Category: Point of Sale
December 30th, 2013 by Elma Jane
Earlier this year, American Express offered its cardholders free permanent membership in ShopRunner, a service that gives its members free, two-day shipping at several retail sites. Similarly, PayPal recently tested two-day free shipping offers with a few retailers, whereby shoppers could get free, two-day shipping without an annual fee if they simply checked out using PayPal. The offer had no minimum purchase requirement. Now, Global payment firm MasterCard announced that its customers will receive free, two-day shipping from five of the Internet’s leading retailers. MasterCard also offered a premium service that extends the free, two-day shipping offer to other online merchants. MasterCard joins American Express and PayPal in offering customers free, two-day shipping options at select online retailers.
Collectively ShopRunner, PayPal’s offer, and MasterCard’s recent move may be part of what some in the retail industry are calling the Amazon Prime effect, which is a trend to faster, free shipping services driven in part by Amazon’s Prime service. These offers are changing customer expectations, so that merchants, regardless of size, may need to change free shipping offers to reflect the two-day service available from Amazon Prime, ShopRunner, and now MasterCard.
MasterCard Offer Aims at Large Retailers
To take advantage of the MasterCard offer, shoppers must register at a special MasterCard site, sign in and shop from the site, select two-day shipping at checkout and of course, pay with a MasterCard. Customers will have to pay for the two-day shipping upfront and email the order confirmation to MasterCard to be reimbursed.
Regular online shoppers may purchase an annual subscription for $69.99, extending the free, two-day shipping to about 30 larger retailers, including Nordstrom, J. C. Penney, Home Depot, and GameStop. The premium annual subscription also raises the maximum limit from $500 for six months to $1,500 per year.
The “Free Shipping by MasterCard” offer features five of the retail industry’s best known merchants: Best Buy, QVC, Macy’s, Kohl’s, and Walmart. Online purchases made from these sellers can earn free shipping up to $20 per purchase and $500 maximum over a six-month period.
Implications for Small, Mid-sized Ecommerce Merchants
Free shipping is now or, at least is becoming a key to online ecommerce success. As an example, Forrester Research’s U.S. Online Holiday Retail Forecast 2013, which was released on November 25, found that many online shoppers will leave a site and not buy anything if there is not a free shipping offer available.
Customers may look at shipping as an extra cost or even a waste of money, which is different from how they calculate the gas and inconvenience of going to a store or mall. Even offering free shipping with a minimum purchase can make customers feel better about the checkout process.
Where MasterCard’s offer is different is that it is increasing the expectation around how long a package should take to arrive, and, perhaps, changing how sellers need to think about free shipping.
When an ecommerce retailer purchases pay-per-click advertising, invests in email marketing, buys banner ads, or even prints a brochure or catalog to include in the shipping box, that retailer is investing to acquire or keep customers.
When it comes to accounting for these marketing investments, pay-per-click advertising, as an example, is often taken as part of marketing expenses generally and not attributed directly to a single transaction. For this reason, it is possible that merchants are losing money on some particular orders because of the advertising and promotional expenses associated with those particular orders, but making a profit overall thanks to spreading out marketing costs over all orders and generally increasing the total number of orders and reorders.
Ecommerce businesses may need to start thinking about shipping costs, even two-day shipping costs, in a similar way, not necessarily associating these costs with individual orders, but looking at the business as a whole to see if the free shipping offers are increasing profitability or market share company wide.
New Opportunity for Payment Providers
Free, two-day shipping offers also represent an opportunity for payment companies, like MasterCard, since these free shipping offers could give a particular payment service a competitive advantage. After all, most shoppers will choose the payment card or payment option that provides free shipping over other payment choices.
For the most part, PayPal, American Express via ShopRunner, and now MasterCard are focusing on large retailers, but there may be another opportunity with small and mid-sized online merchants.
