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April, 2013:

Total Merchant Services Cutting 140 Jobs

Apr 22nd, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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Sad news is hitting the merchant services industry as Total Merchant Services is cutting 140 jobs:

BASALT — Four months after a top executive at Total Merchant Services said the business had no intention of leaving Basalt, the town’s largest free-market employer announced Tuesday it will pull out by May 28.

The privately held company said it is consolidating its operations at its Woodland Hills, Calif., location. The firm employs 140 workers in Basalt.

You can read the full Denver Post article here.

Top 5 Tips for eCommerce Website Credit Card Sales

Apr 22nd, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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If you want to maximize the amount of sales on your eCommerce website here are 5 tips to help you do that.

#1. One Click Check Out –  Your customers like to shop on-line for two reasons, #1 its faster than going to the store and #2 your products are so unique you can only get them online.  If your products are not unique, if you want t maximize your profits and not be the low-cost provider, you want to maximize your sales by making the check out process as easy as one click.  Simple allow the customer to add the product to their shopping card and then be brought directly to the final page where they enter their billing information.  On that page your customer should be able to enter their billing information, hit the submit button and have completed a purchase.

#2. Recommended Products – Work with your shopping cart and merchant services provider to setup recommended products on your website.  So that when someone adds a product to theri shopping cart they also receive a message that says something to the effect of, “People who purchased X also purchased, X, Y, & Z. Do this will surely increase your average order size.

#3. Transactional Emails with Upsell Products – Not only should your recommended products be shown on the check out page they should also be shown in the following up email that someone receives confirming their purchase, and emailing them a receipt.  Just make sure that 70% of the message content is simply a receipt and the subject line is a receipt.  This will enable you to do this without upselling your customers that just made a purchase.

#4. Loyalty Program -Setup a program that rewards your most lost loyal repeat customers with discounts, coupons and special exclusive offers.  This will keep them coming back even more and referring their friends to your website to make commerce purchases.

#5. Promo Codes – Discounts and deals sell.  You should always have promo codes up and live.  Y ou can then offer them to your loyal subscribers via your website, blog, email newsletters, and social media.  Then you can watch your sales go viral (AKA word of mouth online) and for next to no cost you will see increased sales and profits in your ecommerce store.

You will notice that Amazon.com employs many of these strategies to increase their sales as well.  Given that they are the number #1 eRetailer in the world we highly recommend that you emulate them.  In order to do all of the above you will either need to have a great custom programmer, or a great ecommerce merchant services partner that can give you all of these solutions with your credit card processing account.

Buy Retail: Retail Merchant Services

Apr 19th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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For years the only solutions for retail merchant services were more traditional merchant equipment solutions and PC-based systems such as:

  • PCCharge – a PC based point of sale system Verfone VX510 – a quick processing hardware solution
  • Verfione VX510 – a quick processing hardware solution
  • Verifone VX570 – a flexible merchant services solution that includes a thermal printer
  • Nurit 8020 – a small and most versatile payment terminal and debit card pin pad with a thermal printer
  • Omni VX570 – a fast  solution with a built-in thermal printer and ethernet connectivity
  • Hypercom T7P –  merchant equipment that delivers fast processing times and receipt printing times.
  • First Data FD100 – a touch screen credit card retail merchant terminal

Yet, in today’s world mobile merchant services have offered retail merchant services to retailers through simple and cost-effective tools that plug into any mobile device.  This allows companies such as Apple to not force their customers to stand in line to check out but instead they can check out with any retail associate no matter where they stand on the retail floor.  Phone Swipe is one of those examples at it is the lowest cost mobile merchant services solution in the world.

 

Mobile Payment Going Mainstream

Apr 19th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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Here is an interesting article from the Silicont Republic about the future of mobile merchant services.

Speakers at the AIB Merchant Services (AIBMS) Conference held in the Aviva Stadium, Dublin, over Easter mapped out the current commerce landscape and future trends, with a particular focus on developments in e-commerce and m-commerce led by consumers.

“Consumers, retailers and technology developers will see mobile payments becoming mainstream within the next four years,” said AIBMS general manager Nigel Motyer, opening the event, which was attended by 150 people, including merchants. “Consumers will insist on mobile loyalty rewards and coupons, making their mobile shopping decisions based on this.”

