A Local Fort Smith POS Software company has been competing nationally with companies like Microsoft for many years. Recently they decided they would compete nationally on the internet as well. That meant moving up the search engines. Google and the others are where people go when they are looking for something on the internet. When you look for a POS software company on the web most people would go to Google and type "POS software" into the search box. Prophetline is competing nationally on this search engine thanks to Kirkham Systems Search engine optimization. If you want to compete nationally for anything on the web you need to call us and ask us what it takes.

Many businesses don't think of computers as an asset, they think of them as an expense - as something that just takes money away from your profit.  This is usually because owners are unfamiliar with them and get annoyed quickly with trying to use them, or to get them to do the things they need. This is frequently the result of not having the correct software for your style of business. A computer is a tool that will pay for itself very quickly when used properly. It should be seen as a part of your investment, and should make you more money than it costs you. This is a link to a POS Software company that has taken the time to set up a blog so you can read about what to look for from your software.

This post is dedicated to Sears whose website and parts service department are perfect examples of how not to use a computer.

A computer in a customer service setting should be used as a tool to improve customer service, never as a limitation to your customer service. I went to Sears to purchase a replacement wheel for my craftsman lawnmower. It is a self propelled walk behind lawn mower so the back wheels are unique to certain models. I brought the old wheel as a reference, they went and found one, I paid for it and when I got home it didn't fit. It was a little too small.

I am patient by nature, so although it was frustrating, I can accept honest mistakes; the wheels did look almost identical. Here is where the problem comes. When I took the wheel back to the store I asked for a 9x2 wheel instead of the smaller 8x2 that they gave me before.  The response was "I'm sorry we can't look up parts in our computer system that way." This is the problem I have with Sears. An employee should be trained to offer customer support without the computer and the computer should be a tool for helping them with it. I asked for a manager but he just said the same thing. They said "The only way the computer will let us order a wheel for your mower is with the part number for the mower." So I go home to find the sticker with the part number has rubbed off, and I bought the mower used so I didn't have any record of the model number on any paperwork. Essentially I was looking at a very expensive mower that I couldn’t use because I didn’t have a sticker with a number on it. I decided to try the website, which also doesn't work without a model number. So I called the national parts number to talk to someone over the phone, same thing - even with the part number on the wheel they could not find it. I asked for a supervisor because I wanted someone to help me get the model number for my mower. I told him the details of my mower which were distinctive and he said "there is no way to search for the model number of your mower". Frustrated I told him to let me speak to someone about buying a mower (I thought a mower sales person might know the model number). He actually told me "I know what you are trying to do, and they won't be able to help you either, we are all limited by the same computer." I took offense to this and asked to talk to someone about buying a mower and he said the same thing and hung up. After a couple of calls I managed to talk to someone about buying a mower and told them the details of my mower and they gave me a model number in a matter of minutes. Amazingly, he said there were only 38 models of self propelled mower that Sears has made, and only one with the 7 hp engine like mine.

People ask us all the time if we're a Microsoft shop or a Linux shop or a Mac shop. The answer is all three. Too often in technology people begin to identify with a particular platform or technology, such as a operating system or a development language, to the exclusion of all other ways of thinking. It becomes much like a religion, and thusly the debates about the benefits and down-sides to each particular platform or technology can become heated much like a religious discussion.

Too often technology people forget they are not in the technology business; they are in the business of enabling business for their customers. Computers are merely a tool to get the job done, and the choices involved in getting there, while very interesting to people interested in technology, in the end matter very little to the end user. Here, we use the technology that bests suits the customer we're working for at the time we pick it. If that means paying the Microsoft tax and installing Windows servers, we'll do it, because perhaps they need the ease of administration or need the ability to hire trained professionals other than us internally and they need a familiar platform. If our customer wants something smaller, we're likely to recommend a Linux appliance. If they need a website, we're likely to develop on a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP/Perl/Python) platform. If they need telephony solutions, there's likely to be Linux and Asterisk involved. If they need a graphics, video or audio workstation, we're likely to recommend Macintosh. Our goal is to get the job done and help our customers do their business, whatever it takes, using whatever technology it takes to get the job done, and your business should expect nothing less.

Computers are important tools for businesses. Used properly computers can save you hours and hours of work, by increasing efficiency, improving communication, and speeding up research. When computers are implemented wrong however, you can expect downtime, unreliable connectivity, slow programs, and more costly more frequent repairs. Make sure you get the most for your computer investment, call us to look at your current network, computers, and other technology. We will let you know how we can improve it, and get your company running smoother right away.