Still waiting for Google to make their checkout programme available to the UK. Might be better than Paypal but what's the point if not yet available for non-US use Standing by.
Over the past 6 months and several thousand transactions our breakdown is about: 85% Credit Card (through traditional Merchant Account) 10% Google Checkout 5% Paypal If you are a US business, and you sell mainly to US customers, I highly recommend adding it as an additional payment method.
Stick to paypal, google checkout is one of the only google services i think suck, paypal is pretty awesome compared to it.
Not true. It only accepts US sellers and has a long list of buyer countries. I am US based and use Checkout when buyers don't live in a PayPal country. Google Checkout is available to buyers with billing addresses in... http://checkout.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=48115
This list is impressing: http://checkout.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=48115 What isn't, the supported countries for the sellers. How long does it take to move to country #2 ?
I have used both processors (PayPal and Google) and prefer Google Checkout. Between all my digital download websites, I gross $8,000 avg. (net $5,000) monthly. Google Checkout can be used INTERNATIONALLY, but you can only accept US Dollars. So what I do on my sites is if I am selling a product in the United Kingdom for £5.99, I will advertise that GBP price on my site and on the page where the customer actually clicks to make a purchase I will display the price as "Click Here to Purchase for Only £5.99 (approx. 9.99 USD)". Then I charge them $9.99 through Google Checkout. This has worked successfully for me on one of my major websites. About 42% of my traffic comes from the U.S., and the rest comes from U.K., Australia, and Canada. Both PayPal and Checkout have pros and cons: PayPal Pros: 1) Widely used and accepted by everyone 2) If you sell digital download products like e-books, etc. it is a much simpler process Google Pros: 1) You will pay no fees whatsoever. In 2008 they will start charging fees, but it will be much less than PayPal fees. 2) If you are advertising your website on Google Adwords, there will be a huge Google Checkout symbol by your ad -- which will result in a higher CTR. 3) Though not as popular as PayPal, the name recognition and trust is there -- people will definitely sign up. PayPal Cons: 1) **This is the BIGGEST concern I have** These guys have the ability to freeze your funds at anytime for 6 months. Read some of the horror stories on paypalsucks.com 2) From what I can tell, the only processor that has lower fees than PayPal is Google Checkout. Google Cons: 1) If you are selling digital download products, you will get about 15-20% of your customers who don't get directed to your download page, which leads to alot of customer service on your part. This is the WORST aspect of Checkout to me. 2) They don't accept any payment type but US Dollars (however, people in other countries can still purchase from their credit cards, their payment will just be converted into US Dollars). I believe in the next year or two, Google Checkout will get bigger, badder, and better and agree with 6Sigma to implement both choices on your websites (stay away from Plimus though, their fees are horribly high).
Here's a data point if anyone's interested: I run two campaigns with the Google Checkout icon showing below the ad. After one week of data, the CTR changes have been negligible on one campaign and a 20% increase on the other. Yeah, they take a good chunk of the sales for my individual licenses (10%), but they're not so bad for my site licenses (4.5%). I still haven't setup volume discounts and CD fulfillment through the others, so Plimus stays for now. Plus, some corporate buyers look down upon PayPal and Google Checkout.
If I were one of your customers, I'd certainly be looking for a Paypal buy now button before I decide to shop on your website. It keeps my personal and financial info away from risk. And I love secure transactions. Chargebacks are a different side of the coin but then, if Google Checkout does not have a "pay via email" option, Paypal will always be ahead of it. My point.
huh? I guess I passed that because I never saw how to implement a redirection to a download page. Is it possible to do that with G checkout?
I've used both - the biggest drawback of google checkout for me was that you do get the buyers email address
Hi COdy, There is somewhat of a redirect page on G Checkout. When you set up a Checkout account, they will ask you what the url of your website is, and instead of putting my main website address (ex. widgets.com), I will put my download page as the address (ex. widgets.com/download.htm). When your customer completes there order, there will be a link on the Checkout screen that says something like "Click Here to Return to Widgets.com>>". When they click on that link, it will take them to widgets.com/download.htm. On my e-mail address that I use for each of my Checkout account, I have also set autoresponders that have a thank you message and a link to the download page -- that way the customer has two chances to download the e-book or software. Hope this helps! Daniel
I have used the policy page. Will see if it works. Since I couldn't keep doing it with Paypal, G checkout was an option but I had to email the product each time