Overview
For the last three decades ecommerce has become increasingly popular. These savvy shoppers appreciate the ease of comparing prices and product features from the comfort of their own homes. Since the early months of 2020 however, we have experienced a meteoric rise in the number of industries that have shifted to providing goods and services online. Lockdowns, travel restrictions, and retail closures have forced a new set of patients, shoppers, students, and diners online. As business adapts to a new normal, it is more important than ever to provide consumers with easy and secure pathways to purchase. Many of today’s online shoppers are new to the process of making purchases online. They want easy-to-follow instructions and the assurance that their personal data is safe. Pagination is a method of dividing web content and queries into manageable bits of data that can be easily analyzed.
How exactly does a brand stand out in this increasingly crowded ecommerce space?
Retailers can’t just rely on quality products and services anymore. They need to create engaging, personalized, and secure user experiences. Earn your customer’s trust with safe, and easy-to-follow checkout instructions and they’ll visit again and again. Learn your customer’s preferences and pain points to create conversions and a history of purchase behavior. Where are they from, what did they look at, and what did they buy? Paying attention to the details can help you find and create long-term customers. Data is king!
Once you have it, what do you do with all that data?
To reap the benefits of the current booming ecommerce economy you must first create a cohesive strategy across all channels. This includes online marketplaces like Amazon, Ebay and Etsy via social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Just today, 2/25/2020, Twitter debuted a new opportunity for account owners to monetize their original content through subscriptions. By investing in the technology solutions that Payline provides, business owners can generate real time reports to determine exactly where their online traffic is coming from. The data coming in from a variety of customer touchpoints can be overwhelming. How can a business owner consume the mountains of data available in small digestible bites? Why look at data from hundreds of customers worldwide when you’re really only interested in the customers in one particular city?
What is Pagination and how can it help solve the problem of information overload?
Pagination is a method of dividing web content and queries into manageable bits of data that can be easily analyzed. Presenting content in very controlled ways can provide answers to specific questions about buying behaviors and trends. Information gleaned from these searches can influence the creation of more personalized messaging, as well as, regional marketing strategies. Developers can access tools (SDKs) provided by Payline in order to establish and test parameters for more meaningful searches. Pagination also enhances the speed and performance of your application by limiting the amount of data that is shared between a customer and the site’s server. Why look at a thousand John Smith’s across the country when all you need is the John Smith who lives on Main Street in Toledo, Ohio?
By reducing the number of clicks from the home page to final checkout, Pagination also can help boost SEO performance and simplify the purchase process. Your products will be easier to find and quicker to buy.
Auto-pagination automatically adds the next page to your browser search so all you need to do is click the forward button to jump to the next page. Think of this the next time you search Google for popular restaurants near you. If it works like it’s supposed to then Google will return page after page of popular restaurants with the best reviews on the first page or two. Restaurants will continue to pop up but the further you click the less desirable your choices appear. Search by priciest and you’ll likely see some of the same restaurants, but they will appear in order of how expensive they are.
Most of our developer tools support Auto-pagination. This makes it easier to handle compiling large lists of resources without having to manually paginate results and perform additional requests.
What exactly is an API and an API Gateway? And how do they work?
API is the acronym for Application Programming Interface, which is a software tool that allows two applications to talk to each other. APIs let your product or service communicate with other products and services without having to know how they’re interfaces are built or implemented. This can simplify app development, saving you time and money. Each time you use an app like Facebook, send an instant message, or check the weather on your phone, tablet or laptop, you’re using an API. Think of an API as a messenger that delivers your request to the provider that you’re requesting it from and then sends the response back to you.
An API Gateway is an API management tool that sits between a client and a collection of backend services. The API Gateway acts as a reverse proxy that accepts all application programming interface calls, aggregates the various services required to fulfill them, and then returns the appropriate result.
By using Payline’s Gateway API, retailers can process payments within their own existing software and websites; or integrate with 200+ existing online shopping carts. Developers have access to tools, technical support, and a Sandbox environment to test our system for simple, secure online payment processing. They also have access to API Documentation, a technical content deliverable, containing instructions about how to effectively use and integrate with a particular API.
What else can an API do?
With Payline’s API, retailers can sync product data with inventory levels automatically to ensure that customers will receive their orders in a timely fashion. By integrating sales and supply data, business owners and managers can efficiently track performance across a variety of channels. Creating a single source for data makes it easier to connect workflows, inventory, sales, fulfillment, and data sources. This allows you to manage all your sales channels in one place. Simplifying data management frees your team to concentrate on product development, marketing messaging and adapting to a constantly evolving marketplace.
Sellers and developers alike will appreciate Payline’s Gateway and Mobile APIs that offer full customization and control over accepting payments within your existing mobile applications and software. With built-in security and fraud protection that’s easy-to-integrate, you and your customers can be sure that they are shopping in a secure environment.
The best way to ensure your business is fully protected is relying on a payment API that follows PCI Level 1 Compliance standards. This is important for all segments of the payment cycle, including processing, settlement timing and even transaction disputes. Together, the right payment API can keep your business risk low, while enhancing your ability to facilitate and accept electronic payments.
What does it mean to be PCI Compliant?
Business owners and managers have a lot of choices to make when it comes to how they manage their day-to-day business, interact with customers and accept and process payments. One non-negotiable option, however, is to become PCI compliant and follow PCI Compliance security standards.
Becoming PCI compliant is required for any business that accepts credit cards, and involves creating multiple layers of protection. This means ensuring your business utilizes the right tools and solutions to onboard merchant accounts and facilitate payments within your existing software platform, using industry-wide security standards.
To prevent putting your business, and your customer’s data at risk, you should rely on products that ensure the highest level of PCI data security for processing payments — AKA, those that meet PCI DSS Level 1 compliance.
We’ve talked a lot about online sales, what about retail processing?
Streamline and simplify retail credit card processing with products designed to fit the rapidly changing, brick-and-mortar business environment. Reduce your costs and simplify your in-store payment processing with a variety of retail solutions. Payline offer’s secure countertop terminals, and versatile POS devices that help you scale your business and upgrade your operations with ease. Businesses that can pivot quickly with changing circumstances will continue to grow and thrive.
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