¶ … Information Systems for a Nostalgic Record Store Benefits and Drawbacks of Information Systems

Comparison of Five Systems' Cost and Benefits

Launching a new record store that concentrates on nostalgic music can potentially be lucrative as many music fans like to listen to their favorite musicians and artists who may not be played on popular radio today. For a small brick -- and mortar music store specializing in nostalgic music, it is recommended that a series of five systems be considered for managing the business. These five systems include the following:

Accounting System

CRM system

E-Commerce Website and supporting system

Point-Of-Sales System

Pricing and Merchandise Management System

The benefits and drawback of each of these systems id briefly described in this paper.

Benefits and Drawbacks of Information Systems

Each of the systems that the record store needs in order to operate profitably are defined in this section along with their benefits and drawbacks. Starting with the accounting system, it is a critical system for keeping track of expenses and revenues, and capturing how profitable the store is. The benefits of choosing an online system from NetSuite are ease of use, quicker access to the cost and revenue information anytime...

The drawbacks are that NetSuite is hosted on a Cloud-based platform and may at times go down and not work (Wichmann, 1983). The second is the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system and the value of this system is in tracking customers who are the most profitable to sell to. The advantages of this system are tracking their purchases, knowing their likes and dislikes in terms of music, and which promotional programs work the best. The disadvantages are that it takes time to enter information into customer records, costs for usage of the system and can be difficult to keep updated (Sarapovas, Cvilikas, 2008). The third system is an e-commerce website and catalog system for showing the most popular records online fro sale. The advantages of this system are that it gets exposure and starts building a brand for the store online, is relative inexpensive as a means to get advertising, and can generate sales. The disadvantages are the need to continually keep it current with new products and also keep the pricing current (Sarapovas, Cvilikas, 2008). The fourth system is used for managing Point-of-Sales transactions. The benefits of this system include tracking sales more effectively than if done by hand, capturing pricing discounts and also being able to manage pricing in real-time without having to change tags. The disadvantage of this system…