Merchant Account Tips

Based on discussions with merchants over the last couple of months it would appear that the low cost merchant account provider Clickbank is losing popularity in favour of other third party processors.

The reason for this is Clickbank's unfortunate credit card verification process which seems to be refusing many perfectly valid credit cards.

Not only does this mean it is becoming more difficult for international merchants to get an account (because the Clickbank website won't let them pay the activation fee) but also Clickbank may well be losing your website perfectly legitimate orders.

Many merchants have been complaining about a drop in sales over the last few months, coupled with a growing list of dissatisfied customer emails explaining that their credit card, which is perfectly valid, keeps getting refused when they try to order.

Potential customers have written to us, complaining that they are unable to complete purchases, because their credit cards have been rejected by Clickbank. They insist that their cards are clean... I'm inclined to believe that. Just last week a customer whose card was rejected by Clickbank ended up purchasing 3 domains for which we accepted payment via 2Checkout."

Indeed, in recent discussions with Chuck McCullough, author of the excellent Affiliate Mistakes book, he told me he'd had a similar experience with his business.