If you are seeking to expand your online business, you need to familiarize yourself with how to take payments online.
Of course you realized this when you decided to create an online business or expanded your offline business to have an Internet portal. It really isn’t all complicated of a concept to understand. And it’s even easier to implement.
Chances are you have been on the buying end of online payments. Whether you’ve done some personal shopping from online retailers or simply paid bills online, you have engaged in making payments online.
Online shopping (or E-commerce) is huge these days! Everyone does it. But why?
Who wouldn’t rather order the newest gaming console or do their Christmas shopping from the comfort of their home instead of driving to the shopping center just to fight a crowd of people all hunting the same thing?
Which sounds better to you? Fighting through crowds of people at the mall for just one item you need, OR, taking as much time as you need to peruse your one item and other items and buy them on your tablet or laptop from the comfort of your couch?
You could even have them show up on your doorstep the next morning if you feel like paying the extra shipping cost.
Customers have the choice to either break a sweat and experience frustration or impatience because they are stuck in a line 15 people deep, or simply swipe and select those items with the touch of their finger. Easy!
Of course this isn’t possible for everything, and some people would rather go to the mall to do their shopping. This is all fine and well, but having the option to do their shopping from home is what it’s all about, and why online shopping has become so popular as of the last decade or so.
The increase in security measures for online purchases has also helped customers have more trust in paying for items and services online. Although there is always a certain degree of risk with online shopping, most people have more trust in it now than in the past.
To be fair, there is a chance for fraud no matter how customers use their credit/debit cards. Whether it be online or face-to-face. The only safe way to purchase things these days is with cash.
With the inception of smartphones, it was only a matter of time before nearly all of our daily tasks could be accomplished from the palm of our hands.
Smartphones and tablets allow us to finish multiple tasks from wherever we are within minutes, whereas in the past those same tasks could potentially take us days to complete.
Everything has gotten easier these days. It really is amazing you can listen to music, check your email, pay bills, do some online shopping, check your bank account, and upload selfies to Facebook all in one sitting from one device with an internet connection or your phone’s data plan.
The world has seen some pretty amazing advances in technology. A lot of the things just mentioned actually involve online payments. With the development of mobile browsing and more capable devices, mobile payment gateways have also come along.
You don’t have to be sitting at home on your computer with an ethernet cable running from your wall to a PC or laptop in order to make payments or purchases online anymore.
For as many people who do all of these tasks on a daily basis, whether you own an online business or a company who offers professional services, you can’t afford not to offer your customers the convenience of paying for those goods and services online.
Did you know there are over 3,000 different types of payment cards out there your customers can use to purchase their everyday items and services?
Let’s be realistic about the world these days. Everyone pays with plastic, even if they also sometimes pay with cash or check. Yes, a lot of people carry a checkbook. A lot of people still opt to pay with cash for most of their purchases.
But those very same people almost always own a credit or debit card also and use it for certain purchases. Some people only use them for paying bills or shopping online. Bingo!
Getting set up to accept online payments involves setting up an Internet merchant account with a merchant service provider. Once you’ve done this you can set up a payment gateway through them to accept credit cards and other payment types online.
A lot of payment processors include a virtual “shopping cart” for free when you sign up for their services. Business owners and customers love this because it allows the customer to add multiple items to their cart.
It also calculates their total plus tax for them, and informs them of the shipping cost. All they have to do is hit the “Buy” button.
Even people who rarely use credit and debit cards still use them occasionally. Some elderly folk out there are traditionalists and refuse to use their credit card except on rare occasion and usually only for certain things, like paying bills online.
They still carry a checkbook with them to the grocery store. They still use checks to pay for their purchases the majority of the time. No one wants to get stuck behind “the check writer” at the grocery store. A whole extra minute of waiting is too much for most of us!
I’ll admit it, anytime I get stuck behind a check writer at the grocery store, I immediately start looking down the aisles to see if I can jump into a faster lane with the “plastic payers.”
There is nothing wrong with writing checks and it is a perfectly viable means of paying for their purchases.
But this point brings up another question of importance: What if they also want to pay by check online? Should they not be afforded this option?
Luckily there are payment processors who accept checks online. In some cases, the process involves a very similar process to the actual physical process of writing a check.
The payment processor in those cases generates a “virtual check” the customer uses to fill in the blanks, same as with a physical check. Once they have done this, the payment is processed digitally.
On other payment platforms, the customer simply enters their account number and routing number and a few other pieces of information and submits it. Most online “pay by check” options are very user friendly.
For business owners who operate on the Internet to any degree, accepting payments online is essential.
If you have any questions about setting up your business properly, or just want to see what we can do for you that nobody else can, give us a call at (888) 510-9871.
Come see what RedFynn can do for you!
