4 Payment Processing Tips To Help Startups Maximize Online And Offline Conversions

by Startacus Admin

Conversions are one of the most important metrics for measuring a business’s performance. A strong conversion ratio is a reliable indicator of a healthy business and a good strategy. Here are four ways that new startups can use their choice of payment processor to help boost their conversion rates.

Opt For An Integrated Online Solution If Possible

Adding new systems and software to your network can be a fraught process. Conflicts and incompatibilities can slow down the process of rolling out a new system, or they can render the whole exercise a waste of time. Looking for payment processing solutions that integrate with the existing systems and software that you use is an obvious way of making some substantial efficiency gains and saving yourself a heap of trouble further down the road.

For example, your business has almost certainly digitized and perhaps even automated it's invoicing and payroll, doing these manually is needlessly time-consuming. With a compatible payment processing solution that integrates with your invoicing software, you can enable your clients to pay you via a link on your invoice, making things quick and easy for everyone.

Making it as easy as possible for clients and customers to give your money will naturally maximize the amount of revenue you are generating from them. Look for a payment processing solution that integrates as deeply as possible with your existing systems so installation will be painless and you can maximize the opportunity before you.

Use Online Shopping Carts To Their Full Potential

Online shopping carts are an obvious feature for an online store to have. Only a lunatic (or Nintendo) would operate any kind of e-commerce store without implementing virtual shopping carts in 2020. However, while having shopping carts is great, you should be aspiring to do more than merely have them present. If you use them correctly, online shopping carts present a range of opportunities to maximize conversions.

For example, the abandoned cart email is one of the most powerful tools that businesses have to maximize their conversions. An abandoned shopping cart email is exactly what it sounds like, it is an email sent to your users if they abandon a shopping cart without completing the checkout process. There are a number of reasons why someone might add items to their cart but not ultimately purchase them. Unless they have taken the additional step of removing the items from the cart and signaling that they have no intention of purchasing them, it is worth chasing them up with an abandoned cart email to jog their memory.

Many businesses combine an abandoned cart email with a special discount code. For example, if you offer every user who abandons their shopping cart on your website a 10% discount if they complete the checkout process, then you can convert some of those lost customers into revenue.

Choose Your In-Store Card Machines Carefully

Many businesses make the mistake of assuming that taking payment from their customers is the final part of their interaction when they are making a purchase. However, the experience that customers have while they are in your store will have a profound impact on whether other people are likely to take a chance on you. If someone comes to your store to buy something but is held up by slow payment processing, don’t assume that they won’t tell their friends. Bad news about businesses tends to spread much faster.

The brand of card machine that you choose for your business might not seem like a big deal but the card reader and payment processor you use in-store will affect the time it takes to complete each transaction. For example, UTP Merchant Services who can not only offer sleek and modern card readers for business, but thanks to their partnership with Barclays, can offer fast processing which is of course very important.

Offer Mobile Processing

Everything is mobile these days. Most of your users will be browsing your website from their phones and many people who come into your store will be doing so because they have found you online. Releasing a companion smartphone app for your business enables your customers to spend money with you online or offline. By integrating your payment processing capabilities into a mobile app, you can help your salespeople to serve customers with their smartphones, eliminating queues at the register.

It is vital that new businesses don’t underestimate the importance of their payment processing. It is easy to fall into the trap of assuming that minor back-end decisions don’t affect the experience for your customers, but this is wrong. Choosing the right payment processor is vital if you want your customers to have a good experience.

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Published on: 3rd June 2020