On an unstoppable mission to give online retailers the broadest eCommerce tool set to grow sales and profits, we announced last week support for PayPal Express Checkout for our merchants in the U.S., United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Germany. Not to disappoint us a number of online retailers immediately had questions on this checkout solution: How is it different from regular PayPal? What are its benefits? Can it help reduce my payment processing costs? Should I activate PayPal Express Checkout or Google Checkout? To answer some of these questions I have created below a brief primer on PayPal Express Checkout (Reader’s Digest version: turn it on).

Short on time? Here are three three important resources that will help you better understand its benefits, when and how to use it, and hopefully answer any questions that you may have:

  • PayPal Website Payments Pro - Express Checkout is part of PayPal’s Website Payments Pro package, a comprehensive payment solution including credit card payment processing and PayPal’s Virtual Terminal product.


What is PayPal Express Checkout?

Think of PayPal Express Checkout as a checkout accelerator rather then a third-party checkout solution a la Google Checkout. While Google guides the buyer off the retailer’s website, PayPal speeds up the checkout process (a.k.a. — faster, better, safer) and concludes the transaction on the merchant’s site. Here’s a small graphic that does a nice job of illustrating the buying experience (thanks PayPal): PPEC Flow

  1. Unlike PayPal Standard which is traditionally embedded as a payment option in the merchant’s checkout, PayPal Express Checkout is initiated on the shopping cart (or straight from eBay) via the familiar PayPal sunburst logo.
  2. The buyer logs into his or her PayPal account and selects either the default shipping address (rather then re-entering it in the checkout) and default funding method (both can easily be changed by the buyer) for the purchase.
  3. Finally the buyer lands on the merchant’s confirm checkout page to complete the transaction (shipping address and payment clearance are passed under the cover to the merchant).

That’s it. Faster checkout and, this is increasingly important for consumers, no sharing of sensitive payment details with the merchant. Test-drive it at electronics online retailer Cablestar to get a sense of the flow.

Why should online retailers care?

There are a number of key benefits to PayPal Express Checkout that are important to understand when evaluating this checkout option:

  • Faster checkout – First and foremost, a faster and safer checkout reduces cart abandonment and drives buyer loyalty. PayPal commissioned last year a study that indicated a 14% jump in sales as a result of adding PayPal as an option for consumers. Buyers are increasingly seeking out merchants based on checkout options to take advantage of the ease-of-use and speed with which one can buy online via these solutions.
  • Checkout options — The more options you give to buyers the more likely you are to offer exactly the checkout option the consumer is looking for. I am not a fan of registering as a buyer on every single site so I seek out merchants that allow me to use my stored information for checkout rather then re-entering it all. There’s of course the law of diminishing returns. You can’t offer 20 different means to check out or the buyer is just going to flee.
  • eBay marketing muscle — Over 80% of transactions on eBay are paid for with PayPal. That’s a lot of savvy consumers that know and trust the PayPal brand. Not leveraging this brand to your advantage (in particular for eBay buyers that you’re trying to draw to your eCommerce site) may result in those buyers looking for your competitor. That can’t be good for business.

How do you take advantage of it?

It really doesn’t get any easier. We have added a Checkout Solutions view to ChannelAdvisor Complete that allows online retailers not only to select which checkout should be available to buyers, but also how these options should be rendered to the consumer.

In the above example you can see that Postal Supplies Direct has chosen to first display the ChannelAdvisor Checkout, then PayPal Express Checkout and finally Google Checkout in third position. Andrew Dudley over at Postal Supplies has determined that this order provides both his business and his customers the most benefits.

That concludes the not-so-brief 3-step program to getting started with PayPal Express Checkout. If you have additional questions that are not answered here or at any of the resources I have highlighted above, feel free contact me for more information (email me at max.leisten | channeladvisor.com) or simply post in our customer forums on the Strategy & Support center.

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