In the year 2018, Shape security reported that about 90% of the login attempts on the various e-commerce websites were unauthorized or in a broader sense were just hacking attempts. Isn't that a huge number? This alarming figure is enough to justify the importance of a reliable and good quality payment gateway for your e-commerce business. Payment Gateways fights these hacking attacks in real-time by encrypting the information being exchanged between the vendor and the buyer in the payment portal.
We all have experienced online shopping, do we buy all that we put in our cart? Well, the answer is No. This scenario can be termed as “shopping cart abandonment”, but why does it happen? The reasons could be many ranging from technical issues to the absence of desired payment options or an enhanced in-store experience. With so many concerns to address, the biggest question that arises here is how to choose the best payment gateway for your e-commerce store that not only ensures the security and convenience of the consumers but also minimizes any risks.
A payment gateway can be referred to as an electronic cash register used by the merchants to process credit card payments. The right payment gateways are not only reliable to use but also offer a secure experience to the buyers. A high-quality payment gateway also reduces the load time substantially. The entire process accomplishes in the following three steps –
In the above extract, a term called the Payment processor was used. Keep reading the article further to simplify the difference between a payment processor and a payment gateway. These two terms may sound synonymous but have some noticeable distinctions.
A payment processor is mainly responsible to analyse and transmit transaction-related information to the respective financial institution whereas a payment gateway carries out all the functions mentioned above.
In a redirect payment gateway, the customer is driven to the PayPal payment page to complete the transaction. It is particularly a good option for small businesses. They get to benefit from the convenience and security offered by a platform like PayPal.
For example- Stripe. The checkout will happen on the website itself but the payment will occur at Stripe’s back end. This also is a simple payment gateway option but like redirects offers some restrictions on your control over the user’s experience. Katie Keith also supports this idea.
This is a popular idea amongst the larger businesses. As the word implies, they handle the entire payment process on their servers themselves, hence exercise more control over the same. Also, let us not forget to mention here that with great control comes responsibility too.
Businesses must make use of payment gateways like Paypal and Stripe because it is always wise and safe to let the third party site handle the sensitive data of your users. To ensure that the connection between your site and the payment gateways is always encrypted, don’t forget to incorporate SSL technology. This will help you to have secure payment communication over the internet.
Payment gateways undoubtedly add a great deal of security to smoothen the whole experience of online shopping. But you need to do a good amount of research and a clear evaluation of the parameters like price, security, and functions. Then only you will be able to choose the best payment gateway that suits your business needs.
For instance, find out what payment portal your competitors are already using to process payments, what is the payment gateway fee, how secure is their encryption, and so on.
