Lesson #15 Using Multiple Processors
Written By Titmowse

In Lesson #14, we showed you the different types ofways you can receive payments for your adult paysite. What we didn't cover was a new and beneficial option the adult site owner has today, Multiple Processors.

When you patronize a service establishment, don't you find yourself a happier and more willing buyer when the service is subtle yet anticipatory and fulfilling your needs? Perhaps one of the tensest moments of any sales transaction is the transaction. Shopping is easy. Pricing is smart. Comparing is even smarter. Paying. Actually handing over your money to someone else is where bitching is done, cringing is enacted and some people just duck and run. If you have a customer at your cash register with money in hand, will you be able to take their form of money? If you can't, they have no choice except to put down the products, put away the money and leave your place of business. Accept only one form of money and you lose out on otherwise qualified customers.

We stated in Lesson #14 that there were different types of ways to take payment from your members. There were straight-up merchant accounts that are directly tied to a bank. Then we learned about third party merchants. We did not write about another kind of Internet shopping cart, which is a virtual-money type of service but will do so in this lesson. This lesson is to stress to you that there is more than just one way to accept money on the Internet. In the real world a good service vendor anticipates this and provides several payment methods to please the customer and make the sale.

It would be nice if there was one standard of payment for all financial transactions. But that is not the way and you need to take that into account, especially when your client base is worldwide. One third-party processing company may accept the credit card or checking account of customer A but not customer B. Some surfers will be in countries that are not handled through your merchant account. You will find that potential members might be skittish and will only use virtual money accounts to pay for Internet dealings. Whatever the reason, if your possible consumer has money, you should never let the type of that good money stand between you and a sale.

As stated, you can get a merchant account. That means you have to gather the funds together for a huge deposit and find a bank that will deal with your adult business. A merchant account means that you keep a good 90-95% of your Internet commerce transactions because you deal directly with a bank. This method of payment is the most profitable but it is also requires the most money up front to begin.

If you don't have the start up costs to pay a big deposit for a merchant account then for about 15-30% of your sales dollar, you can pay someone else to handle dealing with the banks and the credit card companies and the software etcetera. This is what third party processing companies do. They have the accounts with the banks that have the accounts with the credit card merchants and take care of customer billing needs from software to help desk. Having more than one third-party processor for your paysite is smart because your client may not be able to pay through a specific third party.

The other way you can take payments from members of your paysite is the virtual money method. Virtual money processors are very much like third party merchants in that they require little start-up money from you and will handle the bank and credit card goings on. What sets them apart from third-party processors is that the virtual money processor sets up little Internet bank accounts for the user and seller. A surfer adds to their virtual money account and pays for items on the net with it. A seller is paid by the surfer into his or her own virtual money account. Surfers and sellers both have to have virtual money accounts.

The most well known virtual money processor is PayPal. PayPal makes sure the customer has a valid bank account and they can add to their account with a check or credit card of choice. The problem with PayPal is that they DO NO accept adult sites for their business accounts. For that reason, we at Cozy Academy don't recommend you use PayPal for your adult site. There are other companies like MoneyBookers and ePassporte that offer similar services AND cater to the online adult Industry!

In fact third party processors can set you up so your site takes credit cards, debit cards, checks and even phone-based payments from surfers. The important thing to do is not limit your site to one third party. Try to have more than one third party handle your adult Internet payments. For information and links to sites that will help you get set up to take money from customers on the adult Internet, go to our Cozy Academy Library page. Look under the Billing Services header for links to just what you need.