Google Checkout offers low-cost transactions for sellers; what’s in it for me?

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1. Ryan
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:17 am

   They at least have a $10 savings for customers who purchase $20 or more from some of the stores. It is a pretty good deal for right now.

2. Thomas Hillard
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:20 am

   I don’t understand Google’s philosophy here, maybe I’m missing something. The first page asked me to give my credit card information for no apparent reason. WHOAH! duh like thats the first thing I do at any ecommerce site!

   Where is the foreplay Google? Aren’t you going to woo me first, show me why this umpteenth feature you provide is a vaulable chunk of the 20 in your fabulous 70/20/10?

   Oh right I forgot, this is 2006 you don’t need a reason to give someone your credit card number.

3. Dan Ushman
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:25 am

   I don’t understand why they would do this either… seems backward to me.

4. Wil
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:27 am

   This sounds like Google is trying to be like wal-mart. Google vs. Wal-Mart…
   more like Google vs. everyone else.

   I do like Google but don’t push it. Don’t try to be everything for everyone. I don’t want a company to have all my information. Do try to be like our current administration.

5. Dan Ushman
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:27 am

   Also,

   I should note as someone who has experience in credit card processing I am
   curious to see how they are doing this:

   * Third party processing is against Visa/MasterCard regulations. Look at how
   PaySystems was shut down not-so-long-ago and you’ll see why. It is a risk
   issue.

   * Discount rate bases, Interchange, what all credit card merchant’s are paying
   are very close to what Google is charging. They can’t pos. have any margin in
   their per-transaction costs.

   * Who’s name shows up on the consumers credit card statement? Is it Google
   or your name?

   Dan

6. Wil
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:28 am

   oops … Do not try to be like our current administration.

7. Thomas Hillard
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:37 am

   Okay I went a little too far, they do offer a demo and tour, I made the mistake of signing in first - which led me straight to a form asking for all my credit card info. The tour wasn’t so bad, the demo was pretty well made.

   But yes, Google is off their rocker can’t they focus on any one thing? I think a survey is in order - how many people out there (not you techcrunch readers) use Google for anything bessides search? Maps may come in a distant 2nd place but this is getting out of hand, they have too much money, and nothing left to do with it. Why can’t they focus half of the $$ they spend on all these BS tools by improving their search so people don’t have to wade through thousands of link farms?

   I see what they’re doing… they’re taking on paypal. Which might be okay if they were actually doing something differen’t but this just seems like a big F%&* You to Ebay.

   So let the games begin…

   Round one… fight!

   Who is next? Who else can you compete with Google?

8. dave
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:47 am

   how are they taking on paypal? they’re offering yet another integration and channel opportunity for paypal users who in turn (via paypal) will allow google to tie back into google user bank accounts (on paypal’s side) while still masking transactions to outsiders…elgoog and paypal could (knock on wood) easily hammer out a mutually benefical relationship here, because i do not see the competition between the two as clearly defined (at this point)…

9. soj
   

   June 29th, 2006 at 7:50 am

   I think you mucked up how much credit you get for using AdWords, for every $1 you spend in AdWords, you get $10 worth of sales that you dont pay transaction fees for. So if you spend $50 in AdWords, then make a $500 sale, you would be saving $2 + 2% = $12 in transaction fees.

10. Raff
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:05 am

    I think Google is focusing on one thing: “aquire information” and they needed more than what they get crawling the web.

    From the Term of Services:

    “You also authorize us to obtain from time to time a credit report and/or to otherwise make credit or other background inquiries as we deem appropriate to evaluate your registration for or continued use of the Service “

11. Pete
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:07 am

    Why should google checkout please it customers, its just has to convince sellers to switch from pay pal, once stores start using google checkout, users will follow.
    Aslo in response to #7, the reason google doesn’t improve its search is becasue they dont have to. They can make a lot more money by throwing random crap at people and seeing what sticks

12. alex
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:10 am

    Googles problem is that they dont know how to brand. The media gave them a a brandname (gbuy) and they kicked it to the curb. The link below is a prime example that they have no clue about branding.

    http://xooglers.blogspot.com/2.....still.html

13. Sam
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:13 am

    What is it in for you?

    Urm. Low cost transaction costs for sellers? Which means lower prices for buyers.

