Imonggo is a free web-based point of sale solution that launched in 2009. The vendor says currently it is scaling to address the various needs of states across global markets to become the authority in a point-of-sale solution for growing businesses.
$30
per month, per branch
ShopKeep
Score 7.1 out of 10
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
ShopKeep is an iPad point of sale system; The vendor says it is intuitive, secure, affordable software that helps merchants run smarter businesses. The product optimizes staffing and inventory, while offering sales reports and customer information on a cloud-based platform. The product includes low-cost, integrated payment processing, as well as point of sale hardware. According to the vendor, ShopKeep has 23,000 customers, and a customer…
With all of the supplies and outreach we do with clients, Imonggo is really good at tracking that inventory. We can scan it in to have a detailed accounting of where our supplies end up located. We can scan them out to track which department is using supplies and at which quantities. This helps us keep track of our inventory usage rates and therein our connections with clients. This extremely useful in our grant reporting so we can track spending and demonstrate that money is translating to tangible benefits for our clients.
ShopKeep can maintain up to 10,000 individual stock items. This is perfect for a cafe, coffee shop, wine bar, small retail store, etc. If you're inventory exceeds the 10,000 items then it may not be a fit for you. Also, ShopKeep works with Apple tablets only (iPad 2 or later). If you prefer Android or PC based tablets then this won't work for you.
ShopKeep provides solid pre-sales support. They did a pre-sales screen-share demo that helped us ensure that their system would handle the needs of the business, and they assisted us in making decisions around which hardware would be appropriate.
ShopKeep's hardware seems well thought out and well integrated. One exception is issues with the connection between their recommended iCMP credit card scanner and the register. Other than that, the hardware works well together.
The register has excellent configurability and customization capabilities, and handles a large variety of products easily. High-volume products can have their own buttons on the register. Products can be added to a purchase by using these buttons, by scanning a bar code with an integrated bar code scanner, or by doing a live text search.
The register is also easily configurable to handle product options - either multiple options like pizza toppings, or exclusive options like regular or decaf coffee.
The ShopKeep system can handle hybrid retail/quick serve/restaurant scenarios with grace. This was a factor that eliminated many other systems that are optimized for one or the other, or where the products for handling retail are completely separate from the products for handling quick serve/restaurant operations. Since this customer has a location where there is a quick serve counter, a restaurant, and a retail gift shop all in the same location, ShopKeep's ability to handle all of these kinds of transactions from the same platform is a powerful advantage. ShopKeep also recently added functionality to transfer open tickets between registers, so that if a customer starts out with a cup of coffee at the quick serve counter, their ticket can be picked up and added to at the gift shop if they wander in there to purchase items.
ShopKeep has a Back Office system that can be accessed through any Web browser, or through their mobile app. The Back Office system is used to import and export data, manage inventory, configure the iPad registers, set up product options, manage employees, and report transactions, sales, product costs & margins, and other data.
Discounts, returns and credits are relatively easy to handle from the register, and the system can be configured to require a manager to approve these kinds of transactions, or not.
Bulk imports and exports are handled well by ShopKeep's Back Office. When setting up initial inventory, products can be added through Excel, then imported as comma-separated values (CSV) files by uploading them through the Web browser. Once inventory is established, adding or modifying items can be done directly through the Web interface.
ShopKeep has a mobile app that can be used by owners or managers to remotely access real-time snapshots of sales and other important data whenever they wish.
Design - While the UI is navigable, the design looks a bit dated.
Server issues - Occasionally the web-based client is too slow to process information and can result in a double input of said information. It's not life ending but a bit annoying at times.
Custom Tagging - Most of the tags we input to classify inventory have to be entered manually, it would really nice to have those populate automatically.
Inventory buttons - They used to have buttons that you could click to change the inventory in a given field, now you just have to enter the number in the field itself. Was much nicer to have the option of both.
It's something we've used for a while now and we're pleased ultimately with its functionality. This is not to say its perfect, it isn't, but accomplishes a lot of what we need it to do. The fact we've been able to utilize it outside of a traditional retail environment speaks to its versatility and adaptability. For those reasons we'll continue to use until we're presented with a better alternative.
Because we expect the current issue with the credit card reader disconnecting from the register to be solved with an upcoming software update, and we like many of the features of Shopkeep.
It's pretty phenomenal for inventory management/POS of functions. Relatively easy to use and incorporate into our process. The lack of customization and categorization from the client/customer tracking side of the software is its big limitations and the only frustration for a usability perspective.
The register functionality is excellent, both from a learning standpoint and an operations standpoint. Cashiers learn how to use the register quickly, and the registers can be configured with hot buttons for fast-moving products. Setting up product variations and additions is straightforward. The web-accessible Back Office has good features, but lacks enough granularity to provide a store manager with the ability to modify inventory settings without giving them access to all of the financial reports as well.
It usually loads quickly and without hesitation. There are the occasional slow moments in connectivity that can present small frustrations, but nothing majorly inhibiting. We haven't integrated it apart from being a standalone application.
The few times we've used them, they've been really solid. The only reason they didn't a perfect 10 is that we haven't had a major hiccup by which to judge them.
Occasional long waits [5 minutes or more] or call-backs needed for telephone support. Email support replies usually take several hours. Support personnel are generally friendly and knowledgable.
It's hard to give anything a perfect 10 when it comes to implementation unless it does it all for you. Our biggest complaint was the time it took to set up everything in the software, though to be fair that's almost always going to be the case with inventory management software. The lack of auto-populate fields did slow us down some, but ultimately we got the set up done without egregious headaches, that's a win in my book.
If moving from a "dumb" cash register system, spend all the time needed to get starting inventory and product costing and pricing correct. Shopkeep has good tools for reporting inventory, margins, and other critical business info, but the information is only useful if the starting figures are accurate.
Imonggo makes things simpler given its relatively clean UI and simple options tree that results from each click. Salesforce can do more and use custom tracking more efficiently but is more of a pain to set up and maintain. Xero handles inventory management in a different way than Imonggo and for day to day purposes its easier for our staff to use Immongo. Imonggo lets lower level staff interact with our inventory and we can set up access for them to more akin to its typical POS service, scanning out inventory for clients.
ShopKeep is an inexpensive choice iPad POS system that comes with all of the tools needed to do business without any long-term contracts or expensive fees. It also offers free 24/7 phone and email support along with online live chat during business hours. Coffee Shop Manager offered some of these items, but they also tied you into a long-term contract and you were charged fee after fee for support, etc. Also, the CSM system was big and took up a lot of space compared to ShopKeep's integration with an Apple iPad tablet.
It works exactly as we intend the vast majority of the time. There are moments where the software is slow to respond and thus causes duplicate input of information. That may be the fault of our machine/internet connection, but it happens with enough frequency that it can be a small hiccup. Usually any hiccups that it presents can be remedied immediately.
Inventory management - This has been extremely helpful to track what we're using and in what quantities. Makes budgeting a lot easier and more accurate.
Client engagement - It's helped us engage and maintain clients, but by the same token has proven limited as it's difficult to separate clients into custom subcategories.
Grant reporting - The numbers generated through Imonggo are really helpful for providing numerical feedback to our funders.
ShopKeep didn't integrate with my accounting software. I had to double enter all financial data.
Without inventory controls, all of my financial information was inaccurate. It is impossible to grow a business without accurate financial information.
