Recording Online Sales

What I would do is make another tender type called Online Sales or something like that. When you record a sale just use that tender type. When you do a tender report you'll see exactly what you did for that tender. Craig

We created a sales rep called "internet order".

Plus, since I wanted to easily and quickly reconcile my merchant account deposits, I created separate tender types for Web Amex, Web Visa/MC, etc (tender type is "other" not credit card). They are mapped to download into my Quickbooks undeposited funds accounts.

I like the sales rep method much better than trying to track sales by tender type. I've had customers call their internet order in because they were asking me a question about a product and I prefer to take the order immediately rather than risk them changing their mind when they get back online. I've also had customers send in money orders for online purchases, etc. Visiblity of these sales would be lost if I relied on tender type.

"Brian" wrote:

That's a much better idea Juli. I am currently looking into online sales also and this type of issue is just one of a million I've got to try to figure out. I think sales rep is available on more reports than tender type also. Craig

Summary Sales has a daily report by sales rep. Top Performers does too.

One thing I don't like about Sales Rep reporting is that it shows items sold but not transactions processed (since it's a line level setting, rather than a transaction level setting). I use my online shopping cart statistics to watch transactional data and I can also back this up by using the special Inet tender types I created in RMS to get a decent picture of total transactions, AOV (average order value), etc.

I also considered setting my tracking up using an Internet cashier because it seems like there are more cashier reports than sales rep reports. I went with sales rep because I can also see which cashier entered the Inet order and maintain staff controls. It's been over a year since I weighed the pros and cons of each, so I can't remember the details of that option.

My past life was spent overseeing fairly large-scale catalog and internet marketing. So the level of analysis I can do now is paltry in comparison. But in all reality, I get the info I need to make appropriate decisions for my business.

"Brian" wrote:

Make a new tender type called "ONLINE CREDIT CARD"

Enter the web orders as WORK ORDERS and tender the total amount to this new Tender Type.

It is best to do this step at a NON-CASH REGISTER station...like a computer in the back. If you MUST, you will have to DROP the online credit card amount each day to make the drawer count out.

Recall the Work Order at your shipping station and ship it.

If you expect to have lots of orders, invest in SHIPRUSH, which will pull all your customer's shipping info over, print a shipping label, push the tracking number back into RMS and mark the item shipped all in one transaction. you can use UPS, Postal, or Fedex.

Brian wrote:

Sales Rep works GREAT for tracking--much better than tender type for reporting.

However, your accounting may need to separate the online credit card sales from your In-store credit cards sales since they are likely different processors.

Craig wrote:

Can you explain how using a distinct sales rep for online orders is better/different from using a distinct cashier?

We have begin doing online sales as well, and were advised by our re-seller to use a distinct cashier. Since 'cashier' seems to be a criterion in many report formats, this made sense, but I haven't really spent much time trying to generate reports using it. I would really like to be able to completely isolate all info regarding online sales from store sales as if it were a completely separate store. Does 'sales rep' give me a better way to do that than cashier?

If we do designate an 'online' sales rep, am I correct that each POS sale needs to be assigned to that rep using the 'sales rep' command? Again, what advantages does this provide over using a distinct cashier. (one simple one that occurs to me is that it would be easier to remember to asssign an online sales rep during the POS transaction than to remember to use the correct 'online cashier' login.) Thanks.

Since we have several different ways that we sell...website, Amazon, ebay, in-store, etc, we need to run reports that give totals in each of these areas.

If you make each of those a tender Type, there are limitations in the types of reporting you can get. Since the numbers are transaction based, you cannot see how many widgets were sold via Amazon vs eBay.

However, since I have each of those selling areas listed as a Sales Rep, I can get reports that split out my sales by Month, year, whatever.

I can also generate a report that shows how MANY (QTY) items were sold in each area.

Since I have many CASHIERS both entering orders (making Work Order) and shipping the items (closing invoices), I need to know WHO DID IT. If the cashier is "online sale", how will I know?

Since EVERY ITEM sold is marked with a sales rep, all reports are possible.

PRJ wrote:

Sounds like a lot to consider and that one solution doesn't fit all. I still think the sales rep designation is better based upon ease of use, and reporting capabilities. CRaig

Sales Rep ep is a function I am not really familiar with. I can see how to set up a rep for 'in-store sales' and another for 'internet'; and I can see how to turn on the option to require a rep....... but how do I select the sales rep as part of the POS sales transaction?

This adds that step to every transaction, so it really needs to be something quick as we use the same POS station for all sales.

We don't require a sales rep on all transactions because 80% of our transactions are in-store. For us, no sales rep = in store sale.

To select a sales rep when you're enter> Sales Rep ep is a function I am not really familiar with. I can see how to

How easy is it to write a POS button that the Cashier can hit that would set the Sales Rep to a certain designation?

I need a faster way in the store....this trips us up a lot because I REQUIRE that a sales Rep be entered.

If there was a button in the POS screen they could just hot that instead of fumbling with the SHIFT-CTROL Function key stuff...especially when they can't type fast.

Is there any tutorial on writing the COM-Hook functions? I'd like to learn that!

mickie

Juli wrote:

In My experience with RMS reporting and functionality cashiers and sales reps have different roles within the system and this is borne out in the various reports RMS provides. Of course you can always customize these these, but out of the box Sales Reps are generally reportable against sales for commission purposes. Cashiers are assumed to be the ones actually processing the sale at the register, so their reporting is generally geared toward transactions and tender reconciliation. So really, it depends on how you want to report on your web sales, if you re looking to break out the revenue (bricks and mortar versus web) then a sales rep function would be better. If you are talking accounting then Cashiers might be better...Of curse you could use them both; set up an Internet Order Sales Rep and a Cashier...That way you can run any report that looks at either! To add a third dimension, you could put "Internet Order" in the Reference field of the transaction, and that will give you another array of reporting capabilities. The NitroSell Commerce solution does this automatically, but of course there is a transaction number included which allows individual sales to be tracked.

Todd Jensen NitroSell