How your business can reap Halloween sales rewards.

October 31 might be one of the scariest days of the year in terms of all the ghosts, goblins, and witches wandering around in the night. However, you can take action to also make Halloween a sales jackpot for your business. Thanks to today’s point of sale systems, and a little preparation and research, you can scare up some extra sales during this bewitching fall holiday.

A word about point of sale solutions.

When you accept credit cards, you need to have a way to process these non-cash transactions. On one level, that’s what a POS system does. Customers use their smartphones or plastic to interface with your stationary or mobile card reader, allowing their payment details to be securely transmitted to your payment processing company.

However, that’s likely just the beginning of your POS solution’s talents. It should also come equipped with tools that maximize your ability to grow your relationships with customers, track employees’ performance, manage inventory on all levels, and generate reports you can use to plan for the future. Now that Halloween opportunities are arriving soon, here are just some ideas that you can put into practice to amplify your profits this season.

Enhance the customer experience with an omnichannel approach.

Competition for Halloween dollars is fierce, but you can harness the power of a smart POS system to bring customers into your store, whether it is virtually or in person. The magic lies in the database capabilities of today’s POS solutions, which can be used to store useful nuggets of information about your loyal customers. Once you have their details in place, it’s a simple matter to generate Halloween-related email messages that remind frequent patrons about what you have to offer and give them tons of compelling reasons to visit leading up to Halloween. 

Keeping customers engaged is optimized when your website is accessible to all types of devices. When people can make their Halloween purchases quickly and conveniently, at any time of the day or night from a clear site that is easy to use and stocked with what they want, your chances of attracting their attention and snagging the sale are increased greatly. To that end, make sure that your website is secure and that the payment gateway you use is in compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) that was put in place to protect sensitive cardholder data.

Offer payment flexibility.

Whether you sell locally or internationally, customers value the ability to complete their payments using their method of choice. Keep in mind that if you only offer limited options, your competition is just a few clicks away. Set up your website to take various types of credit and debit cards, as well as less traditional, but very popular choices like Apple and Google Pay, PayPal, and Samsung Pay. 

Harness the power of social media.

If you haven’t already set up social media pages on your customers’ favorite platforms, the Halloween season gives you an extra reason to join this digital communications revolution. Much more than just a vehicle for sharing photos of cats and last night’s culinary creations, sites like YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook provide you with places where you can spread the word about your brand, dialogue with your customers, showcase products, and host lively discussions and buyer reviews. Taking the time to create and update your pages means that you can remain engaged with current customers while simultaneously creating a buzz that can bring in a whole new generation of buyers just in time for Halloween.

Use sales histories and analytics.

One of the best things about smart POS systems is that they can automatically keep a record of every sales transaction you process, who bought each item, and when. This information can help to ensure that you have a plentiful supply of the Halloween products people bought in previous years. It will also allow you to make educated predictions about related merchandise they might be looking for later this year. Combine past sales details with intelligent guesses about the future, and your chances of success increase exponentially.

When prognosticators think about profitable times of the year for retailers, they usually jump right to that sweet spot between Thanksgiving and Christmas. However, there is much to be said for the much-loved harvest festival of Halloween. Play your POS solution and social media cards right, and you just might be amazed at the sales and loyal customers that come your way by the end of October.