Posted in Credit card Processing, e-commerce & m-commerce, Electronic Payments, Point of Sale, Visa MasterCard American Express Tagged with: Amazon, American Express, catalog, checkout, ecommerce, free, macy's. kohls, marketing, MasterCard, Merchant's, online, online merchants, pay-per-click, PayPal, purchases, qvc, retailers, shipping, shoppers, shoprunner, site, walmart
December 30th, 2013 by Elma Jane
Google
With New Debit Card, Google Admits Digital Isn’t Everything
The maker of all things digital is introducing a debit card for accessing Google Wallet accounts. Google is getting physical.
A debit card alone is not a platform, or at least not a new one. In this case, it’s the payments version of comfort food: an everyday, easy-to-use technology to drive greater adoption of the less familiar Wallet platform.
This isn’t a new concept for a digital wallet. PayPal itself has a debit card. The significance for Google is more in its apparent acknowledgment that its business needs to play in the physical world. Earlier this week, the company ramped up its Google Shopping Express service with a partnership with Costco, further expanding its presence in the buying and selling of physical goods. Its self-driving cars are another way the company is reaching beyond digital, though never losing sight of the digital-derived lesson that the real business opportunity is in platforms, not just products.
The MasterCard-branded card is swipe-able at stores, and it can be used to withdraw cash at ATMs, Google said. The company pitched its new plastic in a blog post today as a way to pay for things offline without waiting for the money in your Google Wallet to transfer to a bank account.
This should sound familiar to users of PayPal or any other digital wallet, where the lag time between receiving money and being able to spend it makes such services marginal in the brick-and-mortar world, where most consumer dollars get spent.
That it took Google this long to make such a card available shows just how hard it is for the company to re-imagine itself as expanding beyond digital. For years, Google has supported NFC tap-to-pay technology that lets users of the few phones with such chips use their handsets to pay by Wallet at the few merchants with point-of-sale systems that support NFC. With the release of a debit card, Google seems to be acknowledging that battle is lost for now. In a world Google is trying to remake in its digital-first image, plastic still prevails.
Posted in Digital Wallet Privacy, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Near Field Communication, Point of Sale, Smartphone Tagged with: brick and mortar, costco, debit card, digital, handsets, MasterCard, nfc, payments, PayPal, phones, plastic, platform, point of sale, Tap to Pay, wallet
December 19th, 2013 by Elma Jane
NTC’s BIG DATA
Improving Collection and Analytics tools to Create Value from Relevant Data.
Big data is a popular term used to describe the exponential growth and availability of data, both structured and unstructured. And big data may be as important to business…and society… as the Internet has become. Why? More data may lead to more accurate analyses. More accurate analyses may lead to more confident decision making, and better decisions can mean greater operational efficiencies, cost reductions and reduced risk.
With NTC Virtual Merchant product, it captures email addresses at the Point-of-Sale (POS) into a database to assist merchants and consumer stay connected, and for future Marketing.
In understanding Big Data For Merchants, NTC’s President Mark Fravel, provided a general overview of how online merchants can use Big Data. Large amounts of seemingly random data from many sources…can be used to create competitive advantages.
Necessity of Analytical Tools
Collecting Big Data is the easy part. Storing, organizing, and analyzing it is much more complex. One seam of data that several experts identify as a particularly rich, emerging source of information can be as diverse as CRM software, AdWords, and your own website. Mobile communications, including text messages and social media posts such as Facebook and Twitter. Making sense of it can be overwhelming without analytical tools. These tools facilitate the examination of large amounts of different types of data to reveal hidden patterns and correlations that are not otherwise easily discernible.
A good example is NTC, they could analyze data on visitor browsing patterns, login counts, phone calls, and responses to promotions…they can monitor to eliminate what isn’t working and focus on what does. Some of the off-the-shelf analytic solutions are so finely tuned, they can tell a vendor whether it needs to offer a 25 percent discount or if a 15 percent discount will suffice for a particular customer.
Association rule learning is another analytics method that is a good fit with Big Data. This could be, for example, a shopping cart analysis, in which a merchant can determine which products are frequently bought together and use this information for marketing purposes.
