports) can help you better understand your business and make more informed decisions that move you closer to your goal.
But first, what exactly is POS reporting? Your point-of-sale (POS) system records every transaction you make throughout the day. Standard POS systems only track the basics, such as the items purchased and the total amount of a transaction.
Modern POS systems, such as Milagro SmartPOS, collect additional data that help with your understanding of your business and its customers. For example, you can use POS data to determine how frequently a customer visits your establishment and how much money they spend each time.
Milagro SmartPOS is a great option as it collects all of this data. In addition, it gives you access to built-in analytics tools. These tools can help you sort through all of the data to identify trends and insights that will aid you in making decisions.
Benefits Of Cloud-based Reporting
Milagro ROS platform combines SmartPOS, SmartWAIT, SmartX, and SmartMenus which provides a complete cloud-based Restaurant Operating System (ROS) for restaurants. Here are 3 of the main benefits you get when using our cloud marketing automation platform:
- Accessibility: Cloud-based reporting and POS solutions are typically provided as a Software-as-a-Subscription (SaaS). That means you can access your reports on any device that has an internet connection. Better yet, you can access this data and run analytics on a 24/7 basis.
Whether you’re working while on the road or attending a special event, the data will be available for you whenever you need it. - Visibility across the chain:
If you’re managing multiple locations, cloud-based reporting can help you be more productive and produce higher quality work. Cloud reporting provides a centralized system that enables you to access data from any location. This will give you detailed views of each store and an overall view of the business.
As your business continues to grow and add more branches, the cloud provides greater data storage capacity versus an on-site data system. Not only that but it will be cheaper too! - Enhanced security: Having access to consolidated data from various locations is good. But keeping your data safe with redundancy and backups is much better. Accidents and natural disasters can interrupt the normal flow of your day-to-day operations. Even worse, it can cause you to lose valuable customer data.
When you work with a cloud-based solution like Milagro, your data is stored off-premises in the cloud with automatic backups. So whenever disaster strikes, you can rest easy knowing your data is secured.
5 Essential POS Reports You Should Run
Modern POS systems have A LOT of different kinds of reports you can run. But the truth is, most business owners don’t have the time or need to run every report available. However, there are key reports that can help restaurants make better business decisions.
Here are the key reports you should be running regularly:
- General analytics: One of the main advantages of using POS dashboards is that they are real-time and give you a bird’s eye view of your business.
A general summary report, for example, displays quick facts like net sales during a certain period. You can also drill down to view the number of transactions, invoice totals, and outgoing costs.
Advanced POS systems like Milagro can be configured to email you general reports on a specified basis (daily, weekly, monthly, etc.) - Accounting: Accounting reports are essential for business owners. Most POS systems provide general ledger reports. These provide you with everything you need to know about your assets, liabilities, accounts payable, and more.
- Inventory management: Tracking your inventory helps to streamline the ordering process. It also makes it easier to analyze and minimize waste. On top of that, inventory management helps reduce instances where employees may try to steal from your inventory.
Businesses typically have to run the stockroom to manually check what they have listed as inventory. With a robust POS system like Milagro, you can save time and energy by running inventory reports. These will give you an overview of the current inventory in stock, instantly. - Employee management: POS systems like Milagro allow you to create employee profiles. These will give you access to view particular labor reports of each employee. You get useful info like employee hours worked, their average sales amounts, and their employee scheduling.
A POS can generate time-entry reports for restaurants that rely on hourly employees but who aren’t on a typical 9 to 5 schedule. - Actionable customer information: POS reports can include customer and employee information on each transaction made. This will make it easy to see when there is a potential dispute or questionable activity.
Actionable customer data can help restaurant operators pinpoint how many return customers they have and how often they return to make more purchases.
Milagro SmartPOS For Your Restaurant
Milagro SmartPOS can help you keep a pulse on your business. This will enable you to make better-informed business decisions. For more information about how Milagro’s advanced POS reporting capabilities can help your restaurant, get in touch with our team today.
Explore our related articles for in-depth insights milagro cloud pos systems leading innovative restaurant technologies.