These days, everyone is completing online transactions. From shopping carts to paying a bill to taking donations, it’s common to see payment details on a site. There are a few things you have to get together before you receive your first payment. We’ve helped many clients set up taking payments on their sites and this is what you’ll need to figure out.
1. Know what action you want users to take on your site.
E-commerce sites that take payment are usually pretty different than a donation setup. Knowing how you want people to enter their information and what connections are available for that setup will help you select a payment gateway next.
2. Select a payment gateway.
A payment gateway is usually a third party that allows the transaction to occur and collects payment before you deposit that money into your bank account. It acts as an intermediary to help keep you protected and handle some of the heavy lifting. It also stores payment details so you aren’t liable for keeping sensitive information on your website. Some gateways use a pop-up or redirect such as PayPal, and others are inline such as Square or Authorize.Net.
3. Make sure you have a Secure Socket Layer or SSL.
Now what good is having these steps in place without a secure connection for your users to complete their payment. Your hosting provider will provide a way to sign up for an SSL certificate. This ensures that no bad players intercept any payment details while the transaction is occurring on your site. Sites these days MUST have an SSL to be indexable by Google.
Knowing the answers to these three components before you start the process will help you get up and running quickly. If you need additional assistance getting started taking payment on your site, just give us a shout! We are happy to help you get up and running with your ecommerce store or donations submission form!