Uses of Big Data Analytics:
Big Data can be most useful in analyzing a customer’s shopping and purchasing experience, which can help a merchant in the following four ways.
Become more efficient by alerting you to merchandising efforts that are ineffective, and products that are not selling.
Encourage more purchases by presenting existing customers with complementary items to what they’ve purchased previously.
Enhance inventory management by eliminating slow-moving items and increasing the supply of fast-moving merchandise.
Example: A top marketing executive at a sizable U.S. retailer recently found herself perplexed by the sales reports she was getting. A major competitor was steadily gaining market share across a range of profitable segments. Despite a counterpunch that combined online promotions with merchandising improvements, her company kept losing ground….The competitor had made massive investments in its ability to collect, integrate, and analyze data from each store and every sales unit and had used this ability to run myriad real-world experiments. At the same time, it had linked this information to suppliers’ databases, making it possible to adjust prices in real time, to reorder hot-selling items automatically, and to shift items from store to store easily. By constantly testing, bundling, synthesizing, and making information instantly available across the organization…the rival company had become a different, far nimbler type of business.
Increase conversion rates by better identification of successful sales transactions.
Is Big Data Analysis Affordable?
NTC Data Storage is also a good alternative for small ecommerce merchants because it is relatively inexpensive and is scalable it can expand as data requirements grow.
Relying on data-driven decision-making is crucial in industries in which profit margins are slim. Amazon, which earns increasingly thin profit margins, is one of the most effective users of data analytics. As more Big Data solutions for small online businesses come to market and more online merchants incorporate Big Data into their business tool set, employing Big Data will become a necessity for all Merchants.
Using data wisely has the potential to boost margins and increase conversions for online merchants, and investors are banking on it.
This is Big Data for NTC we know WHO, WHAT,WHEN, AND WHERE a purchase took place.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Credit card Processing, e-commerce & m-commerce, Electronic Payments, Internet Payment Gateway, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Point of Sale, Visa MasterCard American Express Tagged with: analyses, analytic, big data, communications, competitive, consumer, cost, database, decision, ecommerce, email, internet, marketing, Merchant's, mobile, monitor, ntc, online, orgainizing, patterns, point of sale, POS, profit margins, promotions, risk, scalable, solutions, storing, text messages, virtual merchant, website
December 16th, 2013 by Elma Jane
1. Account Updater (Visa)
Incorrect billing information leads to declined credit cards, loss of sales and unhappy customers.
Visa touts its Account Updater as an easier way to keep customer data current. The tool appends all card data with up-to-date customer info so businesses can avoid difficulties over address changes, name changes, expired cards and more.
The tool can benefit any business that bills customers on a recurring basis.
It eliminates the need for manual administration, so it can lower your business’s operational costs and customer-service expenses. And by saving your clients the hassle of a declined payment, you can boost customer satisfaction and overall sales.
2. Netswipe
Paying online is convenient for customers, but keying in an unwieldy credit card number is still a pain.
Netswipe from Jumio gives customers an easier way: The tool lets users pay by snapping a photo of their credit card; it’s almost as easy as swiping your card through a traditional card reader.
According to Jumio, customers can use their smartphone or tablet to scan a card in as little as 5 seconds, whereas traditional key entry takes 60 seconds or more, on average. Having a quick and convenient way to pay could help contribute to a positive buying experience and encourage repeat business.
The system is compatible with any iOS or Android mobile device, as well as with any computer with a webcam.
3. Netverify
Jumio’s fraud-scrubbing tool helps you determine if your customers are who they say they are.
Net verify allows customers to snap a picture of their driver’s license or other identification using a smartphone, tablet or PC webcam. Once the image is taken, the tool can verify the authenticity of the documentation in as little as 60 seconds.
That’s much faster and more convenient than asking a customer to fax or mail a copy of their ID in the middle of a transaction.
The tool can verify identifying documents from more than 60 countries…including passports, ID cards and driver’s licenses, and even bank statements and utility bills. Jumio says its software is smart enough to automatically reject nonauthentic documents.
