Your expertise will ensure your clients have the right solution for their use case, their IT environment, and the best customer experiences.
When it comes to paying online, convenience matters more than ever. People hate wasting time on anything that might be a hassle. This is why merchants are looking for solutions that deliver effortless ease. Embedded payments are one of the best ways to make small businesses and their customers happy.
What are embedded payments?
Not every form of payment gets to be described as “embedded.” The simplest way to explain the difference is that embedded payments are built right into a merchant’s point of sale solution or other business application beforehand instead of being tacked on by a third-party solution as an afterthought. The benefits of going the embedded payments route are clear: When customers are ready to buy, they can complete their transaction with a single click instead of wrangling with a multi-page checkout that adds friction to their shopping experiences.
But the upsides don’t end with the customer. Some payment providers integrate their embedded payment solutions directly into hardware devices for optimal efficiency. This means merchants run a lower risk of payments failing to go through while shaving precious seconds off the time consumers wait for checkout to complete.
How to match the type of embedded payments to a merchant’s business model.
Embedded payments are great for several different sectors, however, businesses often require unique solutions based on their specific operating model. The first place for merchant services providers to start is by figuring out the kind of experience your client wants for their end customers. While fast-casual restaurants might be thrilled to offer the convenience of tabletop tablet payments for customers who don’t want waitstaff hovering over them, other businesses with a strong ecommerce presence might need the robust omnichannel offering that comes with an online ordering integration. Some might prefer an embedded payment solution that redirects consumers to a separate site. That way, it’s clear who is responsible for handling that sensitive data.
Other factors to consider are the features that make sense for the merchant’s business model. For example, does the embedded payments solution need to handle subscriptions and recurring payments? The smallest of small businesses, on the other hand, might just be looking for a straightforward way to deal with sales and returns, meaning a meaty API might be way too much tech for their needs.
Then there’s the issue of PCI compliance. As the payments expert, you can help determine the best course for clients. Depending on how much customer data they handle, some merchants will prefer an embedded payments solution that keeps their PCI, or Payment Card Industry, scope to a minimum and reduces their liability.
An embedded payments strategy should also take into account the kind of volume the merchant handles on a regular basis. The more business it manages, the more capable its payment offering needs to be. At the opposite end of the spectrum, solutions featuring very little or even no code at all might resonate with the smallest of enterprises.
The kind of infrastructure a business uses will also influence what’s possible with embedded payments. Ask merchants about their server configuration to understand if you’ll need to work around firewalls. A company with a lot of servers likely needs a more specialized approach, while a merchant with just one or two can benefit from a less complicated strategy.
Using embedded payments helps merchants compete by offering the fast flexibility people expect at checkout today. By brushing up on the ins and outs of this particular corner of the payments world, you’ll position yourself as the subject matter expert who merchants can lean on for trusted, value-added advice. Small businesses need a partner they can rely on for total solutions. Make sure that partner is you.
