E-commerce has over the last three years become the backbone of retail. The biggest chunk of modern shoppers buys from online sellers. Offline shoppers also go to the internet to “research” the products they need before setting foot in a physical store. Maintaining customer loyalty in this era of online shopping can be a tall order for many businesses, especially the traditional businesses that are accustomed to face-to-face customer interactions.
With that in mind, how can you improve customer loyalty in the digital age? There are many ways of doing this, including gamification, loyalty programs, and quality customer experience. In this article, we will focus on how you can improve customer loyalty by enhancing customers’ online shopping experience, particularly with regard to payment processing.
From the outset, you need to appreciate that your payment processing has to be smooth, convenient, fast, flexible, responsive, and secure. That’s how you will earn the loyalty of digital customers. Here’s how you can create such an impeccable payment processing system:
1. Diversify payment options
There are many secure payment options at your disposal today, from digital wallets such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, PayPal, wire transfers, EMV chips (EuroPay, MasterCard, and Visa), Stripe, etc. You don’t have to die on the hill of debit and credit cards. Now is the time to leverage digital payment options to minimize payment friction and to hand customers more control over their checkout processes.
2. Automated payment solutions
Sorting paper checks is a tedious, painfully slow, and lengthy process. Substituting paper checks with automated payment solutions will speed up payments and lower your DSO (Days Sales Outstanding). Automation unlocks self-service capabilities for customers, which minimizes the inconveniences that come with over-the-phone customer service. This added convenience, by extension, encourages on-time payments. You can also automate payment reminders so you don’t have to make awkward phone calls to customers who fall behind.
Automation extends to automated billing. You can use an invoice processing tool to manage all open invoices on the same dashboard, edit invoices, and set up one-time or recurring invoices. You can conveniently customize and brand invoices, send one-click reminders, and even cancel upcoming invoices when necessary. Billing automation gives you faster access to your funds and enhances customer experience.
3. Invest in secure payment systems
Ensure that your customer’s financial and personal data is secure from fraudulent and unauthorized access. A secure payment processor safeguards your business and its customers from chargebacks that precipitate fraudulent transactions. It also improves your business reputation as customers aren’t skeptical about making credit card payments at your online store.
To ensure that your payment system is secure:
– Understand the ins and outs of credit card fraud, from identity theft, refund fraud, credit card tumbling, etc.
– Define and understand your company’s security needs, fraud risks, and business model. Credit card tumbling.
– Choose trusted and reputable payment partners based on the needs you defined above. At the bare minimum, the payment processor should use Transport Layer Security (TLS) to encrypt and secure user data. The processor should also have effective fraud-prevention and protection measures in place, e.g. BIN/IP address verification, 2-factor authentication, credit card verification code (CVV), etc.
– Implement security measures on your website, e.g. using an SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate to encrypt customer data.
– Limit your data collection and storage to only the information you need. Storing too much (oftentimes unnecessary) data increases the risk of data leakage.
– Keep your data collection and storage systems, as well as payment processing systems, updated at all times.
4. Optimize omnichannel payments
Omnichannel shopping is projected to grow by double figures through 2024. You will boost customer loyalty by creating faster, more secure, and more convenient payment processing systems across multiple channels. For example, keeping a memory of customers’ payment data in your databases removes the need for return customers to input the data over and over at each point of sale (POS).
5. Incentivize early payments
You can, for example, give a percentage discount to customers who make payments within a specified timeframe, say 5 or 10 days. Another practical incentive is upgrading customers’ service for free when they make timely payments.
Note: Penalizing customers for late payment should come as a last resort.
Conclusion
Payment processing has a huge impact on 3 key things: customer experience, customer loyalty, and business profitability. You will achieve all 3 by prioritizing speed, transparency, security, convenience, and flexibility throughout the payment process.
Customer Loyalty in the Digital Age: Ways to Improve Payment Processing
E-commerce has over the last three years become the backbone of retail. The biggest chunk of modern shoppers buys from online sellers. Offline shoppers also go to the internet to “research” the products they need before setting foot in a physical store. Maintaining customer loyalty in this era of online shopping can be a tall order for many businesses, especially the traditional businesses that are accustomed to face-to-face customer interactions.
With that in mind, how can you improve customer loyalty in the digital age? There are many ways of doing this, including gamification, loyalty programs, and quality customer experience. In this article, we will focus on how you can improve customer loyalty by enhancing customers’ online shopping experience, particularly with regard to payment processing.
From the outset, you need to appreciate that your payment processing has to be smooth, convenient, fast, flexible, responsive, and secure. That’s how you will earn the loyalty of digital customers. Here’s how you can create such an impeccable payment processing system:
1. Diversify payment options
There are many secure payment options at your disposal today, from digital wallets such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, PayPal, wire transfers, EMV chips (EuroPay, MasterCard, and Visa), Stripe, etc. You don’t have to die on the hill of debit and credit cards. Now is the time to leverage digital payment options to minimize payment friction and to hand customers more control over their checkout processes.
2. Automated payment solutions
Sorting paper checks is a tedious, painfully slow, and lengthy process. Substituting paper checks with automated payment solutions will speed up payments and lower your DSO (Days Sales Outstanding). Automation unlocks self-service capabilities for customers, which minimizes the inconveniences that come with over-the-phone customer service. This added convenience, by extension, encourages on-time payments. You can also automate payment reminders so you don’t have to make awkward phone calls to customers who fall behind.
Automation extends to automated billing. You can use an invoice processing tool to manage all open invoices on the same dashboard, edit invoices, and set up one-time or recurring invoices. You can conveniently customize and brand invoices, send one-click reminders, and even cancel upcoming invoices when necessary. Billing automation gives you faster access to your funds and enhances customer experience.
3. Invest in secure payment systems
Ensure that your customer’s financial and personal data is secure from fraudulent and unauthorized access. A secure payment processor safeguards your business and its customers from chargebacks that precipitate fraudulent transactions. It also improves your business reputation as customers aren’t skeptical about making credit card payments at your online store.
To ensure that your payment system is secure:
– Understand the ins and outs of credit card fraud, from identity theft, refund fraud, credit card tumbling, etc.
– Define and understand your company’s security needs, fraud risks, and business model. Credit card tumbling.
– Choose trusted and reputable payment partners based on the needs you defined above. At the bare minimum, the payment processor should use Transport Layer Security (TLS) to encrypt and secure user data. The processor should also have effective fraud-prevention and protection measures in place, e.g. BIN/IP address verification, 2-factor authentication, credit card verification code (CVV), etc.
– Implement security measures on your website, e.g. using an SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate to encrypt customer data.
– Limit your data collection and storage to only the information you need. Storing too much (oftentimes unnecessary) data increases the risk of data leakage.
– Keep your data collection and storage systems, as well as payment processing systems, updated at all times.
4. Optimize omnichannel payments
Omnichannel shopping is projected to grow by double figures through 2024. You will boost customer loyalty by creating faster, more secure, and more convenient payment processing systems across multiple channels. For example, keeping a memory of customers’ payment data in your databases removes the need for return customers to input the data over and over at each point of sale (POS).
5. Incentivize early payments
You can, for example, give a percentage discount to customers who make payments within a specified timeframe, say 5 or 10 days. Another practical incentive is upgrading customers’ service for free when they make timely payments.
Note: Penalizing customers for late payment should come as a last resort.
Conclusion
Payment processing has a huge impact on 3 key things: customer experience, customer loyalty, and business profitability. You will achieve all 3 by prioritizing speed, transparency, security, convenience, and flexibility throughout the payment process.
