The global social online gaming market is an industry now worth more than USD300 billion and many companies are positioned to grab a piece of the action. All they need is an innovative concept that gamers love, right? Wrong.
The key to success in this sector is creating opportunities for gamers to pay however and wherever they want. Our gaming clients quickly realise just how limited they are by some common payment pain points. But if you think you can’t build and maintain a payment system that meets the needs of both gamers and retailers, think again.
Finding a processor prepared to handle payments can be an obstacle for gaming retailers because the industry is considered ‘high-risk’. Many processors are unwilling to take on risk or may turn-off payments the moment they notice unusual activity. It is important to have backups, should this happen.
With Payment Orchestration, merchants can easily add multiple payment processors to minimise the risk of a single payment processor and eliminate the possibility of interruption of play.
Through a single integration, gaming retailers can create a more efficient and reliable payment stack within a single platform, rather than juggling dozens of integrations across multiple payment service providers (PSPs). It also sends payments to several payment processors to find the most favourable processing fees and reduce false declines.
The gaming sector is an ever-evolving landscape in which there are more ways to play – and pay – than ever. The number of gamers worldwide is expected to reach more than 3.3 billion by 2024, and many of them will be using Alternative Payment Methods (APMs).
PayPal leads as a payment method for online games in many geographies, but cryptocurrency and play-to-earn, where the player can receive rewards with real-world value, is likely to increase in popularity.
It’s vital for merchants to understand the payment landscape and deliver an engaging and immersive experience for gamers. The easiest way for gaming operators to ensure a seamless payment journey for players is to make sure their payments network is designed to accept any APM.
CellPoint Digital’s Payment Orchestration Platform can help merchants choose between 168 APMs configured to meet their customer’s needs. It takes the stress out of integrating multiple payment methods and enables gaming retailers to deliver an enhanced customer experience by accepting the right payment type at the right time.
More than a quarter of ecommerce in Europe is cross-border, equating to millions of payment transactions crossing borders every day. But cross-border transactions costs add up, coming from unfavourable foreign exchange rates and delays in receiving the payment. A global payment orchestration platform can save time, money, and effort on cross-border transactions.
Using payment orchestration, gaming retailers can easily adapt the checkout process to display payments in local currencies, and direct transactions to payment partners who specialise in the gamer’s geographic region.
Using Multi-Currency Pricing (MCP), consumers can reprice their purchase into their preferred payment currency, while Dynamic Currency Conversion (DCC) gives gamers the choice of paying in the original pricing currency or the currency of their credit or debit card, where different.
Allowing customers to pay in their preferred currency and payment method increases browse-to-buy conversion rates by up to 20% and reduces per-transaction international acquirer fees.
How can you win the fight against fraud while approving legitimate transactions to keep gamers engaged and revenues flowing? We use the latest fraud management technology and data from 141 billion+ transactions to help global social gaming companies increase acceptance rates, lower review rates, and boost their bottom line. Without Payment Orchestration, transactional data is spread over multiple gateways and payment providers, making it significantly harder to detect fraud. With it, merchants get real-time visibility and analytics, which can flag potentially fraudulent payments before they are processed.
Chargebacks are another time-consuming and costly distraction for gaming retailers, but it is possible to reduce chargeback volumes and fees through automated transaction reviews.
Choosing a dedicated platform can simplify the chargeback process, intercepting disputes and avoiding chargebacks by replying in real-time with additional transaction information or refund confirmation. It can also help identify and respond to illegitimate disputes with compelling evidence and reverse chargebacks to recover revenue lost to friendly fraud, which accounts for up to 78% of chargebacks.
Today’s payment pain points can be effectively overcome using Payment Orchestration, but it is also crucial in addressing the challenges ahead.
In many cases, the fastest way to make significant revenue is through subscription services, the complex business of setting up subscription billing across multiple acquirers is an increasingly common challenge.
Looking further ahead, the blockchain technology will likely transform everything, from transactions to how money is raised in the private market. But the world of decentralised finance is complex and ever-changing. A key consideration in the coming years will be how to integrate cryptocurrencies quickly and seamlessly. Payment orchestration is constantly evolving to ensure that as new payment types evolve, merchants will be able to integrate them into their systems.
Kristian Gjerding is CEO of CellPoint Digital and held leadership positions at Network Appliance and Sun Microsystems before co-founding CellPoint. A skilled payment and commerce orchestration professional, he has a background in business-critical technology as well as Payment Orchestration Platforms and is a frequent speaker at airline, financial service and retail events.
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