And customers can rest easy knowing that all submitted information is protected with 256-bit encryption to prevent identity theft.
Online merchants embed Netverify into their websites as part of the checkout process.
4. Payment Gateway
Payment Gateway service does all the heavy lifting of routing and managing credit card transactions online.
Portals like this one benefit small businesses by providing a fast and secure transmission of credit card data between your website and the major payment networks. It works a lot like a traditional credit card reader, but uses the Internet to process transactions instead of a phone line.
Payment Gateway also offers built-in fraud-prevention tools and supports a range of payment options, including all major credit cards and debit cards.
5. PayPal Here
Mobile credit card processing services like PayPal Here make it easy to accept credit cards in person using a smartphone or tablet.
PayPal Here and other similar services send you a dongle that attaches directly to your iPhone, iPad or Android device, allowing you to swipe physical credit cards wherever you are.
One major benefit of mobile credit card readers is that they work with the devices you already own. That means there’s no need to carry around additional hardware, aside from the reader add-on itself. Most credit card readers attach to your device via the headphone jack or charger port, and are small enough to fit in your pocket.
The smallest businesses have the most to gain by opting for mobile credit card readers, which are cheaper and far more portable than traditional options.
6. Virtual Terminal
If you do business online, your website needs the infrastructure to accept credit card information.
Web-based applications like virtual terminal offer the basic processing functionality of a physical point-of-sale system, and are easy to install on your business’s website.
The system allows merchants to collect orders straight from the Web, or take orders via phone or mail and before initiating card authorizations online.
It also includes extensive transaction history to help you manage payment data, split shipments, back orders and reversals. Business owners can even receive a daily email report of all credit card transaction activity from the prior day.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Credit card Processing, Credit Card Reader Terminal, Credit Card Security, e-commerce & m-commerce, Electronic Payments, EMV EuroPay MasterCard Visa, Gift & Loyalty Card Processing, Mail Order Telephone Order, Merchant Cash Advance, Merchant Services Account, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Near Field Communication, Point of Sale, Smartphone, Visa MasterCard American Express Tagged with: account, Android, authenticity, card data, card reader, checkout, checkout process, credit card number, credit card transactions, debit cards, declined payment, expired, fraud, id, iOS, mail, mobile device, nonauthentic, online, online merchants, passports, payment data, payment gateway, payment options, phone, point of sale, recurring, smartphone, tablet, verify, visa, webcam
December 5th, 2013 by Elma Jane
Three key benefits mPOS can provide PSPs. mPOS:
1. Maintains A Continuity Of Operations
mPOS solutions also ease the process of accepting and approving payments, according to the white paper. By enabling face-to-face card present transactions, mPOS allows transactions to be conducted in a highly secure manner. Further, once the encrypted transaction data is decrypted securely by the PSP at the payment gateway (with no access granted to the merchant), the onward presentation of the data into the acquiring network is consistent with that used historically for traditional POS terminals.
2. Simplifies Merchant Support
Thales suggests the biggest benefit to PSPs is that mPOS reduces the variety of costs PSPs need to cover to support merchants, cutting expenses related to equipment, security and PCI DSS compliance. This, the white paper says, allows PSPs that utilize mPOS to better allocate resources toward handling higher transaction volumes and acquiring business.
3. Supports Both Magnetic Stripe and EMV Cards
Another benefit to PSPs is that mPOS, despite its recent entrance to the market, is already widely available. The white paper explains that since the mPOS revolution quickly migrated from the U.S. abroad, mPOS solutions now exist to serve the unique needs of both markets. While this means challenges for merchants operating globally, PSPs benefit from being able to address the needs of merchants who want to opt for any and all available market solutions.
Much has been said about the recent explosion of the mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) market and how micromerchants are driving this payments revolution. But, what this story doesn’t communicate effectively is that small merchants aren’t the only stakeholders benefiting from the ongoing mPOS migration.
Payment service providers (PSPs) are another member of the mPOS value chain that can gain flexibility and security through these solutions, new research from data protection solution provider Thales suggests.