14. Marshall Kirkpatrick
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:14 am

    Soj, you’re right, thanks. Change made.

    Sam, I think any price savings “passed on” to me on my relative handful of purchases is likely to have a negligable impact on my life relative to the question of service features and the larger scale financial impact on vendors doing far more transactions that I am as an individual. In other words, I don’t think that cutting transaction costs for vendors by 1/3 is going to impact me as much as whether this new system is a headache to use.

15. Chris
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:20 am

    I agree with Pete. People are going to use Google checkout because the merchant they are dealing with uses it. Google has to attract sellers to succeed, not buyers. From the buyer’s perspective, they just have to make sure to do no harm.

16. Chris Wine
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:24 am

    Repackaged passports subsidized with ad revenue. Thanks, but I am not uploading my payment data into the googleplex. My form filler works just fine.

17. Don Wilson
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:30 am

    So this is what they were talking about for Google Wallet? wow.

18. Scott Matthews
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:30 am

    The problem with Google Checkout — from a seller’s perspective — is that Google is partly pushing the service with the notion that buyers can hide their email addresses from sellers. I think sellers will (and should) find that onerous.

19. street
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:30 am

    I’m not worried. Besides, this will just make it easier once they decide on a subscription prices for gmail.

20. Thai Bui
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:33 am

    I don’t see why users will use it either. But for the merchants, it’s all about the little icon they get next to their ad…

21. Theodore
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:48 am

    The markets will be very unforgiving if this thing flops. Its ok to ditch some of the other google labs offshoots, but not this one.

    If this flops, look for google to pay a dear price in the markets, and in the brand strength so for that reason, i think they will give it every effort imaginable.

    That being said, this launch will severely dillute their brand in search. Are they Ebay? Mapquest? now Paypal?

    Next they will launch a site that announces new WEB 2.0 companies

22. Jacob Levy
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 8:57 am

    Just wanted to point out a logic problem with your post: To use gmail you dont have to give google your CC number. Would you still use gmail if you had to give them that info?

23. pete
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:08 am

    Here is something odd from their Unacceptable product categories:

    Subscriptions to online or offline content (including magazines and newspapers)

24. Andrew Fife
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:10 am

    “The biggest question then appears to be whether consumers trust the Google brand enough”

    Google probably has the best brand in consumer internet. I think this will be a success specifically because Google’s brand is stronger than Paypal’s amongst mainstream users. I’d be very concerned if I worked at Paypal.

25. thomodachi
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:10 am

    I been dying for a worthy competition to Paypal for ages. I don’t see why people wouldn’t flock over to Google. Yes, the features and functionality are limited at the moment, but that can always expand as the system get’s set into place.

    Paypal has such terrible customer service and has burned me one too many times. I will gladly leave Paypal behind while giving them the finger on my way out.

26. Igor A. Melekhine
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:15 am

    This is awesome!

    Google - i love you!!!

27. Thomas Hillard
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:21 am

    I’m with Theodore (#21)

    Google has lost its identity.
    They are doing anything and everything. Does Microsoft come to mind? Is this just the path companies must travel when they have too much money?

    Maybe they just want to be able to offer everyweb out there tool in their own way. This way internet users eventually wont ever have to leave the Google brand if they don’t want to.

28. Ashish Sinha
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:24 am

    This system gives an unfair advantage to advertisers who are on Adwords.
    More about that on my blog:
    

29. Paul Montgomery
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:28 am

    Sounds more like Microsoft Passport than Paypal. More grist for the 2.0==GOOGvMSFT crowd.

30. pacificdave
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:41 am

    #29: like MS? i remember using Passport like 6 or 7 years ago or something… and all my information was given to the vendor. i couldn’t stop the vendor from sending offers to both my email and home address. i was utterly disgusted with Passport.

    all: i don’t see why all of you are so one sided. this brings in competition for PayPal. maybe not directly but it will spur possibly lower rates and some new innovative ideas over at PayPal to stay above Google Checkout. this is a win win for the consumers because there are more choices out there… and the check out process is streamlined. everyone knows that when Google releases a new product it isn’t full of features because they take user feedback and only work on features that are in high demand to keep their product simple.

