Conversion is the key to success in any ecommerce enterprise. Because online shoppers have a tendency to be somewhat wary, even the tiniest miscue can cause them to leave your site and shop elsewhere. Therefore, it’s incumbent upon you to do everything you can to make it as easy as possible for your visitors to trust you, as well as to buy from you. With this in mind, one of the easiest things to do to increase sales is offer multiple payment options.
Of course, doing so comes with a number of very real considerations. Chief among them is security. A study conducted by the market research firm, Research And Markets found payment security to be a top priority for online shoppers, particularly when paying by mobile.
And yet, mobile payments are steadily gaining ground, especially among younger shoppers. While digital payment methods such as PayPal have also grown in popularity, even rivaling credit card use in some markets, plastic remains the online currency of choice.
Perhaps inevitably, the surge in popularity of credit cards has also brought an increase in fraud. It has been determined that fraud costs merchants more than 7.5 percent of their annual revenue, according to a survey released by Javelin Strategy & Research. Further, the survey found fraud and chargeback management consume between 14 and 23 percent of retailers’ operational budgets.
So while it’s important to offer your customers as much flexibility as possible, it has to be accompanied by adequate security to protect them and your business from fraudulent activity. To accomplish this, the best ecommerce website builders adhere to the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).
Defined by the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council, PCI DSS was created to limit the exposure of credit card data in order to reduce fraud. If you plan to accept payments from Visa, Mastercard, American Express or Discover on your site, both your software and your hosting need to be PCI compliant.
This means the platform upon which your site is based must protect cardholder data. To do so effectively, it has to be maintained on a regularly monitored and tested secure network. A vulnerability management program must be in place to protect the network, along with strong access control measures and a robust information security policy. Annual on-site assessments to validate compliance, along with continuous risk management efforts must be implemented to maintain security on an ongoing basis.
Long story short, the builders of your ecommerce enterprise platform must work diligently to ensure your shopping cart software and ecommerce hosting remain secure.
In addition to protecting your profits and enabling you to accept a broader variety of payment methods, these efforts will help ensure a more positive experience for your customers.
UK-based internet market research firm YouGov, recently conducted a survey in which it found that 50 percent of those who regularly shop online would cancel their purchase if their preferred means of payment were not available for use. Furthermore, over one third of the survey’s respondents said they feel more comfortable purchasing from online retailers who offer multiple payment methods.
With these security measures in place, your enterprise will be well positioned to accommodate them, which will make your customer’s shopping experiences more pleasant and as worry-free as possible. And, best of all, it will improve your conversion rate considerably.
