Q&A with IPN’s Raj Ganesan

Q: How long have you been working on the Intuit PaymentNetwork (IPN) team?
I’ve been working on the IPN team since it was first released with QuickBooks – Fall 2010. Almost 3 years now!

Q: What is your favorite thing about working on the IPN team?
It’s a small, fun, fast team. But I have to say that it’s the IPN customers that keep me going!

Q: What big changes have you seen in the payments space in the last five years?
Payments have always been an enabler. As small businesses have gone mobile and social, they expect payments to be seamlessly interwoven into their workflows – whether it’s their QuickBooks invoices, websites or facebook pages, on their smartphones, tablets or laptops. We’re seeing payments being customized to cater to the needs of specific user networks (Airbnb, for example).

Q: As someone who has worked on the IPN team for 3 years, what features do you find most helpful for small business, charities, specialty schools, etc. who need to get paid quickly?
Our customers have always liked that IPN costs them only 50 cents per payment, and there are no other hidden fees. For specialty schools like hockey leagues or charities that may have seasonality to their businesses, IPN has a pay as you go model, so businesses don’t pay for the service during off-season.

One of the more popular features of IPN is called paylink. IPN lets small businesses create their own payment URL, or branded paylink (for e.g. ipn.intuit.com/pay/RajConsulting). Small businesses can put this paylink anywhere they want to get paid, and their customers simply have to click on this link to pay them online. IPN users can add their logo, tagline and colors, to the payment workflow that their customers see. It’s been amazing to see how our customers have adopted this feature and infused it with their brand.

Q: Can you tell us more about the new Facebook plug-in that IPN recently launched?
A big “aha” moment occurred when we launched the paylink – we noticed paylinks cropping up in wall posts on Facebook. Many small businesses are beginning to create Facebook pages to stay connected with their customers and drive awareness, and that includes IPN users too. When Facebook updated their interface with the timeline and tabs, we saw an opportunity to help our customers get paid.

With the Facebook plug-in, small businesses can create an IPN “Pay” or “Donate” Facebook page tab. An added benefit is that when their customers click on the tab to pay them, they can recommend the small businesses after they’ve made a payment. We hope this will help IPN users get more Facebook recommendations and likes.

Q: Have you seen a big uptick in how IPN customers use social media to obtain payments?
As small businesses go social, payments will be a part of it. It’s still too early, but the rapid adoption of this feature is a good indicator of intent!

Q: Are there any new features for IPN that we should keep an eye on in the coming months?
We are lucky to have a vocal user base that tells us what we should be doing to make IPN better, and we’re listening and working as hard and as fast as we can. Social and mobile enhancements are in our roadmap, as well as constantly improving the experience for IPN users and their customers.

Q: What do you like to do in your free time outside of working with the IPN team?
I have two energetic boys, and when I am not out and about with them, I like to read and catch up on my sleep.

Interested in checking out some small businesses that use IPN? Here’s a sample of our customer’s small Facebook pages. Help them by liking their pages!

• Shadow & Marty’s Pet Care Services
• Green Earth Computers
• Jaros Designs
• Contract TShirts
• J Thomas Accounting Services
• ReIncarnations
• Rachel Bauer Photography

What We’re Reading: Snap Payroll and Small Business Loans

Here are two more interesting articles that we hope will provide you with more insight into the world of small business trends, payments, mobile tips and more. Let us know what you think (or anything we should add!) by leaving us a comment, or Tweet at us @IPNTeam. Happy reading!