“Both merchants and PSPs have operational and logistical issues with traditional POS terminals associated mainly with the highly controlled and certified environment in which they must be used,” Thales writes in its latest white paper on the topic, “mPOS: Secure Mobile Card Acceptance.”
The 27-page white paper provides an extensive overview of the ongoing POS revolution, explaining how mPOS can reduce friction and costs for merchants, illustrating how the technology works step-by-step and highlighting the roles that each stakeholder plays along the value chain.
Posted in Electronic Payments, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Payment Card Industry PCI Security, Point of Sale, Smartphone Tagged with: acceptance, acquiring network, card present, compliance, decrypted, DSS, emv cards, encrypted, face-to-face, magnetic stripe, merchant, micromerchants, migration, mobile card, mobile point of sale, MPOS, payment gateway, payment service providers, payments, PCI, POS, psps, secure, securely, Security, terminals, transactions
November 15th, 2013 by Elma Jane
November 7, 2013 – Payment Card Industry (PCI) Council’s recent acceptance of the world’s first Point-To-Point Encryption-validated solution is great news for both acquirers and merchants, and will aid in reducing merchant scope and increasing business security worldwide. If your P2PE know-how is a little spotty, here are the basics.
What is P2PE?
Point-To-Point Encryption (P2PE) is the combination of hardware and processes that encrypts customer credit/debit card data from the point of interaction until it reaches a merchant solution provider’s environment for processing. Because card data is immediately encrypted as the card is swiped (or dipped), it prevents clear-text information from residing on the payment environment. Encrypted card data is then transferred to, decrypted by, and processed through the solution provider processor who is the sole holder of the decryption key.
In a POS environment, merchants often store decryption keys on their backend servers. Bad idea. If a cybercriminal hacks into that environment, they not only have access to the encrypted card numbers, but the decryption key as well. Hacker jackpot. Many question the difference between P2PE and typical point of sale (POS) encryption.
The reason P2PE is arguably the most secure way to process is because merchants don’t have access to decryption keys. If a hacker breaches a merchant using a validated P2PE solution, he/she will only recover a long string of useless encrypted card numbers with no way to decode them.
Why use P2PE?
Basically, P2PE increases data security and has the ability to make a merchant’s job of reaching PCI compliance easier. The main point of using a P2PE-valiated solution is to significantly lessen the scope of security efforts through PCI Data Security Standard (DSS) requirement and P2PE Self-Assessment Questionnaire (SAQ) reduction. Compared to the 80+ questions required of mainstream merchant SAQs, the P2PE-HW SAQ only requires merchants to answer 18 questions.
Are all P2PE solutions created equal?
Answer is no. Many P2PE solution vendors claim their solution reduces scope, but in order for a merchant to qualify, they must select only P2PE-validated solutions listed on the PCI Council’s website.
To get P2PE solutions and applications listed on the approved website, solution provider processors must go through a rigorous testing process performed by a qualified P2PE Qualified Security Assessor (QSA). P2PE QSAs help entities thorough the 210-page document of P2PE requirements, testing procedures, and controls required to keep cardholder data secure – a task which only a few companies in the world can do.
As of this post, the only P2PE hardware solution approved by the PCI Council is European Payment Services’ (EPS) Total Care P2PE solution, validated by P2PE QSA SecurityMetrics. A number of other P2PE solutions are currently undergoing the review process and will be added to the list once approved.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Credit card Processing, Credit Card Security, Electronic Payments, Merchant Services Account, Payment Card Industry PCI Security, Point of Sale, Visa MasterCard American Express Tagged with: acceptance, acquirers, backend, cardholder, credit/debit, cybercriminal, data, decode, decrypted, decryption, DSS, encrypted, encryption, encrypts, hacker, hardware, key, Merchant's, p2pe, p2pe-hw, Payment Card Industry, PCI Council, point of sale, point-to-point, POS, process, processed, processes, Processing, processor, provider's, saqs, secure, solution, transferred, validated
October 25th, 2013 by Elma Jane
Some brands have managed to pull themselves together to mobilize their online sites…that’s design them to be visually friendly to mobile users.
