E-commerce has transformed the ways products and services are sold. The ease and convenience of buying online have brought a significant shift in the way the business is done. A prerequisite for selling online is an e-commerce merchant account. Let us discuss in detail what an e-commerce merchant account is and what are ecommerce merchant services.
E-commerce Merchant Accounts
Ecommerce merchant accounts are payment accounts for processing debit card, credit card and ACH payments. It lets merchants accept payments directly on their website. A business uses an e-commerce merchant account for mobile credit card processing.
Generally, ecommerce merchant services offer the following as a part of the ecommerce merchant account package:
- Shopping cart integration
- Fraud prevention tools
- Better Security through payment solutions that meet PCI DSS Compliance requirements.
- Cloud reporting
Four Must-Haves For Any E-Commerce Merchant Account
These features are a must-have for any merchant account, and the best ecommerce merchant services online do provide:
Online Shopping Cart
E-commerce merchants need online shopping carts that seamlessly work with payment gateways. Online shopping cart enables the merchants to display products and allows the customers to learn more about the products. Payments solutions integration with online shopping carts enables merchants to accept payments seamlessly and also streamline their operations. It also provides the shoppers with a frictionless and seamless online checkout process.
Payment Gateway
Payment gateways are must-have e-commerce. It connects the e-commerce website to a merchant service provider and transfers the data between the website or mobile device and a payment processor to continue the payment lifecycle. It acts as an interface between the website and the ecommerce merchant services provider’s processing network. The payment gateway sends transactions to the processing network to authenticate purchases and assess transaction processing fees. The payment gateways also offer security services that protect cardholders information to creating databases that store customers information, so customers do not enter it every time they shop on a merchants website.
Support for Multiple Payment Types
E-commerce merchant services should support multiple payment options so that the merchant can provide customers with their preferred methods at the time of checkout. If a customer does not find the payment method of his choice at checkout, the chances of the customer not completing the sales increases significantly. The various payment methods an e-commerce site can support are credit card, debit cards, ACH, bank transfers, e-wallets and mobile payments.
Multiple gateways offer many other advantages to e-commerce merchants, such as entering new markets, wider customer reach, and smoothly handling high volumes.
Integrations
Merchants use different software to run their business. So, when you set up the merchant account, consider the e-commerce merchant accounting software online that offer processing solutions that can integrate with shopping carts and online stores. Most businesses use accounting, business management, inventory management, customer relationship management software, so you should give preference to ecommerce merchant services provider that offers integration with these platforms. Integration of software helps to reduce data entry, prevent data errors and saves time.
How To Choose Right e-Commerce Merchant Services For You
Pricing and other factors need to be considered while picking a merchant services provider for your business. Complex industry terminology used by ecommerce merchant service provider is confusing at times. But here is some help.
Contract Terms
The industry standard on the contract terms when it comes to merchant accounts are a fixed- time period contract for an initial period of three years. The auto-renewal clause that results in an extension of the agreement for one year period after that. A processor also charges an early termination fee if an account is closed and the contract is broken.
However, many service providers are becoming more flexible and doing away with long-term contracts if it is not a high-risk merchant account.
Processing Fees
The processing fees e-commerce merchant services charge vary from provider to provider. It is the most complex part and needs close attention. E-commerce merchant services charge fees to process card transactions. These fees include processing fees and interchange fees. The four types of pricing schemes all merchant service providers use are membership pricing, flat-rate pricing, tiered pricing and interchange-plus pricing.
Compatibility
If you are an established business selling products through retail, you already have a merchant account and only need a payment gateway and online shopping cart, but if you are starting out, then you need a merchant account, online shopping cart and a payment gateway, and e-commerce merchant account services.
Conclusion:
E-commerce merchant service providers offer payment gateway, online shopping cart and merchant account to sell products online.
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