Square Customers vs. Vend

Square is absolutely brilliant if you are just starting out and your business has both an in-person and an online component to it, as Square will solve both in-person POS and online booking/billing. Square also offers the option to create a free website for your company, though it is a very basic site, if you don't have a website yet, this is a VERY helpful option, as it takes away a huge cost. Square allowed us to be up and running in no time, taking away the need to worry about an expensive appointment-setting add-on from our current website provider (Square integrates quite nicely with our current site). Square is probably less ideal for more advanced users or companies with a need for more detailed inventory/service management. But even then, Square will more than likely be able to get the job done!

Incentivized

Vend was great fit for this dry cleaner/laundry that had high traffic volume with customers stopping in before and after work. Things need to be done quickly.

Incentivized

• Sales pipeline
• Customer engagement
• Marketing

Incentivized

• Retail sales
• Inventory management
• Sales and promotions
• Reporting

Incentivized

• Some of the build quality on the peripherals could feel a bit better.
• Have more options for businesses with more credit card transactions such as monthly or discounted per transaction once a certain number is reached.
• Have functionality to allow for a typed card number without the higher fee if the software verifies there is a hardware/read error with the card.

Incentivized

• It would be nice to have alternate ways to adjust prices

Incentivized

The user interface is easy to navigate - that's not always the case for some software! I look for something that is intuitive, easy to use, and doesn't take a ton of training to get up and running quickly.

Incentivized

Square is mostly focused on FAQs and online support, and they do a very good job creating a rich knowledge base. But, if you are not very tech savvy, it could be easy to feel a bit overwhelmed. I would recommend that they add a direct line or chat feature to call, rather than email or Knowledge base first. This might be due to staffing issues at Square, so perhaps it is the best they can do for now.

Incentivized

Not much support needed but they were fast and helpful when it was.

Incentivized

A lot easier to use than Infusionsoft!!

Incentivized

Vend is much more capable than Square POS for product management and inventory control. ShopKeep is fairly similar to Vend but is a more closed ecosystem with fewer third-party integrations and less frequent updates.

Incentivized

• This has allowed me to accept credit / debit transactions without having to have a monthly subscription to a service and lose money on times of no to little use, allowing me to have a broader customer range as checks are risky.
• All of my initial equipment was free and there were no startup costs so my return was immediate.
• The small fee taken out of the transaction is very much worth the ability to accept nearly all plastic transactions.

Incentivized

• Correct inventory levels has been a game-changer. We use to oversell because of inconsistencies between POS and e-commerce sales.
• The built-in loyalty program has been very useful and was much more appealing to customers than we originally predicted.

Incentivized