Point of Sale vs Point of Purchase
As an end consumer, one is hardly concerned with phrases like Point of Purchase and Point of Sale. In fact, a vast majority of the population does not even know these phrases. There are many who consider these phrases as similar and use them interchangeably. However, there are subtle differences between point of sale and point of purchase that shall be highlighted in this article for the benefit of the readers.
In shopping malls or super stores, the queues where people gather to make payments for the items they have purchased at various computer terminals are referred to as Point of Sale. On the other hand, Point of Purchase is the place where they see the display of the item and selects it for purchase. The Point of purchase is of course quite different, and sometimes quite far away from the Point of sale, which is usually near the exit point of a store or the floor. Point of Purchase is obviously more important from the point of view of making display more attractive for the customers and to make a customer buy more from the available space and product range. These days there are consultants that are hired to make Point of Purchase more attractive and consumer friendly so as to be able to generate more sales.
On the other hand, it is very important to make Point of sale hassle free for the consumers as most people find it irritating to be made to stand for an eternity to maker payment for their purchases. This is why, it is vital to procure the best possible and the most efficient software for processing the sales in a short period of time.
These days, it has become common to make use of digital POS which is a display system that does not make use of printed material and most of the information is displayed electronically frequently on LCD screens that customers can see and hear easily.
In most countries, POP is meant to refer to display stands that are used to lure customers to select more items from these display stands. POS is always used to refer to hardware and software used for processing transactions at the exit point of shopping malls.