Snap Payroll app helps small businesses calculate employee pay Los Angeles Times

An Apple iOS app called Snap Payroll that’s designed to help small businesses figure out their employees’ paychecks recently launched. The free app from Intuit Inc.is supposed to help small-business owners calculate the correct amount of pay they owe their employees after including any federal and state taxes as well as overtime hours. Read more

Getting a Small Business Loan When the Bank Says No The Street

One of the greatest barriers in the search for business capital on Main Street is the labor-intensive underwriting process used by banks. Similar to the mortgage process, getting a business loan from a bank — if by some miracle you are approved — takes weeks or more from application submission to closing. For small businesses, the waiting game can put a crimp on operations. Read more

What We’re Reading: Strategies to Get Paid, Mobile Marketing, Mobile POS, and More (Part II)

Welcome to the second week of our new “What We’re Reading” series. We’re sharing the most interesting articles we’ve read in a new weekly blog round-up of stories. We hope these provide insight into the world of small business trends, payments, mobile tips and more. Let us know what you think (or anything we should add!) by leaving us a comment, or Tweet at us @IPNTeam. We will post two more articles next week, so be sure to check back!

Entice Mobile Users to Open Your Emails: 3 Tips Inc. Magazine

If you’re using email marketing to keep in touch with customers and prospects, you probably spend a lot of time coming up with that perfect subject line to get as many people as possible to open your emails. You probably also spend a lot of time trying to whittle the subject line down to around 50 characters, which is typically all that can fit in an email client’s window before it gets cut off. Here’s a little secret: You can say more in the pre-header of your email. Read more

Mobile POS and the end of waiting in line Mobile Payments Today

The store of the future will not feature long check-out lines or any lines for that matter, according to retail experts and a recent survey from CompTIA predicting that traditional point-of-sale solutions will soon look archaic. Although only 13 percent of retailers polled said they’re currently testing a mobile POS, another 19 percent said they will begin tests in the next 12 months. And that number will steadily climb over the next few years. Read more

Summer Vacation: How to Manage Your Payments While Enjoying Your Family Vacation

August is prime time for family vacations and like the millions of Americans who plan to hit the road for sun, fun, and relaxation, small business owners need a summer vacation too. If you run your own business, you know that it can be hard to pack-up and take time off, whether it’s a long four-day weekend, or an extended two week trip.

At Intuit PaymentNetwork, we believe everyone deserves a summer vacation and want to help you take off some well-deserved time to spend with your family and friends. Below are some tips on how to manage your invoices through Intuit PaymentNetwork before and during vacation, alleviating one less task from your pre-vacation check list.

• Do you collect weekly, bi-weekly or month payments? Set up reoccurring payments reminders to your customers to make sure they pay on time, even while you are out of the office!
  • You can manage your recurring payment schedules by clicking on ‘Recurring Payments’ on the left of your Intuit PaymentNetwork home screen (example below):
• Tell customers and clients you’re taking a vacation by sending out invoices early! This will help keep you bank account in check, despite being out of the office.
• We hope you can disconnect from work during vacation, but if you need to check-in, remember that IPN is only an Internet connection away. If you need to check on payments owed or received, just log-into IPN from a computer or smartphone with an Internet connection and you can check on business deliverables.
• For more tools on preparing for vacation, check out this “getting reading for vacation” guide from Small Business Trends.

If there are any tips you have for us, or your fellow readers, let us know in the comments section below or Tweet @IPNTeam. Happy vacationing!

What We’re Reading: Strategies to Get Paid, Mobile Marketing, Mobile POS, and More (Part I)

What’s on your summer reading list? We’ll tell you what’s on ours, beginning this week. We’re sharing the most interesting articles we’ve read in a new weekly blog round-up of stories. We hope these provide insight into the world of small business trends, payments, mobile tips and more. Let us know what you think – (or anything we should add!) in the comments section below, or Tweet at us @IPNTeam.

Credit and Debit Card Evolution Forbes

The credit card. For decades, it has been critical for business transactions. However, its days as the primary method of payment are numbered. There are many changes set to take place over the next several years in the electronic payments and merchant services industry. Read more

7 Simple Strategies to Get Paid Faster and On Time Huffington Post

As a successful small biz owner, you’re brilliant at what you do. You’re on top of your craft and often go above and beyond to impress your clients and customers. Yet when it comes to billing your clients and tracking those expenses, it’s so much harder to feel the same passion. Rest assured, it’s not uncommon to put off your accounting. Read more

Attention QuickBooks Users – Intuit PaymentNetwork Feature Alert!

