Online business owners awake to new problems daily. Among others, if they don’t have face to face customer relationships, they give up some tools to verify customer identity.
Honest customers prefer online merchants with the least resistance to shopping and buying. If the process is lengthy or convoluted, they will move on. You need their business, but they have no patience.
In an economy dependent on credit card traffic and electronic fund transfers, good customers forget what risks merchants take. Merchants must verify identity, but you must do it in fast, low-anxiety, easy way.
E-commerce is open to fraud.
Matt D’Angelo at Business News Daily says, “As more buyers turn online to make purchases, fraudsters have even more opportunity to expose both consumers and merchants.”
Good customers understand a verification process is good for the business and for them. It reduces cost and time to owners who can then manage their business better. But, in an era of cyber-crime and aggressive hacking, online business owners are tasked with protecting themselves and their customers.
There is no single, monitored, or managed universal verification method standard for businesses to adopt. To stay ahead of their need, e-commerce owners need a trusted provider like https://www.jumio.com/trusted-identity/netverify created by Jumio the 2017 Frost & Sullivan’s “Entrepreneurial Company of the Year for the Biometrics Security Industry.”
What’s an owner to do?
In the past, e-commerce replicated the pattern of in-person verification. They read a presented document and link that to some reinforcing link like a secret question or a mother’s maiden name. Securing, storing, and using this data remains vulnerable to access and abuse.
That data actually offers little in terms of information vital to the business needs or financial dealings. Confirming your mother’s maiden name through a single or double-click verification tells you nothing about the person’s ability to pay.
You need a scalable system that is dynamic, flexible, and customized. And, you need it at a cost that makes sense to you and allows business growth. As Investopedia notes, “it must rely on the most up-to-date and high-quality database possible.” So, real-time access, speed, and reporting are vital.
- Admit your weakness. This technology is so sophisticated, you will eventually commit to a provider requiring your complete trust. Give it time. You have to give this some thought. The decision will be with for some time. More important, it will present an image and message to your customer base.
- Price it well. The cost will stay with you, too. While you won’t benefit from a cost-driven decision alone, you should comparison shop on the same performance criteria.
- Talk it over. You want to drill down on recommendations. You can’t ignore or trust online reviews, but you should talk at length with other users, preferably in similar e-commerce lines.
Online business owners have little choice here. You have a business to protect as well as its prospective and current customers. Though the decision is pressing, it requires prudence, caution, and a look into the best options.
About Carson Derrow
