Wallets: alternative payment methods you may want to know about

Just as users went through a period of adaptation to credit cards, alternative payment methods such as wallets have also gone through a learning curve.

The difference is that the consumer has changed and, in some ways, has become more technical and educated. The curve has been so fast that eCommerce and retailers have had to adapt much faster and, even better, they have found some important advantages.

Instead of being a leather wallet in which bills are carried, it is a mobile application associated with our bank account that allows us to make transactions.

Technically, wallets consist of a formula for making instant payments without involving cash. We only have to set the amount and give the order from our mobile device.

Basically two, but they are really relevant and more than justify including wallets among the payment methods (even to the point of dispensing with other more conventional methods).

The first reason is that you cannot turn your back on the customer. If this type of payment is extended to any area of their daily lives, it makes sense to give them the opportunity to use it also in stores (digital and physical).

Secondly, the implementation of this type of payment with virtual wallets is very simple and totally free for the user.

In addition, it is noteworthy that we are providing an extra intangible of confidence to the buyer because we are linking our business to a recognized and recognizable platform, which has the advantage of avoiding having to enter our payment data on different websites or services.

It is the oldest of the ones we are going to discuss, but we must recognize that it is still in top form.

Somehow, it is the one that led the way by linking our email account with our bank account. This allows us to make payments just by entering the email and a designated password.

Oleoshop has had PayPal available as a payment method for years, specifically since 2016.

If you have a physical store, your customers can use the PayPal mobile app to make payments without using cash or needing a POS.   

Although it is not the next in order of appearance, it is probably the most important today in terms of critical mass and number of users who use it on a recurring basis. So popular has it become that the expression "make a Bizum" is heard everywhere on a daily basis.

This platform offers instant payments in a fully integrated mobile experience. That is to say: any person or business with a phone number and a bank that supports it can make transactions without any additional requirements, with the advantage of receiving the income at the moment.

As soon as this payment platform became available for e-commerce, we decided to integrate Bizum into Oleoshop so that our customers could benefit from it.

How could Amazon pass up the opportunity to try to get its head into this area? Remember that they were the first to register the one-click purchase, so their interest in payment methods is more than obvious.

The philosophy is, basically, to use the bank details that the marketplace has of its customers to make the purchase at any other third-party merchant. Simplicity to the maximum to maintain control over their customers.

We will not go into too much detail in the explanation because it is exactly the same as the previous case: a marketplace that uses its resources to make purchases and payments.

The main difference is that, in this case, who is behind it is Alibaba, so it is understood that it is more targeted to the Asian market.

To make a purchase with this payment method in a physical store we only have to generate a QR code that will be scanned at the point of sale. It is very simple and is spreading rapidly in China, Korea and Japan. Other leading tools in those latitudes, such as WeChat, also use two-dimensional codes.

Proof that interest in these applications is growing steadily is that Facebook has just announced that its wallet is now available in Spain, which will allow us to pay directly from its social network.

In fact, this opens up a much wider range because it manages to add the possibility of paying in an integrated way within its ecosystem. It seems that in-app purchases on Instagram or in the company's chats (Messenger and Whatsapp) are really close.

These are the most representative examples of wallets, although we cannot forget the two big giants when it comes to digital.

Google Pay and Apple Pay are also alternatives to consider when we consider opening our business to alternative payment formulas.