31. Jonathan Mendez
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:42 am

    I guess the next step is that I give Google my bank routing and account numbers for a Google bill pay.

    Then, based on a new algo that factors geo information with average household income, my gmail text, searches, purchasese and monthly expenditures, Google can figure out not only know what I want to buy…but what I can afford to buy. It’s genius!

    This really is “organizing the (advertising) world’s information.”

32. Siddhartha Gandhi
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:46 am

    I would definetly use Google Checkout, it rocks, and I love google.

    http://www.googleisawesome.com

33. Christian
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:00 am

    I’m just waiting to see what people do with the API. Perhaps a Google Checkout widget? Look out RightCart!

34. Ashish Sinha
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:03 am

    Maybe this should have been a beta product!!
    Unlike paypal, Google doesnt have the necessary integration with banks (as of this date).
    Also, at times I wonder why is Google trying to be a walled-garden co.? What’s the diff between Google and MS then?

    Ashish Sinha

    http://ashish-sinha.blogspot.com

35. Luke Lackrone
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:11 am

    Now, what’s the implication here that the Google Account is now tied to credit cards and capable of making financial transactions, given that Google Account passwords are the same as GMail passwords and GMail allows POP3 access, which the POP3 account does not feature any encryption of the user name or password?

    Seems like these Google accounts and passwords are passing around the ‘Net in the clear, yet they now hold the power to people’s money.

    Am I wrong?

36. Luke Lackrone
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:12 am

    That should read, “…the POP3 protocol does not feature…”

37. Paul
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:18 am

    I look forward to this being made available to UK sellers. I am, quite frankly, sick to death of PayPal’s ridiculous fees.

    PayPal in itself is bloated. Google is, as always, anything but bloated.

    To all the whiny, generic comments about why Google doesn’t just stick to one thing, yadee yada yada: why? Why should they just stick to one thing? They can do what they please, and as long as they’re doing it well (which they clearly are), I see no problem with it.

    Why is it that when a company reaches a certain size, people (well, tech people) stop trusting it?

    I trust Google with my information. Other than paranoia, there’s no reason not to.

    Chill out.

38. mamamia
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:22 am

    This will be a mild success (read disappointment) for google.

    1) w/ the gov’t trying to find out what cereal you eat in the morning, why would i want one company (google) to know everything about me. my searches, my purchases, my credit history, etc. et.c

    i will not sign on just for that fact alone. google is the new microsoft. be afraid. be very afraid.

    2) there is a contradiction here. this service is to help “people to people” transactions? yet, it is tied to Adsense. The majority of Adsense merchants are big companies. The reason paypal took off is because of ebay. Ebay is all about small transactions between people. Paypal works perfectly for that. This Google Checkout will appeal to large merchants…so why would consumers who have Paypal accounts switch? It’s two different levels of transactions.

    try finding a small merchant in any of your searches. it’s impossible unless you type in a specific store name. small fry cannot outbid the large merchants for Adsense ranking. So essentially, this is PayPal for big time merchants……which is what credit cards are for.

39. Paul
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:28 am

    “The majority of Adsense merchants are big companies.”

    I don’t think so.

40. RBA
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:51 am

    #12, GBuy would have been a very very very bad name. “Google Buy” would have been just a bit better but still a horrible name.

    If anything I’m happy they went for Google + . So perhaps they’re not that stupid when it comes to branding… Still, the G+something or Google + something should settle for “one or the other”.

41. BC
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 11:01 am

    Google has to do this. They’re laying the groundwork to move past pay-per-click and pay-per-impression, and move to a model where they place ads based on the actual sales generated. The good thing is that the ads they schedule may eventually become ads I’d actually like to see.

42. Chris Griffin
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 11:48 am

    I’m not sure why people are criticizing Google for this move. It seems a bit close-minded to criticize them based on what we see now because we only see a small part of a much bigger plan Google has. We can only speculate.

    And why does Google have to focus on one thing? It’s like saying

    “Oh here’s another way to increase our revenue!, but damn it, we only have to focus on one thing because we are only a search engine.”

    Google Checkout, as is today (first day released to the public), probably isn’t much to talk about, and doesn’t come close to Paypal yet. But we need to think of the impact in the long term.

    That’s why you critics aren’t CEOs….

