Consumers don’t intellectually separate commerce from e-commerce any longer, but the payment industry still segregates the channels offering different products and complicating the consumer experience. Bedier stresses that to be successful in the modern market, a company needs to serve customers seamlessly online and in person. “Groupon has done a great job of crossing the Web and local worlds,” he says, “connecting the dots through payments.” Groupon enables local, non-internet businesses to cross the digital divide and bring consumers from the virtual world to the physical shop. It is a case study in how Web search, marketing and couponing can impact totally offline businesses.
ward indications from Google suggest that other issuers will be welcomed. “We feel every card should be in that wallet,” says Bedier. Google Offers What is a wallet without coupons and loyalty cards? This may be where Google brings a unique benefit, perhaps even the so-called killer application, to the mobile wallet. What will Google Offers offer? • Daily deals that leverage the handset for distribution rather than relying solely on email like prior Groupon-style offerings. • Location-based, check-in promotions enable users to tap on arrival and start an in-store dialog with merchants. • Place-centric offers driven via search enable special deals to influence consumer choice. • Merchant loyalty and rewards.
What is Google offering? Google Wallet There have been numerous approaches and technologies around the rather ubiquitous concept of the mobile wallet. But when it comes to actually making the handset function as a wallet, Google likes near field communications. “We bet big on NFC phones,” explains Bedier. “We believe it is at the very early days of its evolution.” Mobile payment is just one application in a mobile wallet, but it is a crucial one. Initially, Google will support two payment types with Wallet – its own prepaid card and Citi-issued MasterCard credit cards that support PayPass contactless technology.
In the near term, the functionality will require manual input or barcode scanning at most merchant locations. As merchants modify their point of sale infrastructure to support it in an integrated manner, NFC data will replace keystrokes, visual inspection and barcodes. Single Tap experience Ultimately, the seamless integration of payments, coupons, loyalty and marketing promotions is the goal. With Single Tap, Google hopes to integrate these functions together such that a single tap at the point-of-sale consummates the range of services, vastly improving the customer experience.
“We started with our own Google Card so every phone would have a payment instrument,” says Bedier. The Google Prepaid Card is purely virtual MasterCard product, so no physical card is issued. It is powered by Money Network from First Data and issued ultimately by Metabank. The account is FDIC-insured and funds can be added using any existing credit card.
“Goodbye Wallet. The phone will take it from here.”
The Citi tie-in enables cardholders to have their Citi MasterCard credit card added to the Google Wallet assuming the account is eligible for PayPass. Though Citi is billed as the “lead bank” for the launch, all out-
“I believe we are on the verge of changing more than a century of payment and shopping behavior,” he says.
That was the concluding tagline from the not-surprisingly polished video Bedier showed the European bankers. It was a typical day-inthe-life piece in which a group of individuals interacted with the new functionality in compelling ways.
Comments like this had to leave some of the more cynical in the bunch mentally altering the video tagline, substituting ‘Bank’ for ‘Wallet’ and ‘Google’ for ‘phone.’ “Goodbye Bank. Google will take if from here.” But he seemed genuinely excited and desirous of collaboration. “This is an open invitation for you to partner with us to create an ecosystem that benefits consumers and merchants,” he said. “Open is who we are at Google.” The invitation worked. People line up to slip a business card into his hand. Whether they are attracted by the opportunity to share in the creation of an ecosystem or by his casual comment about “leveraging the 600 million active consumers” is tough to say.
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Fall 2011