Five reasons your business needs embedded payments

It’s a win for your business, and your customers.

In the early 2000s, payment processing used to be a separate buying decision for businesses: a business owner found a bank for processing payments, and then chose an entirely separate system (or systems) for running their day-to-day operations. Sounds like a lot of work, right? It was.

Today, businesses can combine their operating tech and payments into one software solution, simplifying life. While you’re likely familiar with the concept of integrations and APIs, one area of these quickly emerging technologies deserves more attention: embedded payments.

Seamless and secure, embedded payments go one step beyond integrated payments by offering a richer set of features for business owners, customized for the industry they’re in. For example, HVAC businesses need technology that equips their field services teams to quote, schedule, complete and collect payment for jobs on the move. Meanwhile, in the fitness sector, studio owners need software that allows them to manage studio access and capacity, create stickiness with loyalty programs, all while giving their consumers the freedom to book online, and pay with the click of a button.

And we’re not the only ones who have seen the power of embedded payments. According to a recent article in Wired, “Embedded finance is an elegant way to enhance the customer experience, strengthen loyalty, increase conversion and drive up margins.”

The benefits don’t stop there. Embedded payments can also increase your bottom line. Not only do they allow you to accept payments anywhere, anytime, they can also link to ecommerce shopping cart inventory, loyalty programs, and email and text-based marketing tools so you can sell more products and services to more customers. Plus, they can accept recurring payments – so you can easily set up customers with long-term payment plans.

To break it down, here are five reasons why your business will benefit from embedded payments:

1. Embedded payments are secure

Payment technology embedded within operating software, has a layered security approach that uses tokenization and point-to-point encryption to keep sensitive payment data safe and secure, alongside important business data, to protect both businesses and consumers from fraud.

2. Embedded payments are simple and straight-forward to implement

The onboarding process is quick, right from boarding, signatures, automated underwriting, equipment setup, activation, to device delivery. Plus, you get to deal with a single vendor for all your business and payment technology needs without needing to waste time managing multiple technology providers.

3. Embedded payments are designed for your business needs

With payment technology pre-built into business software, businesses save valuable time and effort – whether that’s time saved serving customers, or doing day-to-day reconciliations, analytics, and reporting. You’ll avoid extra IT development, get faster workflows, and have a clear view of business performance without having to collate data from various sources to understand that complete picture.

Depending on the type of business you operate, you can use a range of in-store, ecommerce, mobile and in-app, email, and telephone payment capabilities, and offer a range of payment methods based on your customers’ preferences.

4. Embedded payments allow you to accelerate revenue growth and reinvest savings in your business

Savings from avoided IT spend, along with more efficient CRM, marketing, loyalty, and engagement feature options, will accelerate your revenues. There’s also the option to adopt surcharging programs that allow you to easily pass on part of your payment processing costs to consumers and reinvest these savings into your business.

5. Embedded payments open the door to better customer experiences

Consumers want to be able to book and buy wherever they are, whether in store, online, or on the move. Embedded payments make it easier to give your customers a consistently wonderful experience, with all the flexibility they need (like the payment methods they prefer, or the ability to easily reorder or subscribe).

What’s more – the embedded payments market is growing. According to Juniper Research, the value of the embedded-finance market will exceed US$138 billion by 2026, up from just US$43 billion in 2021. Over the next decade, it’s anticipated that embedded payments alone will grow revenues by 8-16% on average, and 84% will use embedded payments to increase the number of customer touch points with their brand.¹ Xplor is tapped into this market, thanks to our state-of-the-art, global processing platform, which is built on a cloud-based and microservices architecture to provide a ‘one-stop-shop’ technology service to businesses. Curious to learn more? Reach out and one of our friendly team can give you a tour.

Not only are embedded payments becoming the new norm for payment processing, but they represent the next stage in the evolution of SaaS for businesses too. Flexible, secure, and with powerful benefits to the bottom line and customers, embedded payments could be the next significant move for your business.

¹ OpenPayd