Why Transfer Speed Matters in eCommerce
Transfer speed refers to the speed at which money is transferred between merchant accounts and customer bank accounts. Transfer speed is important, because it determines when you’re paid for the work or items you’ve sold. For small businesses, transfer speed plays a major role in operations for the first few years, as it can impact your operating expenses.
Call customer support for the payment gateway services you’re considering, and ask them how long it takes to process a particular transaction. You might find that you’re only paid once a month, or two weeks after a transaction has been approved. For many, that presents a problem.
The only way out of this dilemma is to shop around, but that’s not possible (or easy) when you’re locked into a contract with a payment processor. Make sure you inquire about payment transfer speed, and get some background information on online credit card processing.
Transfer speed also refers to the amount of time it takes for the user’s browser to load a page, which also plays a significant role in whether he or she completes a transaction. If your site is image heavy, as most eCommerce websites are, then you’re probably going to have trouble loading immediately. You can try compressing your thumbnail images, and using a caching plugin (if you’re utilizing WordPress), to speed up the time it takes for the customer to see a static page.
If you can process transactions in a reasonable amount of time, and present the customer with the Web page he or she wants to view in a decent amount of speed, then you’ll retain more customers and ultimately sell more product.
Bio: Charge.com offers a reliable method of online credit card processing with free software, and no setup fees.
