Web Design Tutor's 6 Basic Steps to Accepting Electronic Payments

Learn the basic steps to locating an Electronic Payment provider and how to implement Electronic Payments on your site.

Web Design Tutor's 6 Basic Steps to Accepting Electronic Payments.

So, Electronic Payment service is the way you want to sell your items online. Be it a physical or non-physical product, you do require a way for your customers to pay you. They could send you checks through the mail, but you've already decided that that just isn't efficient. To do business on the internet, you will have to be capable of accepting electronic payments, like from credit cards. Thanks to advances on the internet, the integration and processing of such payments into your site is now easier than ever. Below are the 6 basic steps for finding and implementing an electronic payment option.

Step 1: Select an Online Electronic Payment Service.

Merchant accounts can provide you with your own card processing, but they usually cost a bit and aren't worth it unless you do a lot of card transactions. For your small business, a third-party payment service would no doubt be a better alternative. There are many services out there that let you accept card payments for a small fee.

While you're browsing through the many payment services, keep in mind the prices and whether or not your customers will trust it. In earlier days, you had to be considerate of which services your customers would have accounts with. Thankfully, most services these days allow you to accept payments from people without accounts with them, thus rendering it as not much of an issue.

At present, the top company of the third-party payment services is PayPal. They're a pretty good service and are definately worth the consideration. However, many businesses have had some issues with them on occasion, such as Paypal freezing their accounts and/or being slow to respond. StormPay could be a decent replacement for PayPal, or at least to be kept around as a backup just in case. You might also consider specific services, like AuctionCheckout for auction payment collections, or ClickBank for non-physical products only (really good for ebook sales).

Step 2: Signing Up.

Alright, now that you've selected your payment provider, it's time to create an account. You will need to provide either your personal name and address or a business name and address. Some of the providers require that you supply them with credit card or bank details. Make sure you do thorough research on any payment providers you find via a search engine but have never seen in actual use.

Step 3: Getting Confirmed and Verified.

Now, before you can begin to receive your money from your provider, you may have to go through a verification. Most providers require this as a means of complying with the law. At this point, if not already, you will be asked for your bank and credit card details. Some payment services may ask you to fax a photocopy of your physical card, or cross-reference your phone number and address and give you a call to ensure that the cardholder and the one providing the information are one in the same - you. Do not be disturbed by this; it is all for the sake of security and to make sure you're not doing anything unlawful.

Step 4: Put the Link on Your Sales Page.

It is now time to put a button on your page so that you can begin accepting your customers' money through your chosen payment service. In many cases this involves simply putting on an image button or link on your sales page for your customers to click on. Generally, you want it to say something like "Pay Now" or "Order Now". Most payment services will usually provide you with the necessary HTML for this, and some walkthroughs to explain things like ways to ensure that the correct price shows up on the payment page.

Step 5: Market Your Site.

At this point, it is time to begin marketing your site and product (if you haven't already started). There are many courses, ebooks, and books out there with information on how to promote and draw in traffic to your site. You definately need traffic to your site in order to get customers to buy your product.

Step 6: Withdraw Your Funds Frequently.

Remember, when dealing with third-party electronic payments, they generally hold your money until you withdraw it. Withdraw at least once a week, or whenever you believe there is a significant amount of money to be withdrawn. There are numerous reasons for this, but the biggest one is that online payment services have yet to be totally regulated like other financial institutions. They are not obligated to release your funds in any timely manner. Think of it this way, any money left with them is to be considered at risk until it's safely within your bank account. Besides, you don't want your money sitting there gaining interest for your service provider instead of you, do you?

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