| LED Digest 1807: Merchant Accounts vs PayPal |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" pair Networks: The LED's Web Host Hosting and Domain Reg. from a Trusted Leader pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam,led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com ................................................ May 21, 2004 Issue #1807 ................................................ .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== To PayPal or not to PayPal ==-- ~ Scott Marino "...if you want to do retail, having a merchant account is necessary." ~ Dirk van der Werff "...very soon I will find out whether offering PayPal works." ~ Debra Sawyers "We feel that accepting credit cards has given a lot of credibility to our business." --== Credible SEOs and SEMs ==-- ~ Dave Roberts "There are two issues of conflict that I've noticed with my own SEO work." ~ Bill Davison "...have them sign a contract..." --== The Demise of Email? ==-- ~ Derek Andrews "I subscribe to many Yahoo! Groups, and own several, and have never had a problem unsubscribing." ~ John Barendrecht "A better solution to spam may be something that Yahoo is proposing." ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Scott Marino Subject: PayPal or CC Accepting Visa/MasterCard/Amex is a must for any e-commerce site. PayPal is fine if you are doing auction sales on e-bay, but if you want to do retail, having a merchant account is necessary. Many more people have a credit card than PayPal. If I looked at 2 sites selling similar things. One that accepted only PayPal and one that accepted credit cards, my $ would go to the one that took credit cards. It is simply a matter of credibility. Most people would not bother to go through the process of opening a PayPal account when they could use the credit card they already had. Most banks have finally gotten on the internet bandwagon and offer some form of e-commerce payment processing. They simply re-sell someone else's service, but often at a lower rate than published. Contact the local banks in your area and see what they might offer that is lower cost than Authorize.net's published rates. Always ask the bank if they can waive the set-up fee, many times they will if you have an account at the bank. Regards, Scott Marino www.webundies.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Dirk van der Werff Subject: PayPal or CC ... very soon I will find out whether offering PayPal works. I have offered subscriptions to my magazine with credit cards for 7 years (only in $US even though I'm based in the UK). I have now turned to WorldPay for credit card options with three currencies as I have been severely upgrading my site for the past 6 months and it's due to go live in the next 2 weeks. The reason for offering PayPal payments (and Nochex) is that all 30 back issues will be available as digital downloads for the first time in PDF format. Some of the older issues from 7 years ago will retail from just 85 cents US / 50 pence UK / 70 cents Euro If people wanted to buy just a couple of issues for 85 cents each it wouldn't be practical for them to pay with credit card nor for me to accept such small payments from them by credit card... so I have introduced PayPal and Nochex as options for those who may buy a couple of digital issues. Only time and experience will tell whether I have been right in my assumption that using these extra options for payment for my 'goods' will prove right or wrong. Dirk van der Werff, Editor / Publisher Plants / Aquilegia Publishing http://www.plants-magazine.com/index.asp dirk, plants-magazine.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Debra Sawyers Subject: PayPal or CC Several years ago, my husband started on online business. I had an established Paypal account which I converted to a Paypal business account for him. Selling live fish online, the marketplace is fairly small and he established himself as a reputable seller very quickly. In the beginning he only took Paypal and did well. The rates for Paypal are comparable to the "non-qualified" rates from merchant account issuers. Within several months, we decided that the business was actually going to work and that we may be able to increase our business by accepting credit cards. It definitely helped that we'd had all the equipment we needed sitting in a drawer from a business we'd retired years earlier. We called up our Novus/Discover account rep and asked if we could reopen our account with the identity of the new business and they had us set up quickly. We put up the MC/VISA/DISC (and Paypal) logos on the website and business seemed to pick up. Within a few more months, we had a customer ask if he could use American Express. Once again, we called our novus rep and they told us what it would cost (surprisingly cheap to add to an existing account). We added the AMEX logo to the website. Since adding traditional credit card payment options, I believe 1 in 10 or more orders is paid by Paypal (I think only 15 orders have been paid by Paypal in the last 6 months). We only have a few regular clients that pay by American Express. The orders paid by American Express tend to be larger, often over $500 (our typical order is in the $150-$250 range). Order totals for invoices paid by Paypal are about the same as Visa and Mastercard. We feel that accepting credit cards has given a lot of credibility to our business. Many of our competitors do not take credit cards. Even one of our main suppliers only takes Paypal. Because of the limited market, customers are willing to accept this. I should point out that we do not have a payment gateway. All orders are still manually processed from a POS terminal. Our volume is not that high and there is a lot of communication with customers before final sale due to availability and shipping variables. Many of our customers like to speak to us by phone for reassurance (shipping concerns are the primary reason for calls). We take credit card numbers by phone which we feel is a huge benefit to customers who may not feel comfortable providing credit card info online. Can't do that with Paypal. It's difficult to say if our business increased only because of credit card acceptance. We started taking credit cards while our business was still growing naturally and may have seen this increase