Is your payment gateway hindering your fundraising?
August 1st, 2022
by Blackbaud Pacific
Online fundraising is nothing new, but it’s recently been growing in leaps and bounds – especially through the COVID-19 era.
In fact, the 2021 Blackbaud Charitable Giving Report found that online giving has grown by 42% over three years, and organisations need to ensure their digital fundraising systems – and especially their payment gateways – are able to keep up with the increased demand.
Is your payment gateway optimised for fundraising?
A high-quality payment gateway should work in partnership with your CRM system to automatically process and handle donor transactions without requiring staff input – freeing up hours of precious time (and funds!) for the work your organisation is centred on.
Your payment gateway should also easily sync with your CRM, updating donor data with each transaction.
When looking for a suitable payment gateway, keep an eye on out for hidden fees and misleading exchange rates that could reduce the value of every dollar given to your organisation.
Instead, look for payment gateways with no hidden fees and charges, and one that offers a consistent flat rate on every transaction – regardless of the card type or category.
Is your payment gateway responsive and flexible?
Your payment gateway needs to allow supporters to click straight from your marketing content right through to your donation page.
Whether your donors are on a laptop, desktop monitor, mobile phone or tablet, this process should be one seamless flow through mobile-friendly checkouts.
Another important factor is to regularly check which payment methods your gateway supports – donors’ payment preferences will evolve, and so should your software.
Being able to offer the latest digital wallets that donors use and trust daily is an important way to optimise donor behavior. Choose a payment gateway that allows donors to give via their preferred payment method – whether that be credit card, direct debit or Apple Pay.
Also look for a solution that provides the option to make a one-off gift or a regular monthly commitment.
Does your payment gateway protect you and your donors?
The rapidly evolving philanthropic sector has become a prime target for scammers and fraudsters. The strong growth in online donor transactions has also led to a sharp uptick in fraudulent attacks.
As a result, your payment gateway solution should provide the latest data and fraud protection for your organisation and your donors.
Secure card scanning and testing processes should be automatically applied to all online transactions, giving you confidence that your valued supporters are enjoying a checkout experience that’s both smooth and secure.
Blackbaud’s integrated payment solution
Blackbaud Merchant Services™ is a cutting-edge payment gateway solution intentionally designed to streamline financial transaction management. It acts as both a credit card gateway and processor, so you don’t have to manage multiple vendors. Instead, you’ll benefit from the convenience and protection that comes from working with a single provider.
When you equip your organisation with Blackbaud Merchant Services, you can rest easy knowing your organisation and donors are protected by best-in-class inbuilt fraud monitoring and protection with machine learning. It has all the proprietary tools including anti fraud software so that you and your donors can feel safe.
As well as excelling in reliability and affordability, Blackbaud Merchant Services sets the gold standard in security, compliance, and ease-of-use. It also easily integrates with Blackbaud’s CRM fundraising solutions such as Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT, which allows your credit card data to always be up to date.
With a wide array of different payment options, and a mobile friendly checkout, Blackbaud Merchant Services allows your donors to have a user friendly and quick giving experience.
“I’ve always considered part of my job as making sure that we have the latest and most secure technology. So it’s good to know that we can trust Blackbaud Merchant Services.” – Felicity Pietersz, Database Manager, World Animal Protection Australia.
Is your current payment gateway software helping or hindering your fundraising? Read more about Blackbaud Merchant Services on our website, and don’t miss to register for our upcoming webinar to discover how other organisations like yours are future-proofing their fundraising.
Don’t Miss Our Upcoming Webinar!
Listen to one of our customers African Enterprise talk about why they decided to implement Blackbaud Merchant Services as their payment gateway and how our partner EzeScan enabled them to take another step up in their fundraising efforts.