GiftCard Partners Blog

Consumers have begun an organic transition into mobile payments and digital currencies. They are slowly filing cash, check, and credit cards right into the history book, next to the floppy disks and video tapes.

Last week GiftCard Partners senior management attended Money 20/20, the biggest industry event surrounding payments and payment technology. The team learned quite a bit on the trip about what the latest technology could mean for how consumers pay for goods. A study released by
Accenture, put an interesting spin on payments that can sometimes can get lost in the latest technology and the cutting edge applications: the consumer perspective. The ongoing challenge in the consumer payments industry has been consumer confidence and adoption. Every wallet, app and mobile device is useless if consumers aren't willing to put their personal information in and use the technology. In the Accenture
survey of over 4,000 North American consumers, they expect to use traditional consumer payments methods like cash and credit 66% of the time, but that drops to only 54% by 2020. While the number is modest, it shows a trend over time that indicates consumer adoption is trending the way of mobile and virtual payment options. The survey results also indicate that although there are the typical fears about security, consumers are also interested in payments choices. Consumer choice overcoming consumer trepidation is the ultimate formula to real mobile and virtual payment adoption. Consumer impact is the only thing that will allow the consumer payments industry to truly turn the corner.

Mobile payment is an increasingly popular trend. This makes a ton of sense when we look at the increase in overall mobile activity, from sales to marketing to everyday use. But when it comes to mobile payment, the steady rise is sure to affect everyone from retailers and merchants to those in the gift card business. In this
infographic, by e-complish, we can learn a lot about mobile payment trends and growth. In 2012 mobile payments only amounted to $1.5 million, but by the following year, that number had grown to $4.5 million, showing the exponential growth that the mobile payment industry is currently seeing. The U.S. and China are two of the leading countries in mobile use, meaning that they'll also be key countries for growth in mobile payments. Sixty one percent of U.S. adults own a smartphone, meaning that mobile payments will likely spread to many of those 61 percent, if they haven't already. Mobile payments crept into the payment systems and now have skyrocketed in popularity. It has been predicted that by the year 2025, as much as 20 percent of all purchases will be made on a mobile device. Because of the new trend, we're also seeing a growth in mobile payment apps and "mobile wallets." Keep your eye out for larger shifts in technology as we see more and more consumers paying for purchases on their mobile devices.  

As technology keeps expanding and growing, so do our payment systems. We're starting to see forward-thinking payment trends involving everything from mobile to loyalty rewards. Here are some of the latest movements in payment technology:
Mobile Capability With so many now owning smartphones, online shopping has seen a huge jump in mobile business. Because of this jump, companies are now placing a higher focus on mobile capability payments.  Plus, now the focus goes beyond smartphones as payment systems are also being developed and tested for tablet optimization as well.
Focus on Omniconsumers While mobile functionality is a very important factor for those in the payment industries, it's not only about mobile right now. Younger users are known for paying on a variety of different platforms, meaning the highest functioning payment systems will have to cater to a variety of different channels.
A Blur Between Physical and Online Shopping Consumers are not sold on only in-person or only online shopping. Many prefer to utilize both. That means that a majority of complaints that come from these double shoppers is centered around consistency between the products offered and product pricing. Smart companies are working to create consistency between off and online, especially when it comes to utilizing coupons and coupon codes.
Loyalty Rewards Loyalty rewards are becoming tremendously popular with consumers. Now, 73 percent of consumers carry loyalty rewards cards for their favorite businesses. And they don't keep it down to just one. One out of 10 customers carry six or more loyalty cards on any given day. This only goes to show the tremendous growth that the loyalty and reward businesses are seeing and will continue to see in years, and even months, to come.
For more information, read "The Ten Hottest Trends in Payments."

We wrote last week about the Innovation Project held at Harvard late last week. The Innovation Project brings together the innovating leaders in the payments and commerce space for a summit that is packed with content and collaboration. Now, we don't like to brag, but our COO was on the winning team for the second straight year. She didn't do it alone however, her team brought together innovative leaders from across the industry. The winning team was a collaborative effort between