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My membership site is just now starting to make some decent money, and so far I have not been willing to spend the $750 to offer Visa as a payment option. (I have CCBill, and before that IBill.)
What percentage of your sales are Visa?
How many sales am I losing by not offering it?
I have had only one complaint about it in a whole year, and he might have been overseas anyway.
YES!!! you are losing the majority of your potential sales. The visa fee should be looked at as a cost of doing business and if you cannot afford it then you should not be in this business!
cheers,
Luke
Boy, Luke, that was a bit harsh, true, but harsh.
Mark, Actually, I tried to edit my comment, but it was too late. I actually don't think you're losing any sales as a result of not having your own credit card processor. As long as they can pay, using CCBill, with a credit card, it is no less convenient. It might be costing you more on a per transaction basis, though.Quote:
Originally posted by Hotpopporn
Boy, Luke, that was a bit harsh, true, but harsh.
I'd have to agree with Luke in that the Visa fee is just a part of doing business these days. It should be factored in from the get go as an expense that need be covered.
Visa has enough credit card market share that it's just something you gotta accept.
And that you definitely are losing sales by not having it.
I must be missing something, other than transaction costs, why would Mark be losing business using CCBill instead of processing his own credit cards?Quote:
Originally posted by BDBionic
I'd have to agree with Luke in that the Visa fee is just a part of doing business these days. It should be factored in from the get go as an expense that need be covered.
Visa has enough credit card market share that it's just something you gotta accept.
And that you definitely are losing sales by not having it.
CCBill is only the 3rd party processor.Quote:
Originally posted by Hotpopporn
I must be missing something, other than transaction costs, why would Mark be losing business using CCBill instead of processing his own credit cards?
CCBill would process Visa. He can't process his own, and so uses CCBill to process Visa, Mastercard, JCB and Discover.
But you got to pay $750 to have CCBill process Visa for you because of Visa's rules concerning adult sites. Without paying that money, CCBill can not process Visa for him. Same way with all 3 big processors, pretty much (IBill, PayCom/Epoch, CCBill) I believe.
So he'd either process Visa through CCBill, or not process Visa at all.
Well I disagree totally on VISA and losing sales.
When this whole VISA blackmail started I was running a membership site and opted not to pay it.
I simply upped the VISA price and offered MC at a lower price and all.. WITHOUT EXCEPTION... of my members opted to renew using MC or DISCOVER...
I moved out of a membership site simply because I can make more selling the books individually and don't have to worry about updates or anything...
But with decent marketing I don't think anyone can lose out in any dramatic sense.
Just a reminder, the argument used on why you need to cough up $750 for VISA or lose sales is the same argument used way back when AMEX opted to get out of the adult area... THe Adult biz didn't collapse nor will yours if you just use creative pricing and up front honest approaches.
And with all due respect, I'd say that simply because someone doesn't wish to pay or feel they can't justify the $750 blackmail fee is any reason for them to get out of the business.
Just my 2 cents worth.
Ian
about 70 - 75% of our sales are visa, and unlike gaystoryman, when we tried not offering visa, our sales dropped about 40%.
also keep in mind that $750 is not that much, and mastercard is the company that is levying fines so high that they put pswbilling out of business. also epoch was suing them for fines that totalled over a million dollars, as i recall.
also those fines are for unspecified percentages of chargebacks, and there are no specific written regulations, so there is no way to comply with mastercard if they want to fine you.
as far as calling the $750 visa registration fee blackmail, i keep in mind that most business stuff includes start up costs. many hosts charge a set up fee, and other companies charge deposits or other expenses when you start up.
I think it's important we remind ourselves of how credit cards work.
It's the credit card company's money, not the surfer or ours.
The lender purchases that membership. And the surfer pays back the lender at a later date for that purchase.
So, really, I have trouble faulting the credit card networks for working to protect their own money. Because it is their money.
And, really, when credit cards are involved in the process we as online merchants never actually get money from the surfer themselves. We get it from the lender.
So I simply can't find fault in Visa demanding that fee. It's their money! It's entirely up to them who they want to give it to and who they don't want to. And there were enough bad apples in the barrel to leave the rest of us stuck with this $750 fee. And we just gotta live with it.
It's now a basic business expense. We know full well we engage in a high-risk industry where there are complications and issues unique to it and unlike any others faced by those in different industries.
Our bandwidth usage is high because of all the video we stream and make available.
Our competition is fierce because there are so many other adult sites like ours out there.
Access to our websites need be controlled because of the kinds of content that rests on them.
Legal issues concerning our content and sites are different than those faced by others.
We see lots of naked people.
Those are just some of the inevitable and everpresent, definitive aspects of this industry. And a $750 Visa fee is now one of them.
There is no entitlement here to credit card processing. We don't have a right to it. It's the lender's money and when one of those lender's with a 60% market share throws a new rule on the book, we gotta accept it.
Of course, their are always other options. Not processing that particular card. Not doing business in this country. Not accepting credit cards at all. Arranging for some other type of payment set up that doesn't involve Visa. But then that is a business decision just like moving hosts or upgrading to a new server or buying advertising or redesigning your site. Just one of the many decisions that has to be made by a business. Weigh the pros and the cons and if it makes financial sense then go with it. Business.
