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With the rise of online shopping, smartphone access, and electronic banking, digital payments have become an essential part of conducting business. Customers are increasingly expecting digital payment options like Apple Pay and PayPal, in addition to online card transactions.
As a business owner, understanding the advantages of digital payments is critical if you want to stay competitive in the marketplace. I’ve rounded up the top 7 advantages digital payments can offer your business.
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What Are Digital Payments?
Digital payments (sometimes called electronic or e-payments) are transactions that happen electronically. They take place without the need for physical cash or checks. This type of transaction encompasses a wide variety of payment methods, including credit and debit card payments, digital wallets like PayPal and Google Pay, bank transfers, and more.
Digital payments have grown in popularity over the last decade, particularly with the rise of online and mobile-based shopping. In fact, by 2024, digital and mobile wallets alone will account for more than 50% of all transactions.
Different Types of Digital Payments
Digital payments encompass a variety of different payment methods including:
- Credit and debit cards: The most common form of digital payments are credit and debit cards which can be used online or in-person and are widely accepted.
- Digital wallets: Digital wallets allow customers to store credit card information or bank information virtually. They can be used online or through mobile phone apps in person.
- Bank transfers: online bank transfers, either through wire transfer or ACH, allow customers to deposit money directly into your merchant account.
- Buy now, pay later (BNPL): BNPL is a type of digital financing service that allows customers to split large purchases into smaller payments over time.
- Cryptocurrency: digital currencies such as Bitcoin are decentralized currencies. While they aren’t widely accepted, they are growing in popularity.
7 Advantages of Digital Payments
1. Convenience
Digital payments offer convenience for both you and your customers. Customers can make payments from anywhere, at any time, without having to carry cash or even visit a physical location. When they are in a location, they simply have to tap or swipe, instead of fumbling with cash.
It also improves convenience with recurring payments, as digital payments offer an easy way to “set it and forget.” For you, it also means less manual work to ensure payments go through. Pay.com lets you easily choose which payment methods you want to accept, adding new ones as needed – all with the simple click of a button. It’s a hassle-free way to get paid.
2. Faster Transactions
The checkout experience is often cumbersome when it comes to traditional payment methods. Cash or check payments need to be physically deposited into a bank, which costs you time and slows down cash flow.
With digital payments, you can speed up the checkout process and get paid near-instantly. Both in-store and online, digital payments often require a quick tap or swipe which simplifies the transaction. Then, the money is deposited into your account without the need to visit a bank at all. It simplifies your life and increases real-time cash flow.
3. Easier to Track
With physical currency, it can be hard to track and trace transactions as they happen. You have to do manual record-keeping to ensure your books are completely accurate. Additionally, with cash, you also risk losing the money or having it stolen, unlike digital payments.
Digital payments are recorded for you. That makes it easier to stay on top of your transaction records, monitor for fraud, and deal with returns or exchanges when they occur. With the Pay Dashboard, you’re even able to gain unique insights about your customers based on their transaction history and payment methods.
4. Enhanced Security
Unlike cash, checks, and even physical credit cards which can be easily stolen and used, digital payments are generally much safer. That’s because digital payments often have advanced security features like tokenization to protect customers’ details.
To protect your business from fraudulent transactions, online card payments often involve multi-factor authentication techniques to prove the identity of the card holder. Other digital payment methods, like mobile apps, also use biometrics like fingerprints or face ID to authorize purchases.
Pay.com uses the industry-leading 3D Secure 2.0 to detect and prevent payment fraud.
5. Increased Customer Experience
Providing customers with digital payment options can have a positive effect on the shopping experience. Because digital payments are fast and convenient, you can ensure your checkout process is seamless, which can boost customer satisfaction.
Also because of the variety of digital payments options that are available, you’ll be able to offer the methods your customers most prefer. Customers are more likely to follow through with a purchase, reducing cart abandonment.
6. Global Reach
The rise of online shopping means that customers are no longer limited to buying locally. In fact, Statista reports that in 2022, cross-border payments topped $156 billion dollars in value. Digital payments allow you to expand your customer base, increase visibility, and boost sales.
Pay.com makes global payment processing simple. We offer the ability to accept common payment methods used for cross-border payments like credit cards and PayPal. Additionally, we continue to expand our offerings to include local payment methods, so you can offer customers of specific locations the payment options they prefer.
7. Scalability
If you only rely on traditional payment methods, you are deeply limiting your business potential. By adding digital payments into the mix, you can more easily scale your business for increased revenue and growth. For instance, digital payments could help you move your business online or offer a new subscription-based business model.
Even if you are just looking to expand your brick-and-mortar locations, embracing digital payments can make scaling easier. You won’t have to spend as much time processing or collecting payments across locations and you can even gain new customers.
The Best Way to Accept Digital Payments
Pay.com is the ultimate solution for businesses looking to accept a wide variety of digital payment options. Pay.com makes it easy to streamline your checkout process for you and your customers. Switching to Pay.com is hassle-free, thanks to the straightforward signup and transparent, flat-fee payment structure.
Once you’ve signed up, you’ll be able to choose how you want to accept payments. If you have a website, easily create a simple checkout page for your site using our no-code solutions or integrate our payment components into your platform using our APIs. We also offer Pay Links – unique payment requests you can send directly to your customers.
No matter how your customers pay, you’ll be able to track it all through the intuitive Pay Dashboard. You’ll gain access to detailed customer insights, allowing you to better understand your customers and tailor their shopping experience. You can also track transactions, to determine what digital payment methods your customers most prefer.
Click here to sign up with Pay.com now!
The Bottom Line
Digital payment methods are some of the most used payment methods for customers around the world, and growing. Choosing them as payment methods for your business can increase customer convenience, decrease cart abandonment, and help future-proof your brand.
At Pay.com, we provide secure and customizable solutions for businesses of all sizes to accept a variety of digital payment methods. You can create a custom checkout experience that’s safe, secure, and branded with our no-code template or developer-friendly API tools – flexible to fit your specific needs!