even without a traditional merchant account. I can say that at times when we order from our supplier, he's commented that "you're the only ones who seem to be selling on the east coast right now". Is it our excellent reputation for the best fish around, our low minimum orders, our easy to use (and find) website, or the fact that we take credit cards? Probably a good combination of all. The bottom line is that I still consult with my customers and recommend what I feel is best for their specific product line. In some cases they'll be fine with Paypal, others should get a merchant account and others may offer both. Debra Sawyers, Web Developer Pagesandlogos.com ------- new post - new topic ------- From: Dave Roberts Subject: SEOs and Conflicts [was: Credible SEOs] > Ask the potential SEO if they do any work for your competitors. > No SEO can fairly work for two companies and try and increase > the search positioning for the same keywords... - Richard Stubbings, LED 1806 There are two issues of conflict that I've noticed with my own SEO work. The first one is working for competitors -- I learn a lot about my clients' businesses that they consider proprietary. I can't also be working for their competitor. Whenever I take on a new client, I disclose the business and location to any other clients I have in related businesses. If any object to my taking on the new client, then I'll have to choose between the two that are in conflict. This has worked well for me--my clients like this policy. The other form of conflict is selling things to my clients. I'm in the position to recommend products and services. But if I make money on them, how can my client be sure that I'm objective? So I charge a flat monthly fee, and anything extra that I recommend is delivered at cost. I seek to make deals with things that I pass on, so my clients often get significant discounts on services and products that I resell to them at my cost. When a new client joins me, I send them my Confilict of Interest policy for their review. I generally get very favorable reactions to it. Dave Roberts http://www.davedoesitall.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Bill Davison Subject: Credible SEOs > Where can I find an industry standard or required > credentials that I can use to validate a potential SEO? > Is there a published list of "Who's Who" among credible > SEO's who meet an industry standard? - Clint Whitsett, LED 1804 How do you find a reputable SEO? Simple, have them sign a contract guaranteeing a specified increased cash flow amount! That's increased cash flow - not increased hits on your website. Can't find anyone who will sign such a contract? Well then, will they sign a contract whose only payment will be a percentage of your increased profits? No? Hmmm... then maybe you shouldn't waste your time or money. Bill Davison bizwebpage.com ------- new post - new topic ------- From: Derek Andrews Subject: Email demise > ... I did not realize that to join a group at Yahoogroups > was as permanent as marriage. In fact, unsubscribe@yahoogroups > was just finger exercise... Any suggestions? - Stu Langley, LED 1805 I subscribe to many Yahoo! Groups, and own several, and have never had a problem unsubscribing. But I have heard complaints from folks who can't manage to join a group. The best interface for managing group is the MyGroups feature, for which you need to have signed up for a Yahoo ID. This allows you to see what groups you are a member of, and then to unsubscribe or change delivery methods to digest, no email etc. You may want to check out these help screens: How do I leave a group or unsubscribe? http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/groups/groups-32.html I'm receiving email from a group, but when I visit the group page, it says I'm not recognized as a member. http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/groups/groups-51.html How do I verify my email address? http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/groups/groups-49.html (if you unsubscribe by email you must be sending the e-mail from the address you subscribed with. Obvious I know, but if you signed up to have email sent to an alias, This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it but your outgoing email is always from This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it , then it probably won't work) If none of that helps, then consider the possibility that the group owner is spoofing the Yahoo headers and sending mail directly to you, rather than through the group. There is a facility within Yahoo Groups whereby list owners can be notified by mail whenever someone joins or leaves the group, so it would be fairly easy for them to do this. I truly hope that you can resolve your problem. As a satisfied owner of several Yahoo Groups I would hate for the word to get around that they should be avoided for fear of being spammed. Derek Andrews, woodturner Wedding Favors ~ Artisan Crafted Gifts ~ One-of-a-Kind Woodturning http://www.seafoamwoodturning.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: John Barendrecht Subject: Email demise Karl Baldwin says Spamcop works. Yes there is an automatic way to report spam. But where is the automatic form to get off the spam list? If I run LED through Spamcop, it will report Karl as a spammer because his URL is there. I'm still struggling to send email to some domains because this happened to me 3 years ago. With a service that doesn't manually verify every report, you can get false positives. For a lot of people it is easier to report to Spamcop then to unsubscribe, even if it was a double opt-in mailing list. A better solution to spam may be something that Yahoo is proposing. Yahoo's proposed standard would embed outgoing messages with an encrypted digital signature matched to a signature on the server that sends the message. http://snipurl.com/6kb9 [wired.com] John Barendrecht http://www.centralhome.com ------------------------------------------------------- The LED Digest is sponsored by pair Networks: pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains Copyright 1995-2004 Adam Audette. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "So it's hurry! hurry! step right up It's a matter of life or death The sun is going down And the moon is just holding it's breath." - John Prine |
