Rain Point of Sale

Opmerkingen: Since we opened, we have hand written all our checks and inventory, which has sometimes lead to discrepancies in what we have in stock and prices on items. It also takes longer to cash people out at the register, which has left some customers at an inconvenience when running late to a gig. Since moving to Rain, we are now able to easily see what is in stock and let customers know if we have extra in the back all from our phones. Recently we had a customer whos speaker blew while at a gig and he was able to order a new one online for us to have ready for him when he walked in the door! We love using Rain!

Pluspunten: Rain POS was surprisingly easy to set up and integrate into my exsiting website, it really opened up a lot of doors to help sell things in my store that have been sitting a while. We do a lot of lawaway orders, so it was nice to be able to set up a lawaway option on our online store.

Minpunten: The only thing I wish I was able to do is have the option to add multiple products at a time to help streamline the inventory process. Other than that, I have had zero issues!

Opmerkingen: It was easy to use

Pluspunten: It is easy to use and update, so I can create and modify my own products, and add products from the integrated industry catalogs. It provides me with useful information about my customers and sales transactions, data which really helps me keep and attract new customers. I especially like the batch product update feature so I can change a group of products at a time without having to individually update each product record. I have had good customer service, especially when there was a problem with the software. I have seen my sales grow and my professional online image enhanced. The cost is reasonable for my business so far. The video training is great and absolutely necessary to understand how to use the software efficiently. I also attended training at Fall Quilt Market which was excellent and highly informative.

Minpunten: I am disappointed that I am unable to integrate my email marketing with the website. In my opinion, The Marketing package is not as useful to online-only stores as it is to POS customers. The newsletter module is clunky and hard to work with. The email feature is useful, but since my email list is on a different service and not integrated, it is not as useful as it could be. It took awhile for my site to get up and running well, and to work out all the bugs. I had to be persistent in following up to get problems fixed and clear in my communication to be sure they understood what I was asking for.

Opmerkingen: Tech support has helped us so many times. First, they helped us figure out some of the features that we were not completely certain how to use. Then, when we encountered bugs, another quick call to Support and they had us back up and running within no time. I just wish that the program was not dependent on the internet. We’ve had a few times where the internet went out and we were not able to conduct business. This is not good, but it hasn’t happened too often, just enough to be mildly irritating.

Pluspunten: This program is so easy to use, even for those who are not technologically literate. While we do not use all of the features, such as the rental option, we are really happy with the program. The fact that everything is stored in the cloud helps us when we are not in the store, such as with trunk shows. The tech support has been so helpful when we experienced bugs in the software, and they were very knowledgeable of the product. I have also found the SEO option of Rain, and we intend to utilize it to its fullest extent to promote our business and get our name out there.

Minpunten: There have been a few bugs in the software, but nothing that a quick call to support couldn’t fix. One thing that I did not like was when the internet went out. The fact that everything was based on the internet meant that we couldn’t use the cash register. This led to a loss of sales. Nothing too major, but it’s still significant. There should be a backup or a way to use the register when there is no internet connection. More traditional POS systems allow for use without internet, but for inventory reasons, something like Rain is required. Hopefully, they’ll release a version that stores a temporary backup on your system that updates the inventory once the internet is back up and running.

Opmerkingen: We have a hard time getting on the same page. The communication is mostly by email and the timing is hard because we are so far apart. The support people are very kind and try to get things done but the day to day trying to muddle through this change was not worth it, if I could get my money back I would. I am currently paying Lightspeed just not to loose my past sales and lay-a-ways until someone can merge them, this is costly for a small business. I also wish they would talk to whoever answers the phone as I can't just sit on top of the phone all day waiting for a call, this could have been fixed if they would have just talked to the person answering the phone. There are only three people who work here and all three of us are capable of following direction.

Pluspunten: So far the only Pro is that you can pull a some information from Vendors. Being able to have inventory taken out with sales from Reverb is really nice, it was the catch hook that brought me to RAIN.

Minpunten: The merge is really rough, I did not get all of my customers merged from my previous POS system, my lay-a-ways were lost or messed up, past sales are lost, pictures had to be taken again. All the upc numbers were mismatched with other products. When you try to put pictures of your product for the website, you never know what picture it may choose no matter how many times you choose the correct one. I have had a bass I have tried many times to add a picture and it refused to add it and puts up a picture of a gig bag. I was told if I used Chrome many of the issues would subside, sadly this is not true. If you are starting out fresh, this may be an okay system to use, if you are migrating from another system, I would NOT recommend using RAIN. I really had high hopes but this has been a disaster. Even the work orders, which I thought would be easier, are a huge pain.

Opmerkingen: I'm the owner of the NAMM 2015 & 2016 Top 100 Dealer, The Acoustic Shoppe in Springfield, MO. We tried the "big guy" of our industry, and found it to be outdated and not user friendly. After a year of attempting to get it up and running, we started looking for an alternative when we ran across RAIN POS. It feels like navigating a website through your browser so it was easy to learn. Within a little over one month we had our website built, products in our system, and were live with running transactions. I love that everything in in the cloud, so I can run sales in my parking lot, at festivals, trade shows, etc., or just access reports anywhere from my phone. Putting items on our website is just a button clicked, and inventory is shared online and locally so if I sell online, it's taken out of stock in my local system, and vise versa. So far customer support has been great to work with. We have run across a few minor bugs in the day to day use, but they are pretty quick at getting it straightened out. I'm sure it doesn't have all the depth of that other system, but I'm able to use it and they are adding features very quickly. We don't do rentals right now, so I can't say how well that part works. We do a lot of repairs, some sent off site, and the work order module works great for keeping up to date with the repair status. We're waiting on the Lessons module that we here is in the works, and a better way to handle consignments and trades. So far we are very happy with RAIN POS and our interactions with customer support. I highly recommend.

Pluspunten: Ease of use, and integration with our e-commerce site.

Minpunten: There are a few features that I'm waiting on that will tailor the system more for the music industry.