When you want to establish a business online, there are many products to consider that will help you succeed. For those businesses that want to sell products directly to their consumers from their site, payment processing products are needed as well as merchant accounts that help the business get their money quickly. One of the premier processing services, Google Checkout, was replaced a couple of years ago with Google Wallet, a superior and more popular processing product.
The History
Google Checkout was first launched in June 2006. Google wanted to provide a product for both consumers and companies that would take care of the payment processing needed to buy and sell products online from individual websites. While it mirrored some of the aspects of other online payment sites such as PayPal, it differed in that it did not allow peer-to-peer transactions and had a number of other features geared towards businesses rather than consumers. The product was also to be tied to AdWords, which would give companies better rates and terms if their sites used the AdWords system.
The Beginning of the End
The downfall for Google Checkout was that not enough consumers adopted the processor. It was also a general failure because some sites that allowed PayPal as a payment option would not allow Checkout (eBay is an example of this). Checkout seemed to be the middle of the road product that served some customers well, but not others. To revamp it, Google thought about making it a payment portal, but since Google Shopping already existed for that purpose, this idea was scrapped.
Another thorn in the side of Checkout was when Android launched its marketplace, but did not have an effective way to let consumers pay for apps. That is when Google Wallet was launched, which made much more sense to use for both consumers and businesses with merchant accounts. Google officially announced the end of Google Checkout on November 16, 2011. All existed users of the system were merged into the Google Wallet system.
With Google Wallet, processing payments for both individuals and companies is much easier and more streamlined to work for today’s fast-paced e-commerce environment.