Small Business Merchant Services Study

Barlow Research’s 2020 Small Business Merchant Services Study

Approximately half of the 8 million small businesses (companies with $100K-<$10MM in annual sales) in the United States accept credit card payments, making a strong merchant services product a key offering for this segment. The merchant services marketplace is flooded with options for credit/debit card processing systems. Do you know how your bank’s application experience stands up to the competition?

Study Components & Goals:

In this study, Barlow Research will:

1. Base Study: New Customer Application Journey
   Document the new small business customer application journey. A total of 22 shops will be conducted examining 11 different providers. Competitive intelligence on merchant service providers to be captured includes timeline of events, channels involved, communications, documents/information required, transparency on fees/installation pricing, cross-sell and overall ease of process. The journey will be followed to the point of application submission.
2. Add-on Option 1: Existing Customer Experience at Top Banks
   Identify how small business merchant service users navigate to find transaction detail, dispute information and statements at Bank of America, Chase and Wells Fargo.
3. Add-on Option 2: Online Panel of Existing Merchant Service Users
   Provide insight into switching behaviors of small business merchant service users and factors that influenced current provider selection.

Deliverables:

Comprehensive report and video presentation for your team. Includes customer journey maps and detailed listing of documentation requested during application process.

For those purchasing add-on options, summary of findings will be included in main report and the following information will be available in accordance with your purchase selection:

• Pertinent screen shots of existing customer experience at top three banks
• File of verbatim comments collected during online panel