Guest Post: ISVs – Four Signs That You’ve Outgrown Your Integrated Payment Solution

By Ralph Dangelmaier, CEO at BlueSnap

Are you an independent software vendor (ISV) thinking about ways to enhance your product offerings and improve customer experience? If so, you should consider optimizing your payments processing technology. It’s a great way to boost the value of your software and can allow you to bring in new and recurring revenue.

If you get payment processing right, it can generate more revenue than the core business itself, but the only way to realize these benefits is to adapt quickly to the rapidly evolving world of global payment technology. That said, if you’re working with an outdated or poorly-matched payments provider, you’re likely overlooking several factors that can impede the success of your business.

Here are four commons signs that you have outgrown your current solution:

High Cross-Border Fees

The most obvious cost of an outdated payments solution is, well, cost. You’re probably paying very high and unnecessary cross-border fees if your payment provider is unable to process international payments efficiently.

For example, maybe your company started out only doing business domestically, so it made sense to partner with a US payment processor. But, now that you’ve expanded internationally, having a US processor means that you’ll likely experience high payment decline rates and cross-border fees, which furthers the divide between your potential revenue gains and the sunk cost of a limited solution. What you really need now is a global provider.

Missed Opportunities

Speaking of sunk costs, think of the number of opportunities you’ve already missed and will continue to miss without a global, fully-integrated payments solution.

You need a payments processing platform that can support different currencies, payment types, and higher conversion rates as your business grows and your customers begin selling globally. At the same time, a global payments processor enables you to easily expand into new markets whereas your old solution may be limited to the host country.

Additionally, as new payments technologies, such as Apple Pay or Google Pay, enter the picture, your customers will come to expect these additional offerings. If you can’t adapt to new innovative technologies like ewallets, your customers are likely to move on to a provider with a more modern payment experience.

Clunky Onboarding

The onboarding process for new payment technology clients is incredibly nuanced in different regions around the world. Your current payments provider might offer an efficient process for opening accounts in one country, but a clunky — or nonexistent — process for other regions.

Friction in the onboarding process can disrupt your sale entirely. If your competitors offer a quicker, simpler onboarding process for businesses around the world, you’ll be hard-pressed to convince new customers that your solution is worth the initial nightmarish onboarding experience.

Poor User Experience

Ultimately, delivering an excellent end-user experience is of the utmost importance for your customers.

Therefore, in order to retain and grow your customer base, you need to enable the most seamless payments experience possible with a painless onboarding process, global functionality, the latest ewallets, and more. Also, it’s important to remember, if you’re experiencing challenges with your payments provider, your customers are likely experiencing these issues tenfold.

Future-Proofing Your Payments Solution

If your current payments provider has been especially troublesome for your business, choosing a new provider can be an intimidating process. To avoid any headaches during the integration process, look for a payment provider with a hosted solution or developer-friendly APIs that allow you to integrate however is most convenient for you. In a few days, you could be live with a new provider, global functionality, and localized user experiences.

After all, there are no border limits on selling software — so choose a payment provider who can cross those borders with you.

Going to TRANSACT?

I’ll be speaking more on this topic at TRANSACT in the Integrated Payments Track, sponsored by Red Hat, on Tuesday, April 30th at 1:45 pm in session room Islander E. Click here to read more about my panel session, “All about ISVs: Straight Talk about Payment Partnership Integration.”

And be sure to visit us at our TRANSACT meeting room (#3614) on the show floor to connect with us directly!

TRANSACT is the world’s largest payments technology event, happening April 30-May 2 at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Over 4,000 payments technology industry professionals will attend the show, coming from every corner of the payments ecosystem for unrivaled networking and leading-edge networking. Click here to register.