Citibank-sponsored service Single-Click Checkout just launched at the Open Mobile Summit in San Francisco. The service is the first in-app single click credit card checkout system for Android. With Single-Click, merchants can accept credit card payments from any mobile user.
The service enables credit card transactions across the existing infrastructure from companies like MasterCard, Visa, Discover, American Express and others – it doesn’t require users to create a new account with an associated username and password.
When using the app, one click displays a pop-up box which is overlaid upon the app, and the entire checkout process takes place in this window. Unlike competitor PayPal, there’s no sign-in process – users don’t have to enter in their username and password to use it. Instead, Single Click identifies unique handsets using proprietary technology.
One of the key features of the new system is that it enables cross-merchant payments. The company has partnered with the leading payment gateways and can process over 150 currencies.
The design of the app is important, too. Users need a contextual awareness of the checkout process, explained Single-Click CEO Andy Kleitsch on stage today at the mobile event. The pop-over design enables this, he said. A user clicks “buy” and Single-Click then handles the entire checkout process in the pop-up window.
In testing the service, the conversion rates were impressive. The first time a user tries Single-Click, there’s a 20% conversion rate, much higher than the current average of 3.4%. After the first transaction, the user is Single-Click enabled and future transactions then see a 72.4% conversion rate.
Since there’s no carrier revenue share, merchants get to keep more of the money per transaction -there’s just a cost of $0.05-$0.10 per transaction for the associated processing fees.
Any Android developer can integrate Single-Click into an app now using just four lines of code. For more details, check out the Developer Portal on Single-Click’s site.
