At Gravity, we often see small business owners struggle with their online presence – in particular, creating a beautiful, yet functional website where their customers can find company information and pay their invoices – safely and conveniently.
If you own a service business or you’re a contractor, and you’re just starting out, building a website can seem daunting – and it might not even make sense to prioritize it. At the same time, customers are getting used to convenient, one-click payments everywhere they go – which could pose a dilemma.
You may be thinking:
“Aren’t there ways to accept payments online without having to build an entire website?”
There are!
And most of them are easy to set up and convenient to use. Let’s dive into 5 methods you can use for online transactions that don’t require a website, including their suitability for different business types and industries.
Use a Payment Link
Using payment links is the easiest way to accept payments online without a website.
With Gravity’s text-to-pay solution, you can send personalized payment links to your customers by text message, email, or via social media. When the customer clicks the link, it takes them to their invoice which they can pay using their preferred payment method, such as a credit card, debit card, or a digital wallet like Apple Pay.
You don’t need a website to do this!
It doesn’t get more convenient than this, and it might even help speed up collection of your accounts receivable because customers are likely to pay faster when you make it easy.
If your business has social media profiles – or you run your business via social media – you can add a similar payment link to your profile and posts which customers can use to pay for your products and services.
Use a Hosted Payment Page
A hosted payment page is a dedicated payment page or payment form hosted by a payment processor like Gravity.
You can customize the page to your branding, including your logo, brand fonts, and other design elements. This makes it look like an actual website!
For the customer, paying via a hosted payment page looks and feels similar to a typical ecommerce shopping cart experience – so they are likely familiar and comfortable with this type of experience.
Just like the payment link, a hosted payment page facilitates all of the most popular payment methods and your customers can choose their preferred method.
Utilize Third Party Platforms
Third party platforms provide an easy way for business owners to accept payments.
If you run an ecommerce business, you can use third party platforms like Amazon to sell your products.
If you are a freelancer, you can offer your services on freelance platforms like Upwork and Fiverr.
And there are many industry-specific online marketplaces that connect sellers with buyers.
The big advantage of using these types of solutions is that the platforms provide everything you need, including payment infrastructure – you don’t have to create your own website to get paid and your payments are usually protected by an Escrow system.
A downside of using external platforms to sell your products and services is that these platforms charge (often steep) fees. Setting up your own payment infrastructure with a payment processor like Gravity is almost always going to be significantly cheaper.
Use a Virtual Terminal
A virtual payment terminal works similarly to the countertop credit card terminals you would use in a brick-and-mortar store – except it’s all online and cloud-based!
You can run a virtual payment terminal on your phone, tablet, or laptop, and you just manually key in your customers’ credit card information to process payments. All you need is internet access.
A virtual terminal is an ideal solution if you are on the move a lot, do a lot of on-site visits, and/or receive a lot of orders via telephone and mail (MOTO) where the customer’s physical credit card isn’t always present.
RELATED: Everything You Need to Know About MOTO Payments.
Integrate Into Business Software
Another way to accept payments online without a website is by integrating payment processing into your existing business management software.
This is an ideal solution for veterinary practices, healthcare facilities, restaurants, and other types of businesses that use specialized management software.
By integrating the payment process directly into your management software, you can streamline your business processes, automatically update inventory, save time, and reduce human errors.
Gravity Payments integrates with many different software partners across different industries to provide a seamless payment experience, directly in the software.
RELATED: What are Integrated Payments?
Accept Payments with Gravity
Having a website is good for any business – but building it, managing it, and keeping it up to date can be resource-intensive. It may make sense to go without a website, or to go for a basic website that doesn’t have payment functionality.
The good news is that you can still accept payments online – conveniently and securely – without a website.
Gravity Payments facilitates all of the methods outlined in this article and we can advise you on how to proceed as part of our white glove setup.
Check out our merchant services and don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any further questions.