Did you know you can accept credit cards through Intuit PaymentNetwork in QuickBooks 2012*? You can elect to have customers pay by credit card or with their checking account. This feature can be turned on in QuickBooks 2012, and you can customize this feature to be for one invoice, specific customers, or all customers.

We hope these features will help you get paid faster. Try it out, and let us know what you think! We love hearing your feedback.

*This feature is only available in QuickBooks 2012. Users of earlier versions can turn on/off credit card acceptance by logging into their Intuit PaymentNetwork account under the Profile tab. 

New Intuit PaymentNetwork Feature – Multiple Variable Pricing

E-Commerce Buttons:

One of the top feature requests we have received from the Intuit PaymentNetwork community is support for multiple prices within a single button. Many small businesses sell goods and services with different price points, and we understand the importance of utilizing variable pricing.

We are happy to announce that as of today, Intuit PaymentNetwork includes a feature that supports e-commerce buttons for multiple price points.

Whether you are selling services from plumbing to tutoring or even baked goods like muffins and cupcakes, you can direct your customers to pay for different services with a drop down menu and a simple click of a button.

Check it out in Intuit PaymentNetwork and below!

A huge thanks to all of you who have been using single price buttons and provided valuable feedback. We hope you’ll enjoy this exciting new feature!

New! Mobile Payments + Custom Branding

Your customers can now pay from their smart phones

You can now create your own QR payment code. Your customers can then use this code to pay you from their mobile phones. ITS THAT EASY!

Steps for small businesses:

1) Log in to IPN and click on ‘Enable Mobile Payments’ on the left

2) A QR code will be generated that you can use by:

a) Printing on ‘Event Fliers’, ‘Marketing Banners’ or a fliers that you can paste at your retail store

b) Copying and pasting it on your printed invoices, emails, etc

Steps for your customer:

1) Download a QR Code reader on their Android or iPhone (if they do not have one already)

2) Scan your image to pay you

Extending branding capabilities to ‘eCommerce’ and ‘Payment Request’ flows + More Colors

You can now apply ‘Your’ small business brand across pay link, eCommerce and ‘Payment Request’ flows. Just click on the ‘Branding Customization’ button on the left to use this feature.

Also, you now have more colors to choose from to match your website or business style. Here is an example of what your customers will see after you customize it:

Enjoy and please provide feedback. These requirements were built on feedback we received from you.

- Your IPN team

Customers can now see your brand on Pay Links + Guest eCommerce payments

Introducing Customizable PayLinks!

You already know that you can create your own unique pay link URL to paste wherever convenient for customers, but now you can:

• Upload your own logo
• Create a slogan
• Choose a color theme

After making your branding choices the new payment page that your customers see will look like this:

In the above example the small business picked an ‘Orange’ theme and the slogan is ‘Automobile Parts’.

For those of you that don’t have pay links you can easily create one by logging in to IPN and clicking on ‘Custom Pay Link’ tab on the left.

Guest payments and credit card on eCommerce buttons!

Customers that pay you by clicking on an eCommerce button are no longer needed to sign up for an IPN account. (they can do guest payments). Also if you have credit card turned on, they can pay you via VISA or MasterCard.

For those of you that don’t have eCommerce buttons you can easily create one by logging in to IPN and clicking on ‘Ecommerce Buttons’ tab on the left.

Please check these new features out and let us know what you think.

- Your IPN team

Guest payments and credit card on Custom Pay Link

You don’t need to sign up to purchase groceries; or to dine at restaurants. Then why do you need to sign up to pay with IPN???

We are now getting rid of mandatory sign ups for those paying by custom pay links. A payor can now click on a custom pay link and initiate a guest payment. Also, if the small business has enabled credit card, a payor can initiate a credit card payment on a custom pay link.

• Screenshot of the new custom pay link payment page

• What is a custom pay link?

A custom pay link enables a small business to get paid from any channel they want (Facebook, Craigslist, etc). To create your own pay link click on the ‘Custom Pay Link’ tab on the left once you sign in to IPN.

Please provide us feedback!

Thanks,

Your IPN team