How to choose the ideal payment gateway for your e-commerce?

Why integrate a payment gateway in your e-commerce?

Online customers are looking for ease and immediate answers. In most cases, they have already made a decision, but if they find a confusing and extensive payment method, they will surely abandon the purchase and increase the transactional phase bounce rate, impacting the conversion rate and revenue generation.

Choosing an ideal payment gateway that meets the expectations of customers across the board will yield great benefits to your business, such as:

• Multiple payment methods

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Offering a wide variety of payment methods directly leads to strengthening the user experience. There are those who prefer credit, debit or outsourcing payment with bank providers, so it is important to include the most common alternatives so that the customer can pay according to their interests, inclinations, or needs.

• Safer payments

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Payment gateways have rigorous and reliable policies to protect buyers' privacy and security. This point is crucial, considering that one out of every five users abandon their order when they feel that their confidential information is at risk. 

• Data storage

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Payment gateways provide the option of saving data requested during the purchase process, protecting them with verification filters that make up the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS) and anti-fraud systems that prevent theft or identity theft.

• Immediacy, fewer mistakes and time savings

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The payment gateway reduces the purchase process compared to traditional methods by storing the data. In addition, transactions travel directly to the payment system and do not have to be processed by a partner. Also, as it is a defined flow, it reduces errors to a minimum and speeds up product or service sales due to its processing speed.

• Easy and fast integration

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Integrating the payment gateway with your e-commerce is an easy, intuitive and simple process. The provider you choose will give you the guidelines from registration all the way to the technical integration that will guarantee its optimal operation.

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How does a payment gateway work?

Once the payment gateway is integrated into your e-commerce, performing necessary tests and validating its operability, the purchase process will be the same for all customers. Here we explain it in five steps:

1. The online customer chooses a product or service and adds it to the shopping cart.
2. Then he/she must fill in the registration data required for the purchase.
3. Then he/she can choose the payment method and complete the transactional and shipping information.
4. The browser will protect the information provided and send it to the platform that registers the payment.
5. Finally, the system will confirm if the transaction was successful or if any additional validation must be provided to execute the transaction.

Tips for choosing the most efficient payment gateway

Without a doubt, choosing your payment gateway is a fundamental step to ensuring a successful process. It is important that you choose one that suits the type of business you manage. Don't know what to consider before making the final choice? Follow these tips and strengthen your e-commerce with the most effective payment solution for your customers:

• Learn about payment gateways and get familiar with them

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It's important that, when selecting the payment gateway, you ask for all the existing documentation to clarify questions such as: does its integration require a custom development? Does its operation depend on a plugin? Is it required to follow any specification for its operation in the mobile version? In short, concerns may vary, so it is important to have written support that clarifies each question.

• Simple payment management

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Go for an option that offers a simple and easy-to-understand checkout, this will make the customer value the transactional process highly. Additionally, this point will serve to differentiate yourself from the competition, connect with more services and boost possible upsells during the purchase.

• Online security above all else

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Verify that the payment gateway complies with security requirements, SSL protocols and the rules governing payment cards (PCI SSC), in order to protect confidential data and prevent fraudulent actions. Currently, there are multiple security strategies, one of them is the tokenization service that seeks to reduce the servers that have access to the purchase holder's information.

• Set up and analyze customized reports

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Payment gateways need to be optimized with a defined frequency, based on the user's behavior, consumption habits, and preferences during a transaction. Therefore, we recommend that transactional platforms or providers can provide personalized information that allows for correcting, improving, or strengthening the payment experience.

• Specialized technical support

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Choose a payment gateway that offers 24/7 tech support, prioritizes requests according to urgency level and corrects them in optimum times so as not to affect the e-commerce operation. In these cases, response times should be short, since online users are generally looking for immediacy and are not willing to wait.

Finally, it is important to ensure that the payment gateway works properly in the mobile version and guarantees a user experience that reduces the bounce rate or page exit without conversion. This transactional management platform will seek to increase credibility, trust, and customer loyalty.