Earlier this month the quick-service restaurant debuted a new item on its menu…the Smoke Brisket Sandwich…with a campaign that involved a number of social media components. Included among those were a game that awards points based on a customer’s tweets, the online challenges he or she wins and the photos uploaded to Instagram.
It starts with a purchase of the sandwich at an Arby’s outlet. When the customers receives her receipt she takes a picture of it and uploads it to mobile site PunchTab created for the campaign.
What sets this campaign apart from many others is that it is coordinated at the point of sale.
For this campaign, PunchTab created mobile Web onto which Arby’s customers upload a receipt. When users make a purchase, they can take a picture of their receipt and submit it via the mobile website. From there, points are dispersed, the players advance…and hopefully, return to Arby’s for more purchases, err, points.
Helping Business
There’s definitely been a trend in the POS and payments industry to add value offerings by helping businesses better understand their customers. This trend is built on the wealth of transactional data being collected by POS and payments companies, and the goal is to present simplified consumer behavior analyses that can be used by merchants to generate more revenue.
Looking ahead, more and more retailers will understand the value that capturing this customer data can unlock for this business, and will put the software in place to tap into a customer’s purchase history and thus their preferences.
Now the focus is on salespeople delivering a personalized experience to customers. The next stage, will focus on extending to individual customers the inside track on new products that will appeal to them and complement or replace things they have previously purchased.
Pimping Out The POS
Engaging with the customer at the point of sale is hardly a new idea. It certainly is an established practice in traditional brick and mortar operations…think credit card solicitations and offers for loyalty points and cards…as we all as e-commerce sites, where a customer is usually presented with several offers before the checkout is complete.
Now CRM is making its way into the mobile POS and customers are finding that there are a number of unique benefits to the model.
In the case of PunchTab, it ties the receipt-scanning functionality that doesn’t require an app…not to mention several other benefits to the system.
For example, Marketers get greater insight into purchasing behavior because a receipt is usually involved. Consumers are right there and thinking about the campaign…which they wouldn’t necessarily be when they got home to go online, and it is relatively easy system to set up.
Arby’s for example, has 40 POS systems and because it is a franchise, it requires coordinating with multiple owners. For them, mobile is the best and easiest way to engage with customers at the point of sale.
Real-Time Offers
Other companies…such as Groupon with its Breadcrumb mobile app…are adding even more advanced CRM capabilities, such as reporting at the mobile point of sale.
It is a growing trend for all mobile applications and most especially apps in the mobile POS to bring more CRM capabilities into their service platform.
Eventually, some of these CRM-infused mobile POS systems will be able to make offers in real time to customers based on their purchase at the moment and accumulated knowledge about the preferences of other customers that make similar purchases. Example it might be noted that in 20 percent of all purchases of a particular type of coffee the customer also purchase a biscotti, then the server can offer up the option as a reminder for purchase/order.
The example assumes the mobile POS system has access to customer data about purchase and preferences…which is somewhat rare now, but a trend gaining momentum.
Posted in Credit card Processing, e-commerce & m-commerce, Electronic Payments, Internet Payment Gateway, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Point of Sale Tagged with: app, awards, brick and mortar, crm, customers, data, design, franchise, functionality, mobile, mobile pos, mobilize, online, payments, payments industry, point of sale, points, POS, purchase/order, purchases, receipt, receipt-scanning, restaurant, retailers, revenue, social media, transactional, uploaded, users, web, website
October 22nd, 2013 by Elma Jane
The best place to start understanding your customer is to put yourself into every step of a buying cycle and analyze what influences various purchase decisions.
Who is your customer?
Basic demographics and usually includes the following:
Age range Education level Gender Income level Location Marital status Profession
Many of these basic demographics can be inferred from your interactions with customers. In many cases, you can simply ask them.
