Foreword Online

Ideas, information and industry news for collegiate retailers



'April Showers Bring May Flowers' Customer Appreciation Sale

Posted by Jason Smallheer on 4/3/17 5:30 AM

Host an April Showers Bring May Flowers customer appreciation extravaganza; your opportunity to make sales and motivate the troops as buyback approaches. With students preparing for exams and needing last minute supplies, you have an opportunity to generate a bump in sales.

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Facebook Pixels

Posted by Liz Schulte on 3/31/17 5:30 AM

As the world’s largest social media site, Facebook may be the hub of your online platform. With more than a billion active users on Facebook, it is a natural place to look when setting up online advertisements, but how do you ensure you are reaching your specific market? With the declining organic reach, it is increasingly difficult to reach loyal fans of your page, let alone engage with new ones. Advertising and boosting your posts are the next logical steps, but with such a large base, defining your audience is essential. You can choose to do it through keywords, regions, countries, pixels, etc. However, at the end of the day, if you aren’t using Facebook Pixels, you are ignoring Facebook’s greatest targeted advertising tool.

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Arc: The New Browser-based Retail Management Suite From MBS

Posted by Jason Smallheer on 3/28/17 5:30 AM

The tasks associated with running a bookstore take you away from facing customers. Instead, you sit in front of countless web browser tabs with multiple log-ins telling you what you have on the shelf, where to send POs, managing your ledger and figuring out who to staff and when. Now there’s help.

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Avoiding the Social Media Black Hole

Posted by Jason Smallheer on 3/24/17 5:30 AM

Today you will know how to make at least $800 more than you did yesterday and more than $300 every day thereafter — by doing less. The social media black hole is costing you money each day.

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Campus Marketplaces: Beating 'em by Joining 'em

Posted by Dean Asher on 3/23/17 5:30 PM

You hear rumblings about a new website or service advertising itself on campus as the latest, best and only student-oriented, free marketplace for selling books, apparel and other items directly to other students.

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MBS Spring Forums Provides Hands-On Learning

Posted by Liz Schulte on 3/22/17 5:30 AM

MBS Systems’ 2017 Spring Forums is weeks away. Join us April 18-20, 2017, to learn the capabilities of the system in your store, network with other college stores to learn what they are doing differently and receive in depth training on your own system’s capabilities. The Spring Forums is free, and you receive a special MBS rate on your hotel during your stay.

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Take a Tour of MBS [Video]

Posted by Dean Asher on 3/21/17 5:30 AM

We’re proud of our state-of-the-art warehouse that lets us get the right books to our partner institutions, on time. Since everyone doesn’t have the chance to see it first-hand, we’re bringing it to you.

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Colorado State University Bookstore; 2017 Collegiate Retailer of the Year

Posted by Jason Smallheer on 3/20/17 5:30 AM

It was an award 20 years in the making for the Colorado State University Bookstore and the Collegiate Retailer of the Year Award now proudly sits on their mantle.

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Five Ways to Get Out of Your Twitter Rut

Posted by Liz Schulte on 3/17/17 5:30 AM

Twitter is one of the easiest platforms to fall into complacency. The breakneck pace of a Twitter feed makes it harder for your message to be read by a significant portion of your followers. Therefore, using Twitter often feels like no one sees your posts because tweets don’t get as much attention as statuses do on Facebook or pictures Instagram. Many businesses quickly wear out on trying to be creative and fall into the pattern of posting periodic links back to websites and reply only to direct messages. They stop engaging in the real manner that Twitter users want, which lead to their message becoming white noise. Revitalize your Twitter account with these five ideas that you can start implementing today.

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Boost Sales With Old Inventory

Posted by Liz Schulte on 3/16/17 5:30 AM

Old inventory is costing your college store money. Every day merchandise sits unseen on shelves, it becomes dated. The longer it stays there, the less likely it will sell. You can either continue to let it take up valuable space, or you can form a plan to move the unwanted stock. Below are four ways you can use your unsold products to generate more sales.

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