About a year ago, Google Wallet launched its Instant Buy API for Android apps, and today it is bringing it to iOS apps. With Instant Buy, developers can integrate Google Wallet’s checkout into their apps and have users check out with as few as two clicks.
The Instant Buy API gives developers an easy way to access and store payment data in the cloud. The shipping and credit card information is stored on Google’s servers and Google only passes this information to the merchant after a user has decided to complete the order. The merchant can then run this information through any existing payment processor. Google itself does not charge any fees for this service, but it does provide its own fraud-monitoring service in addition to the credit card issuer’s existing systems.
All of this, unsurprisingly, plays together very well with Google+ sign-in.
One of the biggest issues with mobile e-commerce is that users abandon their shopping carts at alarming rates. One of the reasons for this is that mobile checkout is often annoying, given that you typically have to type in your credit card number and address — something that’s rather error-prone on a phone. Instant Buy and many other payment solutions aim to simplify this and, according to Google, the results have been pretty encouraging so far. On Android, Fancy increased its conversion rate by 20 percent after it implemented Instant Buy, for example.
Developers who want to implement this service can’t just get to work without Google’s approval, though. They will have to sign up here and then wait to get waitlisted by the company before they can integrate Instant Buy into their apps.
The new feature is launching with a number of partners, most of which already support it in their Android apps. They include B&H, Eat24, Fancy, Newegg, Sionic Mobile and Wish.com.
