(Untitled)

With consumers spending on the increasing in the first quarter of the year and the popularity of online shopping continues to increase across every demographic group, merchants face both more opportunities and competition to the consumer's dollar. That means looking for new ways to cater to the demands of customers by giving them more motives to visit your brand or site. A great place to start is with the checkout processfinding opportunities to streamline this important last step of the sale, and also provide payment options for your customers to enhance their shopping customer experience.

One of the trends that has rapidly grown in popularity for online purchases includes the "Buy Now, Pay Later" (BNPL) choice at the time of checkout. BNPL is a payment option that permits shoppers to split the amount of their purchase in low-cost installments which are divided over time- in some cases for a couple of weeks and in others over multiple months.

Pay later, buy now is getting more popular.

Many consumers are using pay-over-time services whenever they're accessible. The year 2023 saw online retailers experienced a dramatic rise in the number of purchases that were made using BNPL, with volumes increasing by 42.5% over the previous year. As a result, BNPL added around $16.6 billion on merchant books over the course of the final 2 months in 2023 and this trend Adobe anticipates will last until 2024.

Roughly 93.3 million consumers are predicted to utilize BNPL by 2024, according to EMarketer, and American Banker reported that the BNPL market in the US could be as high than $8.3 billion by 2028. BNPL is also being used more and more by online retail giants, like Amazon.com which is further speeding up the growth of the market and making the choice more accessible to those who purchase online.

This makes BNPL an option merchants must consider when competing in an increasingly crowded online marketplace.

Offering buy now, be paid later: Some points to take into consideration

Incorporating BNPL choices for checkouts earlier instead of later provides merchants more opportunity to capture new customers as well as establish a long-term connection.

For merchants that don't yet offer an BNPL option at checkout, this could be the ideal opportunity to introduce one into the mix. If they do provide it by placing the BNPL option prominently displayed on their site, especially at checkout, or advertising the availability of the option through advertising can help to make their brands stand out and increase the experience of shopping for customers.

The more noticeable the BNPL option is displayed on a merchant's site and the faster they promote the feature via emails and on social networks and the more likely that customers would be interested in learning more, which can help the merchant bring shoppers to their website to complete the sale.

BNPL can help merchants expand their appeal to customers who wish to purchase items in the near future, but wish to manage their cash flow, without credit. By allowing the possibility of splitting the cost of a purchase into like, four payments that are interest free every two weeks, consumers are able to purchase what they want without delay. Some BNPL service providers, including Affirm and Affirm, offer long time options that span several months to up to 3 years for carts with large sizes and high-ticket items.

While adding yet another payment type on the backend of an ecommerce website might seem daunting for smaller merchants already pressed for time, there are options that are quick and simple installation that will simplify the entire process for the retailer. In this case, they are often able to make use of pre-built eCommerce integrations, for instance the Affirm Payments extension for, to easily add the BNPL option to their current checkout page.

Advantages of offering buy now and pay later your Woo store

What benefit can an BNPL integration offer? For one, using an integration can streamline the purchasing process for the ever-growing amount of consumers who prefer to pay over the period of. Making sure that customers are on your website and moving them towards the checkout process is also important, especially when it comes to younger customers who grew up using internet-based shopping. Indeed it is reported by it is reported by the National Retail Federation reports that more than half (46%) of Gen Z respondents consider a effortless checkout process to be essential for their purchasing experience.

A key aspect to think about when implementing the integration is the user experience for the buyer. It's important that the customer can view their payment options and go through the approval process without having to go to an additional site. Through an integrated system, retailers can make the procedure as simple and simple as is possible to the customer, so they don't stand out of the sale.

An easy checkout process can aid in reducing cart abandonment. A recent Baymard Institute metastudy of 49 research reports revealed that the cart abandonment rate remains at around 70 but hasn't drastically changed within the last decade. One of the main reasons to abandon carts: a checkout process that was long or complex (22% of cases) and also the site did not offer enough payment options (responsible to 13% cart abandonments). With a tightly integrated BNPL solution, retailers can address both of those customers' concerns in one go.

Which is the best buy today, pay later service

Picking a BNPL supplier that matches your needs as a business and with customer requirements is a crucial aspect to find the right fit. Affirm, for instance, Affirm provides custom payment solutions to merchantsthey can offer both long- and short-term options as well as zero-interest options. By offering payments that are in line with the needs of customers and standard pricing, businesses are able to increase the affordability of customers and possibly gain a customer over the competition.

Another feature unique to Affirm is the Adaptive Checkout technology, which dynamically offers the most relevant ways to pay your customers dependent on each product's price and total cart value. With personalization the name of the online game, Affirm customizes the time length and the APR of each purchase -- delivering several relevant pay-over-time options to customers, all within an easy-to-use user experience.

How do you let your current and potential customers know about the BNPL choice prior to checkout? Depending on your target market it is possible to think about promoting the offer on social media platforms. Retail Dive says that 85percent of the customers' purchase decisions are influenced via social media. So advertising the possibility of offering BNPL through these platforms could give you an advantage. If you're targeting Gen Z, know that 45% of respondents named TikTok as well as Instagram as top apps influencing their purchasing choices.

Since summer is often a slow season for companies, there's an opening for retailers to work on getting BNPL operational on their site, before when the Back to School rush signals the beginning of the busy weeks leading to winter holidays. This gives merchants the chance to take a thoughtful decision about vendors, smooth out the technical glitches and launch the marketing efforts to announce the launch of BNPL as a fresh payment option that can be used at the checkout.

The availability of an BNPL option at checkout and announcing it on social media could be a game changer for merchants looking to capture higher online spending and beat out other merchants.

Are you ready to include flexible payment options to your checkout? Apply to Affirm to begin and use the Affirm Extension for Payments to provide pay-over-time through your payment process.

--

*Payment options through Affirm are subject to an eligibility test, may not be available in all areas, and they are made available through these lending partners: affirm.com/lenders.