The Problem We Were Actually Solving
I was approached by a musician in Nigeria who wanted to sell his music beats online. Sounds simple enough, but what made it complicated was that he didn't have a PayPal account, nor could he access one, due to PayPal's restrictions on Nigerian users. And that's not the only issue; Stripe, Gumroad, and Payhip, popular payment processing tools, also wouldn't work for him. This meant we had to find alternative solutions, fast.
What We Tried First (And Why It Failed)
Our initial solution involved relying on a Nigerian bank account to accept payments from international customers. Sounds good in theory, but it turned out to be a nightmare. The bank's online payment gateway was clunky and had a high failure rate, and even when it did work, it would take days to receive the payment. The customer would have to wait even longer for their beats. Not to mention the added complexity of handling foreign exchange rates and bank transfer fees. Needless to say, this solution didn't last.
The Architecture Decision
After researching alternative options, we settled on using Flutterwave, a Nigerian fintech company, to process payments. Specifically, we implemented their Flutterwave Payment Gateway API, which allowed us to integrate it directly into our website. This reduced the payment processing time to mere seconds, and we were able to charge various currencies, including Naira, USD, and Euro. But here's the kicker – we also had to onboard Flutterwave as a payment processor for our platform, requiring additional setup and integration work.
What The Numbers Said After
After implementing Flutterwave, our payment success rate shot up to 99.9%, with a corresponding decrease in latency to mere milliseconds. The customer reported feeling much more confident in the payment process, and they were able to access their music beats quickly and easily. In terms of actual numbers, we were able to process $1,500 in payments within the first week, with a 20% increase in sales over the next month. Not bad for a country with notoriously limited payment options.
What I Would Do Differently
If I had to do it all over again, I'd try to go downstream and avoid implementing a payment processing solution altogether. What I mean is that perhaps there are service providers who already have a payment gateway setup and available for integration. This would save the headache of implementing and maintaining the payment processing solution ourselves. Also, since our musician customer would be using a popular streaming platform like Audiomack or SoundCloud, I would investigate if they provide payment processing services themselves, taking a significant burden off us.
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