Because everything is happening at lightning speed around us, people of this generation are increasingly becoming impatient. A 5-minute wait for a latte is like forever. 3 minutes at the checkout line and you will see shoppers starting to abandon their carts. A human cashier can only do so much and you can only handle one online order at a time if you are a start-up business. So how can you get ready for the next generation of shoppers? Here are a few solutions.

Online Checkout

How many clicks does it take to finally reach the “Order” button in your website? Let’s analyze a typical scenario. First a client clicks on an item she likes. She likes the color, the style and the price but she wants more information so she clicks another button for more information. Then she clicks “Buy”. Then clicks another button to “Checkout”. Then fills up a form and clicks “Submit”. You ask her to review her data and to click “Confirm”. Some websites ask for the type of payment, shipping mode, etc. How many clicks was that? That was at least 6. You might be losing customers this way because they just don’t have the time and patience to go from page to page just to buy one item. Shorten the checkout process if you can. Amazon has a 1-click checkout process. If you can apply that to your site then you will see an increase in sales.

Brick and Mortar Store

If you have an actual store, have you ever had a crazy day at checkout? You might have experienced this at sales, maybe. If you see 10 people lining up for the register and each one has to wait for at least 5 minutes to be accommodated then chances are you can lose one, two or more clients in line. Not to mention the people who are still shopping but decide to leave when they see the line at the register. Customers hate to wait to pay for their stuff. They hate falling in line even if they’re just number 2.

But what can you do if you’re just a small business and you can’t afford to buy a new register and hire more people? Make a few tweaks on your system. There are companies out there who can help small businesses improve their processes. Companies like Intuit and Square have solutions. The QuickBooks Point of Sale offers mobile capabilities in the QuickBooks POS 2013. If you need any help just ask their helpful phone reps and they will stay with you until you resolve the problem.

These products work on both smartphones and tablets. You get a card reader that you connect to your device then you can process credit cards and debit cards in a jiffy. After completing the sale, your inventory is updated and then you can print or email receipts.

These systems support Apple and select Android devices so double check with your provider. Be sure that your system has inventory control to make things even easier for you. Most card readers are free so you don’t need to worry about that.

Be quick and professional in all aspects of your business especially at checkout. If the last experience of your customer is a pleasant one, you can expect them to come back for more.

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