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Has your business truly embraced mobile and the payment methods that go along with it? Or maybe you’re trying, but things aren’t going as well as you’d hoped. With mobile seated prominently at the head of the eCommerce table, this is one area you can’t afford to let slide.

Do either of these situations sound familiar?

  • Mobile is a fairly new channel for you, but you’re not seeing as much growth there as you’d like. Those industry benchmarks you’re supposed to be hitting—let’s just say they’re located in a galaxy far, far away.
  • You’ve been noticing higher refunds or chargeback rates on mobile than on desktop. Having looked closely at your mobile site, you can tell that it’s missing key information (product reviews, company policies, etc.) that could be contributing to your customer support issues.

Aside from the critical step of designing a mobile-friendly website, it’s equally important to evaluate your payment processor when it comes to improving your mobile payment ecosystem. Because while one of the above problems can be solved by better design, the other is a more complex issue with which your provider can help.

A Mature Mobile Payment Ecosystem

Merchants who are serious about providing a top-notch mobile experience focus on four things:

  1. Making the mobile checkout experience consistent with other channels.
  2. Offering mobile-centric payment methods.
  3. Ensuring access to easy-to-use developer tools.
  4. Utilizing mobile-focused fraud prevention.

1. Making the mobile checkout experience consistent with other channels.

Providing a consistent shopping experience for customers online and on mobile devices is a proven strategy for attracting and retaining customers. Many shoppers start their journey browsing on mobile but make the final purchase online or in the store. Each time they switch back and forth between channels, you’re taking a risk that they simply won’t come back (anywhere!) at all.

To make shopping with you as easy as possible, offer the same payment methods on mobile that you offer online. Consistent experiences encourage a sense of familiarity with your brand and promote faster transactions. It may be that your current provider can’t support all of your online payment methods on mobile, even if they are supported online. If that’s the case, it may be time to rethink your partnership.

2. Offering mobile-centric payment methods.

We’ve all been there—having found something on our smartphones we want to buy but reluctantly putting it aside until we can access a keyboard to type out the ridiculous amounts of information we know we’ll be asked to provide. It’s a main driver of mobile abandonment.


To find out some simple strategies for optimizing your mobile eCommerce—including the art of the perfect checkout design—download this free ebook! 


To lower the risk of losing customers as they switch channels, make it easy for them to complete purchases on mobile. Your customers should never need a keyboard to make a payment. Mobile-oriented checkout methods like Android Pay, Apple Pay, Visa Checkout, Masterpass, and PayPal eliminate the need for all that typing. Shoppers should simply be able to choose the mobile wallet of their choice, authenticate quickly, confirm the card on file, and rest assured their product is on the way. Many payment processors support one or two of these mobile payment methods, but not all. There are better options available for merchants.

3. Ensuring access to easy-to-use developer tools.

Some things about the mobile payment ecosystem should be easier for you (not just the customer!). If you have already built an app in-house, your payment processor should make it simple to integrate its functionality. Beyond the mobile payment API, does the processor offer software development kits (SDKs) to make the integration process faster and easier for your developers? Not all payment providers offer SDKs, but they’re extremely helpful when provided.

4. Utilizing mobile-focused fraud prevention.

You may have fraud prevention for your regular online channel, but mobile fraud patterns don’t always look the same as fraud patterns online. And there are specific risks to selling on mobile, especially if the intentionally frictionless mobile experience doesn’t gather as much information as that in other channels.

Your payment processor should put an emphasis on mobile fraud protection, even if it’s supplied by a third party. BlueSnap’s own fraud protection partner, Kount, is a mobile-fraud specialist. Our merchants are well-protected thanks to Kount’s ability to track the following:

  • Where the mobile device is physically located.
  • If the device location matches the billing and/or shipping address.
  • If it is using an anonymous web service to conceal where an order is actually coming from.

Kount can also track the same device over time in instances of suspicious behavior. The more your payment processor can do to prevent mobile fraud, the better your chances of success.

Ready to improve your mobile payment process?

Everything about your mobile payment ecosystem—from your mobile payment methods, to fraud protection, to your overall mobile strategy—impacts sales for this all-important channel, so don’t leave it up to chance. If you’d like to learn more about what BlueSnap can do for your business, visit our website or talk to a payment conversion consultant.

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