More and more data is being stored in the cloud. Instead of clogging up their smartphones with photos and videos, people are choosing to free up storage space on their devices and store that media in the cloud. The increased security and convenience of the cloud might be a factor as well.
It’s no different in the payment processing space, where cloud-based payments are growing in popularity for many of the same reasons. Consumers demand seamless, convenient experiences as a rule, and the cloud is helping merchants meet that expectation all the time.
While it may still sound futuristic, processing payments via the cloud is very much a contemporary thing.
As with every digital innovation, cloud-based payments provide convenience. Through this advent, for example, both merchants and their customers are no longer tied to a point-of-sale system. The cloud empowers ISVs to provide their merchant clients greater flexibility, which is at the heart of most considerations in our current omnicommerce world.
But it’s not just about making things easier. Cloud-based payments also offer another layer of security that’s missing from more traditional payment methods. Privacy concerns are only growing in the digital age, making this another integral feature. Cloud-based payment solutions produce limitless potential by helping ISVs develop more personalized experiences for merchants and their customers.
There’s a lot more to like, though. John Clarke, Payroc’s EVP Product & Sales Strategy, points to these five aspects of cloud-based payment processing as the most beneficial to ISVs.
As an ISV, retrofitting your solution to new functionality is challenge enough. When it involves payment processing, it can be even more of an inconvenience — especially if you don’t have that expertise on your development team.
But with cloud-based payments, that enormous obstacle is not a problem you have to solve.
“The beauty of a cloud-based integration is that you have nothing to do in your own environment,” Clarke said. “It doesn’t matter what platform you’re running on. It doesn’t matter what version of a system you’re running on. None of that matters anymore.”
Cloud-based payments eliminate incompatibility concerns for ISVs, freeing up your team to develop solutions based on what merchant clients need and want to do instead of learning how to develop payment processing functionality that meets their needs.
With cloud-based payments, ISVs and their merchant clients never have to worry about a software upgrade again. That’s appealing because it eliminates a significant expense, of course, but it also eliminates costly downtime for your team and your merchants to perform upgrades and testing.
With the cloud, all of that is done for you. And in no time at all.
“When we update the cloud, it is automatically pushed out to everybody in an instant,” Clarke said. “You don’t have to worry about going offline for system upgrades. That scheduled downtime is gone. Cloud-based payments give you a real 100% uptime capability.”
That also enables a more stable product, meaning your merchants get a more reliable and efficient experience.
In addition, as we release new features, they automatically become available to all of our ISV partners. No need to re-integrate. We upload the feature to the cloud, and all of our ISVs can instantly have access to that feature. The same is true as we add new lines of hardware. Once you are integrated to the cloud, you get access to all new hardware devices and families as they become available. Automatically, no need to re-integrate.
Another benefit of cloud-based payment processing is its effortless scalability. As your merchants grow and expand their footprint, they can easily leverage the same functionality with just a few clicks in the cloud.
“It’s not a case where we have to buy physical hardware and install it to provide for more processing capability,” Clarke said. “The cloud-based solution gives us that ability to scale up and down in real time.”
The cloud also affords more comprehensive and actionable metrics. Instead of having all of your vital data scattered, a cloud-based payment processing system consolidates data, which allows for a more thorough picture of your business and your merchants’ operations.
Clarke said that kind of intelligence is priceless.
“It gives you a more holistic view of everything, and in real time,” he said. “That reporting is the kind of data you used to have to compile exhaustively and expensively. Now it’s instantaneous and complete.”
Keeping up on compliance is effortless with a cloud-based system, too.
“We don’t have to do a rollout to multiple different locations,” Clarke said. “Because it’s running off of a single, centralized cloud solution, everything is ready and automatically available at once. You don’t have to wait for some new release. When the cloud updates for one, it updates for all.”
That centralization is also a security bonus, thanks to the efficiencies of the cloud.
“For example, if Visa comes out with a security concern that needs to be addressed, we can fix it immediately and upload it to our cloud solution,” Clarke said. “Instantly, everybody is on the latest version with the best security.”
The cloud has already revolutionized payment processing, and for everyone involved.
With cloud-based payment processing, ISVs can offer unparalleled and instantaneous security and compliance upgrades to your merchant clients. In turn, they don’t have to worry about regularly scheduled maintenance costing them sales. And they enjoy a personalized experience thanks to the cloud-provided insights that power better marketing strategies.
These developments are not the wave of the future. They’re the here and now.
If you’re not utilizing cloud-based payments, you’re missing out on countless features that could help you build and maintain a competitive advantage.
Payroc can get your payments system on the cloud and modernize your processes.