Just business.
Brian,
I guess the reason I was confused is that when I looked a LavenderLounge, I was taken to CCBill's payment options, including credit cards were one of the payment options. So, I guess that means he paid CCBills fee.
I thought Mark was saying that he was using CCBill because he couldn't afford to pay the initial fee to process his own cards.
BDBionic - you certainly filled in my comments admirably! and every word you said is true. no one owes us credit card processing...
To be honest, I think the adult industry has caved in too easily to VISA but it is just my opinion.
Like has been said, its a decision we all make individually depending on our own strengths and weaknesses. What works for one doesn't necessarily work for another.
Oh well. I am just an odd duck in an odd world.
Ian
And, it's very very illegal.Quote:
Originally posted by gaystoryman
Well I disagree totally on VISA and losing sales.
When this whole VISA blackmail started I was running a membership site and opted not to pay it.
I simply upped the VISA price and offered MC at a lower price and all.. WITHOUT EXCEPTION... of my members opted to renew using MC or DISCOVER...
Card association rules clearly state you can not charge a higher price or offer a discount rate in that manner. You can not say "use Visa and get a 20% discount!" or anything like that.
It's bullshit, but those are the rules.
THIS THREAD IS GETTING OFF THE TOPIC!!!
The subject of this thread is NOT about debating 3rd party processors vs. merchant accounts, and it's not about the validity of Visa's yearly fee.
All I wanted to do was conduct a survey to find out:
-what percentage of your sales use Visa.
-if anyone started with only MC/JCB/Discover and later added Visa. Did you see a jump in sales by adding Visa?
The results you post will help me determine if I should spent the $750.
Understand, rubberband?
Hey Mark,
You should check out eCommerceGlobal.com. We will wave the $750.00 fee on a case by case basis.
Brief overview:
* Fast Setup and Low Rates
* Live Client Support and Live Support for your Customers
* Real-Time Reports on Transactions
* Settlement by Wire Transfers / Direct Deposit
* One-Time & Recurring Transactions
* Professional front and back-end Interface
* Fraud Scrubbing & Complete Transaction Reports
* Free technical support
* Affiliate Tracking Program
* Customized Join Pages
* Customized Emails
* Cascade Billing
* Password - Membership Management
* Discreet Billing Descriptor
* Offshore processing, with sales / support office in Seattle, WA.
TO LEARN MORE AND GET STARTED:
http://www.eCommerceGlobal.com/cgi-bin/click.cgi?id=5
Feel free to contact me if I can be of any further assistance,
Ty W
206-424-9134
www.eCommerceGlobal.com
ty@eCommerceGlobal.com
ICQ # 209963807
Well ... I don't run the part of my business that deals with 99% of the credit card issues, but checking I was told more than 85% of sales are with a Visa card.
If you do a search on the various boards, this has been asked numerous times and everyone seems to say that Visa sales are 75%+ of their sales.
I'd have to say that you would indeed be losing out, yes.
Visa's market share alone makes them an option worth having.
With all of the sites I work with, having scanned over a number of them today and checked accounts and what not, I'd say 65-75% of all CC transactions are made with Visa at quick glance.
Now who knows how many of those people simply choose Visa but could use a MasterCard or other if they had to or how many of them use Visa alone.
But there are many angles to it. Say not all of that 65-75% only has Visa and a good number of them have MC or something else as well and thus can still buy... but what about the inevitable portion left over that can't? Overtime they'd definitely make up 750 bucks worth of business on any site that is marketed, designed, and successful at being a worthwhile revenue source.
As well, how might it affect affiliates' conversion ratios? How will they feel about sending traffic to a site that doesn't process Visa? With all the options they have out there that might be the factor that has them choose to go with someone else.
I'm feeling a little like Kerry at the moment, but I can explain my reasons for flip-flopping:goofy:
But, I found an article that quantifies Brians assertions.... http://www.usa.visa.com/personal/new...1trillion.html
Granted, it's published on Visa International's website, but I tend to believe it's at least close to accurate. Visa does almost twice the dollar volume of Mastercard. I think that should give you your answer. If you can't recoup the $750 cost in a reasonable amount of time, I'd have to agree with Luke, you should probably consider another vocation.
Tony
Actually this is not the case with all processors. There are some processors who you do not have to pay the set-up fees to Visa. Although the set-up fee is about $500, so it might be six of one and half a dozen of the other.Quote:
Originally posted by BDBionic
But you got to pay $750 to have CCBill process Visa for you because of Visa's rules concerning adult sites. Without paying that money, CCBill can not process Visa for him. Same way with all 3 big processors, pretty much (IBill, PayCom/Epoch, CCBill) I believe.
So he'd either process Visa through CCBill, or not process Visa at all.
it's true - $250 of that $750 goes to the processor. but considering the great service some of our processors give, reliable checks, and setting up everything we need in our servers, i can't see why that should be a problem.
Actually from what I heard at a meeting the other day - this registration fee is only applied to North American processors