Jon Rutter, director of product management for mobile solutions at US payment processing company First Data Corporation, advised merchants not to be complacent when it comes to adopting new technology. “Consumers have an increasing amount of power and will take business elsewhere if dissatisfied,” he warned.

“You have to get ahead of that curve, get in touch with your consumer base. Over 80pc of the world population have a mobile device. One-third of all Facebook usage and one-half of all Twitter use is mobile,” he added, explaining that consumers want a seamless experience. With First Data being an AIBMS partner, Rutter unsurprisingly recommended that merchants develop partnerships to leverage others’ expertise in m-commerce in order to keep up with consumer demands.

Opportunities and challenges in m-commerce

Dr Philip O’Reilly of University College Cork’s Financial Services Innovation Centre highlighted how m-commerce represents a huge opportunity for merchants, particularly in terms of the ‘digital wallet’ and integrated electronic consumer payment services that allow for secure payments both online and offline.

“There is demand in the ecosystem for multiple payment technologies,” commented O’Reilly. “Contactless payments will, in the coming months, be incorporated into national policy. Yet, for consumers, the mobile payments ecosystem is still fragmented. There is a lack of standards and a lack of clearly communicated value propositions.”

Citing a survey by Millward Brown Lansdowne for Central Bank of Ireland last September, O’Reilly pointed out that most consumers are satisfied with the current range of payment options available, so new concepts need to have a clear consumer benefit to be attractive.

Michael Nolan, payments and operational excellence manager at Paddy Power, told the conference that one in two people join the betting giant via mobile applications. “Over five years, where traditional transactions remain stable, e-commerce has grown healthily and m-commerce has come out of nowhere to 39pc,” said Nolan. “We predict that this will increase to more than 50pc, but the value of other transactions is still growing.”

Interchange Fees for Payment Processing – A Huge Global Tax

Apr 12th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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Have you ever seen the 12% or even 24% interest rates that Visa, MasterCard, American Express & Discover charge and think about how rich those companies have to be charging such ridiculously high interest rates?  Here is the crazy part – that is another HUGE part of their financial success that you may not know about – it’s called interchange fees.

Here is how interchange fees work:

  1. Visa, MasterCard, American Express & Discover charge every company in the world that processes through them a percentage of every transaction.  These interchange fees range between 1% of a transaction to as high as 3-4% per transaction.
  2. These fees essentially are fees that any company that accepts credit cards has to pay.
  3. In effect, these credit card companies are enacting a global tax on almost all electronic transactions ranging from 1.2% to 4% per transaction.
  4. Companies to combat these fees essentially charge an extra 1% to 4% for everything they sell – and this costs gets passed directly onto the consumer with a higher cost for a service or product.

As a small business, it is important for you to partner with a merchant services partner that can keep your rates as close to true interchange as possible – and therefore lower your payment processing costs.

PayPal Goes Mobile With Magento

Apr 12th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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Here is some more information about the fast and exciting changes in mobile merchant services.  This story comes from Gigaom.

When eBay bought Magento in 2011 it gained an e-commerce platform that merchants could use to create custom online stores, but eBay has largely kept Magento separate from its most famous e-commerce acquisition, PayPal. That’s now changing, though, as the two are announcing a partnership to integrate PayPal’s m-commerce and mobile payments technology with Magento’s service.

In an upcoming blog post Wednesday, PayPal CTO James Barrese said his company is creating two new extensions for Magento’s 150,000 merchants. The first, called In-Aisle Selling, hooks PayPal’s point-of-sale mobile payments service Here directly to a merchant’s store. Here lets a salesman to take a credit or debit card payment anywhere in the store with PayPal’s triangular magnetic reader, while Magento’s ordering and inventory system pulls down all purchase and customer details.

The second extension is called Order Ahead, which lets merchants set up shop in PayPal’s mobile app. In January, PayPal launched a pilot project with one of its key mobile payments customers, Jamba Juice. Customers could access Jamba Juice’s menu from the app, place an order while waiting in line or before they arrived — even make special substitution requests — and of course pay for their drink.

Barrese said the pilot was a success and now it’s expanding Order Ahead, starting with Magento merchants. Stores can use specialized templates to create their menus or catalogs and synchronize their opening hours and locations with PayPal’s ordering system. Merchants can then manage the pre-orders through a simple console available in the extension or directly integrate Order Ahead into their existing point-of-sale systems using Magento’s APIs. Customers can pick up their orders either by presenting their names, order numbers or the QR code on their mobile phones.

