ICYMI: Top Takeaways from The ROIG Group’s Unlocking Value in Payments Webinar

The ROIG Group’s Payments Practice hosted a webinar focused on helping organizations create and optimize effective payments strategies. Couldn’t make it? No sweat! We’ve outlined the top takeaways your organization can leverage if you’re looking to integrate payments or other financial services into your offerings.

The opportunity in fintech is enormous, but one of the biggest pitfalls we’ve seen is organizations jumping into the payments space without the proper strategy alignment or appropriate planning. This usually causes stall points, confusion, and misalignment that can end up causing you time and money. If you’re ready to create sustainable transformational change, slow down now so you can speed ahead later.

Here are some key steps that organizations need to consider before launching or enhancing a payments strategy:

Identify where your company is in its lifecycle and set your sights on growth. Identifying where your company is in its lifecycle can help you be more efficient with your resources. The ROIG Group classifies companies into four designations: Revive, Optimize, Incubate, and Grow. Revive companies may have launched offerings but seem to be losing their core customer and business model intervention may be needed. Optimize companies have grown their offering over time but are having trouble scaling and/or need help gaining efficiencies. Incubate companies tend to be startups or businesses that are in the feasibility or viability stage, or they are entering the payments space for the first time. Grow companies have been able to effectively scale a solution that is delivering the results they want to see and are looking to further expand their solutions. Company designation is a great place to start to determine HOW the company should approach their payments offering(s).
Determine your role in the payments value chain. There are many different roles you can play in the payments space - from distributor to program manager to processor. These roles can sometimes become blurred. It’s important to do your research and understand the responsibilities, benefits, and limitations of each role. Understand that each role has a different financial model, which ultimately impacts overall expenses, losses, and revenue.
·Take a cross-functional approach. The most successful companies see payments as a line of business versus a product. Moving into the payments space requires cross-functional involvement including but not limited to sales/marketing, account management, compliance, technology, operations, and more.
Decide how you will bring your payments strategy to life. Where will you need to build, buy, or partner? When it comes to scaling and driving value for your organization, understanding the key areas where partners can be leveraged is a crucial part of your strategy.
Enter the market with a pilot or a minimum viable product (MVP) to start. So many clients want to go straight to execution with a full solution. But, there are many benefits that can be realized by starting with a product that early customers can react to and inform future product development. It’s a great way to quickly learn and iterate then for the next release. By starting with something in its simplest form, you can potentially avoid and prepare for any issues that might arise from going straight to market.