Beyond the basics, you will also benefit from more personal data, such as the following:
Interests Activities Political affiliation
That data is harder to access, but there are databases that will allow you to target individuals based on those criteria. Facebook’s ad platform provides an incredible amount of targeting data. You can infer your customer profiles by the types of results you get by running ads aimed at specific target markets. That will help identify the interests of your customers.
What? consider what consumers need to know about a product to make a purchase.
Are there ongoing costs? Does it need anything else to make it work? How big is it? How does it function? How long will it last? How much does it cost? Is there a warranty? What are its specs? What does it look like? What options are there? What sizes and colors are available?
To find those details, shoppers will seek different sources: articles, websites, blogs, and actually looking at products and trying them on. Make sure you understand the “what” questions for your products. Then, provide answers to those questions.
Why? The “why” questions are important. Do you know why your customers buy your products?
It could be for the following reasons.
Address an immediate need or desire. Loyal to a particular brand or store. Need flexibility to return products. Need product occasionally or on a regular schedule. Purchase because product is cool or trendy. Seek bargains. Seek high-quality products Seek little or no shipping or sales tax. Seek the lowest price possible. Shop around every time they buy.
Answers will surely vary. Consider also, what motivates your customers to purchase the products you sell and also why they purchase them from your company versus your competitor. This will help you better refine your value proposition of why shoppers choose your company.
How? This area is the most significant change in a consumer’s shopping cycle. As recently as 15 years ago, most product research was done in stores or catalogs or magazines. Today, product research is done in many ways. In the living room, in the boardroom, at the hospital, you name it. Most shoppers start their search at Amazon.com or on Google by searching on a product.
Many searches start with an opportunistic email promoting a product. From there, we may find the shopper looking at the item on that store’s website.
Consumers likely check product reviews, from other consumers. They may read professional reviews. Browse the Internet on SmartPhone.
The point is to understand your customer’s research process. It will vary widely. But in many cases it’s something like this.
An event triggers an interest in a product. Check other brands or alternative products. Conduct research by looking at a product’s pictures, reading descriptions. Evaluate the product’s real value, and eventually make a purchase decision. Narrow your selection and shop for price. Seek out reviews or ask friends.
Where? That leads us to the where customers are researching. They could be reading relevant blogs, going to brick and mortar stores, checking comparison shopping engines, and reading trade publication articles. They may be looking at Pinterest boards, Facebook posts, and checking with their network of friends on Twitter.
They will be using tablets (increasingly the shopper’s preference), smartphones, laptops, desktops, Xboxes, and store visits.
Can an ecommerce merchant be in all of these places with your message? Likely no. But you can identify where your customers are looking for information as they move through their cycle and try to make sure you are seen. You can also ensure that your messaging and content are mobile friendly.
To compete in the future, your store needs to provide input and information to support all those steps. If you lack reviews, your customers will seek them out elsewhere.
Most ecommerce merchants can describe their customers in a general way. They likely know basic demographics – age range, gender, income level. But, do they understand the “why, where, when, and how” their customers make their purchases? These basic tenants of marketing are more important than ever.
The buying process has never been more complex. Consumers have hundred of places online to purchase products that meet their needs. They may shop at home, at work, in the grocery store. They may be using an Android phone, an iPhone, or an Xbox.
Posted in e-commerce & m-commerce, Electronic Payments, Internet Payment Gateway, Mobile Point of Sale, Point of Sale, Smartphone Tagged with: alternative, Android, brick and mortar, comparison, competitor, consumers, content, costs, customers, cycle, data, databases, desktops, ecommerce, Facebook's, flexibility, Iphone, laptops, leads, Merchant's, mobile, ongoing, online, phone, pinterest, platform, price, product, profiles, purchase, selection, shop, shoppers, smartphone, store's, tablets, target, trigger, value, websites, xbox
October 21st, 2013 by Elma Jane
UL’s (Underwriter Laboratories) latest contribution to the future of payments has been accomplished through its three years of work with National Security, a French biometrics company that has created a commercially viable biometric technology solution for the point of sale.
