How Becoming a PF Improves the Merchant Experience
Many small businesses have long had to settle for tools and solutions that weren’t built for their specific needs. They may have had to patch together multiple solutions or supplement their business software with time-consuming manual processes.
In response to this need, B2B software companies or independent software vendors (ISVs) have come to the rescue, fixing broken processes with comprehensive, integrated solutions that streamline operations and free businesses up to focus on serving their customers.
Yet despite these successes, a crucial need often remains unmet: the ability to accept payments beyond cash and checks. Setting up the needed infrastructure to take in electronic payments has traditionally been out of reach for many small businesses.
The ISVs providing those much-needed solutions also face challenges from the legacy payments system. Their merchants are dealing with another vendor to manage, separate from the one providing their business software. And those third parties have complete control over a critical experience that touches their merchants every day.
For many ISVs, becoming a payment facilitator can help them gain control and improve their merchant experience. Integrating payments into their software enables many ISVs who choose to become PFs to deliver the best possible solution to their customers, end to end.
ISVs have detailed, in-depth knowledge of the verticals they serve, which allows them to tailor processes to their merchants. Becoming a PF allows software companies to offer payment processing services that are built to meet the specific needs of their own unique markets, with control over:
- Onboarding and underwriting
- Processing rates
- Funding
- Transaction reporting
A PF can also create a more unified payments experience. When an ISV becomes a PF, it consolidates touchpoints and vendors, making itself a one-stop shop for the merchant’s needs. Merchants no longer need to get their business software from one vendor and work separately with a merchant acquirer. They are often also able to seamlessly pull their sales data into other systems, such as accounting, inventory management, or customer relationship management.
Quite simply, operating as a PF can give ISVs the control they need to bring previously cumbersome, fragmented pieces of operating a business together.
To learn more about ways PFs can tailor their processes to their submerchants’ needs and create a better solution, download the white paper, How Does Becoming a Payment Facilitator Improve Your Merchant’s Experience?