Payment Request API — Giving Users The Final Push At Sales Funnel

Generally, users have to go through a lot while they are dealing with any online business— be it through native apps or Progressive Web Apps .

Native apps find it really hard in driving traffic— but whatever they do— they have a reasonable conversion rate.

On the other hand— web apps have more online footfall, but they also have their own set of challenges when it comes down to conversion.

At least native apps have a better conversion to entry ratio than mobile web apps.

Web apps have a meager ratio that indicates that if PWAs have to showcase their might in the present & the future— we need them to be right on the money.

MACH Approach to eCommerce

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An overwhelmed user always deserts.

Maybe— just maybe— we are leaving too much on users to do every time they decide to complete the purchase cycle.

They first have to search the sign-up button if they are new, enter their details, search and select their favorite items— and even after making it to the final point of the buying cycle— they have to go through a complicated checkout process.

Users have thousands of reasons to abandon your store at the checkout process.

They might not remember their card’s credentials, have no access to the cards at that point in time of purchase, couldn’t help but enter the wrong data, and flaky networks don’t want them to buy either.

It can be anything you could possibly assume or think of in the world.

And we want these users to get over their excuses. We want to reduce as many reasons for abandoning the cart during checkouts.

Fortunately, Payment Request API is an API that gives reasons to your users not to leave your store.

Payment Request API— One Tap Of Midas— And BAMM!

The Payment Request API borrows the payment information at minimal integration, which eventually makes web checkout less pain in the neck.

Let’s say your store wants payment details of the users.

Traditionally, you’d arrange a form at the checkout process that will not only deter your customer but also hit your revenues.

But with Payment Request API— you are getting all the payment details at a single API call without necessitating them to enter their credentials at all.

So, how did the magic happen?

Well, our browsers are getting smarter day by day.

As users interact with many mobile web apps, they drop in their payment details in some of the essential purchases, if not yours.

Google Chrome stores these details. By Payment Request API— your store can request these payment credentials stashed in the browser.

The API makes sure that your store is not forcing users to make tedious and manual entries, which, in turn, ensures that they are checking-out in one tap rather than “n” taps.

The API solves multiple problems— A welcome change.

Any online payment has two crucial facets— security and convenience.

Until now— both were working at cross-purposes— that means if you were trying to achieve a secure payment option, you had to trade off convenience.

And if you were going for setting-up a convenient payment style— you would end up compromising the security.

But Payment Request API solves both the problems at one go quite comprehensively and ensures that security and convenience can run parallely.

So, any system that resolves more than one problem is a welcome change in the industry— and Payment Request API is one of them.

Goals of Payment Request API— sprinkling as much nativity in the web apps.

Well, as discussed— Payment Request API completely eliminates the need for checkout forms, thereby letting users enjoy the seamless and consistent shopping experience.

It’s a process layer that’s not a payment method.

In fact, you can’t even integrate it directly with any payment processor because that’s not what it’s meant for. Here’s what the API aims at:

● To make the browser a common link between merchants, users, and payment methods. It implies that browsers act as temporary databases for users and merchants. Users can enter their details— merchants can request these details from the browser’s data reservoir.

● To maximize the standardization of the payment communication flow. A homogenized payment communication flow makes it relatively simple for the merchants and users to establish a trade-relationship.

● To manage a harmonious environment between different secure payment methods. Credit or debit cards, net banking or mobile banking— the API supports a variety of payment methods.

Are we in the final checkout generation?

We have had three generations of Checkout processes so far— “the lengthy form generation,” “the shorter form generation,” and “the autofill generations.”

Finally, with the Payment Request API— we are in a generation where we might not need to make any change in the checkout processes.

The way it standardizes the payment methods— the API will be long-serving the industry until something out of the box bubbles out.

It could just be the technology that progressive web apps are looking to behave as close as native apps— who knows— the API could work out as the primary contributor to sales and conversions?

Thanks for reading this post and I do really appreciate it. I’ve a small bonus for you. I have written an in-depth article on this topic of “Payment Request API”. You can read that by visiting PWA new upcoming feature (Payment Request API) .

Hope you like this post, do share it with your friends and colleagues. If you have any questions or suggestions, you can reach me at @piyush_lathiya , I would love to respond you back.

See you on my next post, until then take care of yours and your family.