At Amazon Pay, one of our guiding principles is customer obsession. It may sound intense, but we see our customers as the core reason we exist as a service. We are constantly seeking ways to better understand their needs. We then incorporate that information into the evolution of our products and features, to best address those needs and offer a delightful customer experience.
We asked Amazon customers what benefits are important to them when choosing a digital payment service (such as Amazon Pay) over traditional payment services (such as credit cards).1 The top 10 benefits from this exercise primarily encompassed themes including; security, purchase guarantees, trust, and convenience. Below is a snapshot of choices in order of priority.
- Protects me against fraud (Security)
- Alerts me if there is a security issue with my account (Security)
- Guarantees that my money will be refunded if the product isn’t delivered (and the seller doesn’t help me) (Purchase guarantees)
- Guarantees that my money will be refunded if the product is damaged or is not of the promised quality (and the seller doesn’t help me) (Purchase guarantees)
- Avoids sharing card/bank details with the seller (Security)
- Accepted widely by sellers (Availability)
- Offered by a trusted brand (Trust)
- Enables fast check-out by using a familiar login and password (Convenience)
- Easy to keep track of my purchases (Convenience)
- Earn reward points/discounts/cashbacks for using the payment service (Incentives/Value)
To understand these benefits in more detail, let’s walk through each theme at a high level.
Security
The top two benefits customers chose were ‘Protects me against fraud’ and ‘Alerts me if there is a security issue with my account’. The importance of these ‘must-have’ benefits indicates a perceived security deficiency will discourage customers from adopting or continuing to use a digital payment service over a traditional one. In the spirit of keeping their financial information safe, customers seek a digital payment service that avoids sharing their credit card/bank details with the seller as the fifth most important benefit.
Purchase guarantees
Customers are comfortable using traditional payment services. In order for a customer to start using digital payment services over traditional payments, they seek differentiating benefits around the theme of obtaining money back guarantees if a product is undelivered, damaged or not of promised quality. These expectations are customers’ third and fourth most important benefits when choosing a payment solution.
Trust
Brand trust, the seventh most important benefit for customers, is key in the payments space. For customers to change their behavior and use a new digital payment service, they must be presented with an option that evokes trust and offers peace of mind.
Convenience
The eighth most important benefits customers’ value is the ease that comes with paying at a store using a familiar login and password. While convenience is important, it has to be offered by a trustworthy digital payment services brand to gain preference over traditional payment services. It also ties into the customer’s ninth most important benefit -- a preference towards a keeping track of their purchases through a single digital payment service rather than tracking purchases over multiple credit/debit cards.
Availability and Incentives/Value
Acceptance by merchants is the sixth most important benefit to customers, and earning rewards using a digital payment service is the tenth most important benefit. Customers trust in a digital payment forces merchants to make it available, which in turn boosts visibility, driving further adoption. Customers are used to earning rewards/points on their traditional payment service, and seek the same or more from digital payment services.
When sellers choose a digital payment service for their site and store, they need to be cognizant of the above customer needs. Amazon Pay is one way you can offer your customers the benefits we’ve outlined above.
Sign up and start offering Amazon Pay as a payment option for your customers today.
1Source: Survey conducted by Amazon Pay in 2018 among 2251 Amazon customers in the United States, United Kingdom, and Germany. Results in this article are from a trade-off exercise that tested 35 benefits. The context of the trade-off exercise was: “In this section, you will see a list of benefits that might be important to you in choosing a digital payment service (such as PayPal, Amazon Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay etc.) over traditional payment services (such as Credit cards, Debit cards, Checks, Bank accounts etc.). On the next few screens, we will ask you to follow a series of steps to rate the importance of these benefits.”