The move positions UL and National Security at the forefront of an industry that is expected to expand by 140 percent to reach $12 billion in revenue over the next five years, potentially transforming online, mobile and in-store commerce by increasing the speed of transactions in the process.
Still, arguments can be made that biometric use at the point of sale will remain limited. Why does UL believe the market is right for biometrics, and how did it successfully ensure biometric payments will be ready for all parts of the payment process?
Why The Time Is Now For Biometrics
Consumer concerns regarding identity theft and violence are on the rise, and the solution according to many is a viable biometrics payment solution. Reports show that there is already strong demand in the U.S. and Asian markets for such products, and major research outlets have put their support behind the technology.
UL’s case study elaborates on the benefits illustrating how biometric data has been developed to be harder for hackers to infiltrate and compliant with EMV security standards.
Developing The Technology
UL’s work to ensure biometrics will remove friction at the POS has been extensive. For example, its latest case study profiles how UL developed the underlying technology to overcome challenges and work in harmony with wireless technologies such as bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Further, it explains how UL assessed the human health impact of National Security’s biometric solutions.
Posted in Credit card Processing, Electronic Payments, EMV EuroPay MasterCard Visa, Mobile Point of Sale, Near Field Communication, Point of Sale Tagged with: biometric, bluetooth, commerce, data, developing, EMV, future, hackers, identity theft, impact, in-store, mobile, online, payment process, payments, point of sale, POS, process, security standards, solution, speed, transactions, viable, Wi-Fi, wireless
October 21st, 2013 by Elma Jane
Retailers today collect email at every point of interaction. Collecting customer information in the store at the point of sale (POS) offers the greatest potential to build retailer’s email list quickly and to drive timely offers and communications that increase customer loyalty and retention.
The practice of collecting email addresses at the point of sale (POS) isn’t a new one. However, more companies are embracing the trend, and they’re doing so with increasing regularity.
E-Receipts
One popular technique among retailers is to ask shoppers if they would like a receipt emailed to them. It is important to note that an agreement to receive an e-receipt should not be necessarily interpreted as consent to be added to a commercial email list unless this intent is adequately communicated to the consumer and they consent. It always best practice to reference their consent to marketing emails at the same time as the e-receipt request.
It is possible to collect (PII) Personally Identifiable Information at the counter in a
careful and conscientious manner if you follow guidelines.
1. Be transparent about the commercial intent. A consumer who feels misled is more likely to complain and to seek redress under the consumer protection laws. If following different scripts is a challenge, apply the same disclosure/request script for both credit and cash transactions.
2. Consider using the credit card terminal or other touchpad device for customers to enter their email rather than using the sales associate. The device should first prompt the customer to consent to receiving an in-store e-receipt and/or marketing communications, ideally before proceeding with the transaction, it could be after as well.
3. Decouple PII collection from the credit card purchase. Ask customers for their email addresses before taking their credit cards or after they sign off on the purchase so it is clear that email is not required as part of the transaction.
4. Fulfill any incentives offered at the counter through email. Provide each consumer with a dynamic and unique link. A consumer will have less of a reason to give you a valid email address if you offer and fulfill the incentive at POS. Limiting the use of the incentive to email will help you avoid incentive abuse.
5. Send a welcome permission pass. Don’t assume that the customer wants anything more than an in-store e-receipt even if you can legally claim to have this right. Let the customer make an informed decision at the counter or in a subsequent email.
6. Validate submitted data. Ask customers to verify the accuracy of their PII before submitting. Use appropriate list management tools to prevent avoidable domain errors.
Clients that take the proper steps to overcome POS challenges and risks will reap the rewards of subscriber loyalty, a stronger reputation and better inbox performance in the long run.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Credit card Processing, Electronic Payments, Gift & Loyalty Card Processing, Point of Sale Tagged with: associate, best practice, cash, commercial, communications, companies, consumer, credit, credit-card, customer, e-receipts, email, emailed, incentive, interaction, list, loyalty, offers, personally identifiable information, pii, point, point of sale, POS, retailers, rewards, sales, script, subscriber, timely, touchpad, transactions, transparent