Source: http://gigaom.com/2013/04/10/ebays-paypal-and-magento-join-hands-offering-mobile-payment-service/

 

Merchant Services for At Home Care Services

Apr 12th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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Running an at home care business is one of the most noble businesses that one can run. It is a business that is 100% about serving others. When it comes to bill collection from customers after insurance and medicare reimbursements this process is the last conversation that you want to have with your customers as they deal with the challenges of illness and aging. This is why it is important for you to have a good merchant services processing partner like Choice Merchant Services that enables you to automatically bill your clients without having to bother them and ask for payments. This process can save you the work and hassle of most of your bill collection and allow you and your customers to focus on the most important part of your business – caring for the sick and aging.

Choice Merchant Services offers merchant services processing rates starting at 1.05%. Our low rates save your company mone and enables you to either increase your profits or lower the rates that you charge your customers. In addition, our recurring billing systems that we offer with PCCharge, PlugNPay, and Authorize.net enable you to put your cutomer billings on auto pilot and then send you alerts whenever an automatic billing fails due to a bad check and an expired credit or debit card.

Prevent Identity Theft: Where Merchant Services Meets Fraud

Apr 5th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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Identity theft is a rapidly expanding crime.  Identity theft happens when a criminal gets ahold of your credit card number or social security number and any other personally identifiable information anyone uses that to make purchases using your identity.  They get a bunch of stuff for free and you get stuck with the bill. As a consumer there are simple things you can do to protect yourself from identity theft.  In addition, as a merchant who allows your customers to pay you through merchant services solutions you have an important job in protecting your customers from being victims of identify theft.

How to Protect Yourself From Identify Theft

  • Shred up personal documents, bank statements, credit card statements, or anything with your social security number on it before you through it out.
  • Do not save personally identifiable information such as your social security number on your home PC.  In addition, protect your home PC with a firewall and require a password to login to your computer.
  • Do not give out your social security number online.
  • Do not make a purchase online unless the ecommerce merchant you are buying from has encryption on their website.
  • Signup for LifeLock to get instant alerts if someone commits identity theft against you and get identify theft insurance so you are never stuck with the financial losses of identity theft.  I am a customer and I am a fan of it.

How to Protect your Customers From Identity Theft Through Effective Merchant Services Processing

  • Be PCI complaint and be smart about how you accept payments and store customers payment information.
  • Do not accept payments through old and outdated merchant equipment – in other words only use approved merchant equipment.
  • Only use the highest forms of encryption when accepting payments online – in other words only accept payments through Authorize.net or PlugNPay.
  • Store all data securely.  In other words do not store credit card data in any place but within your merchant equipment or software.
  • If accepting payments online use the latest and best breed of anti-fraud prevention tools such as PlugNPay’s, FraudTrak2.

If you do all of the above you will be as close as you can be to completely protecting yourself and your customers form fraud and identity theft.

Discover the ETA Annual Meeting & Expo for Merchant Services

Apr 5th, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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April 30th through May second in New Orleans, LA is the ETA Annual Meeting and Expo. The expo covers the topics of where merchant services, intersects with mobile, technology and commerce.  200 exhibitors will be there along with 3,000 top industry executives.  This is a great opportunity for merchant like yourself to go and learn how they can maximize their revenue and earnings by driving customers to their business, profitably, and with provable return on investment utilizing the latest mobile and commerce technologies that integrate with payment processing solutions.Some of the best merchant services topics covered at the conference will be:

  • Mobile Payment Innovations 2013
  • Fraud Management Tactics & Trends
  • Introduction to Sales & Marketing
  • Staying Ahead of Change in the Payment Processing Industry
  • The Value of Brand Equity in Your Business
  • The Mobile Revolution in Retailing
  • NFC vs. Cloud: The Best Method to Engage Customers and Increase Sales

For more information visit the website of the ETA Annual Meeting and Expo.

Easter Marks Lull in Merchant Services Processing Volume

Apr 1st, 2013
by JJ Belle.
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It is nice see the world slow down a bit and take a breather.  This Easter Sunday, payment processing volume dropped well below standard Sunday purchase volume.  Even in our fast-paced interconnected world things slow down for important holidays such as Easter Sunday.  This is from looking at the merchant service provider processing summary of Choice Merchant Services customer onEaster Sunday March, 31, 2013.