43. Troy
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 1:14 pm

    Just goes to show you that what was old is new again.

    I remember Microsoft rolled basically this exact thing out about about a decade ago and called it the MS Wallet, IIRC. It was hooked to that Passport thing… yeah, I think that’s it. And, as I rewind the tape in my way-back machine (it pre-dates TiVo) I think I remember MS Wallet slinking off under the fridge of obscurity for (at least) a couple of reasons:

    1) Microsoft was near the height of their ability to exploit the Windows platform. Windows was everywhere, Linux was then an obscure geek tinker toy. The DOJ was snooping and sniffing around the campus, and the lock-in MS had rather rapidly created had struck a cacophonous chord in everyone in the tech world. And the smell of fear and loathing was everwhere. I think I’m catching a wiff of that again, but from a more southerly direction this time.

    2) Gates had the audacity to announce that MS using the Wallet, MS would merely take a penny or two of every e-commerce transaction on the Internet. And every merchant on the planet would thank him for it.

    And today? How’s this compare? Platforms are now ecosystems, but lock-in by any other name is still the same.

    Checkout? Spreadsheets? Gmail? Calendar? Desktop? Products X, Y and Z? It’s pretty easy to see they are simply building up a deep, detailed and connected cache of data all about you, my fellow Googleheads. Coincidence? I think not. Beneovelence? Not from a public, for-profit company with this much market at stake.

    Google is to today what Microsoft was to the late 90s. But the difference here - and this is key - is Google is smart enough to grease the hinges on the gate prior to closing it behind you.

44. Misconstrued
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 1:39 pm

    Thomas Hillard

    Here’s my list of what I use Google for on a daily to semi-daily basis:

    Gmail
    Search
    Homepage (custom)
    Google Finance (Stocks)
    Google Desktop
    Google Spreadsheets
    Google Maps

45. Digger
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 1:54 pm

    If it’s cheap and easy to implement as a a seller. If it lowers sales transaction cost. If it is trustworthy (Google brand). Then it will succeed. Sellers will use it. Buyers will have to use it if they want to buy a product from that Seller.

    1. Buyers don’t really care about checkout systems and don’t search for products on that basis - however at checkout time a household name like Google will help allay any trust fears. (I’d guess that this is why they went with Google Checkout vs GBuy). The right move? - yet to be seen.

    2. As for buyer benefits - the one account(single sign on for Gmail & Checkout) for all purchases is a benefit that buyers will appreciate and I suspect most consumers will be happy with trusting the Google brand.

    Personally I’d use it if I can get it New Zealand - but alas Google Checkout is US only for now (p.s. even PayPal after all these years is still not available in $NZ)

46. pacificdave
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 2:04 pm

    #38 mamamia: wow, you ARE out of the loop.

    #42: Bravo!

    and to the ones stating that Google is collecting information from each and every single one of us…. well, what’s new? this is been done for many years by numerous companies. as for just handing the collected personal information over the the feds without a loud fight…. i think that was answered for all of us when the US Government tried to pull information from Google a few months ago. and say for instance the US Government “does” attain your personal information…. So What! if you’re not terrorists or a pedophile then you have nothing to worry about.

47. Anonymous
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 2:09 pm

    It’s interesting…some prominent bloggers have turned anti-google while the users still mostly cherish them.

48. Daniel
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 2:18 pm

    This is US-only. Any word on when they are expanding?

49. tech guy
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 5:35 pm

    Google will need buyers and sellers. If you look at Yahoo Direct!(that failed) you will see they had plenty of people selling products, but no one buying it. If you don’t have enough people buying products then merchants won’t use or will stop using google checkout.

    I still wish they’d lower their transaction costs since the data in itself is valuable to them.

50. Troy
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 6:01 pm

    pacificdave: You’re right, privacy in this electronic world is nothing more than a naive fiction. Lots of folks have been collecting lots if interesting info about all of us for a long time (Visa/MC, for example).

    But the thing I find fascinating (and admire) is how deft Google is at getting many to accept and adore some concepts MS couldn’t give away just a few years ago. I think it’s more than admiration. It’s awe, really.

    But will Checkout make big dollars for Google and actual sense for world at large? Does anyone on the buy side really care? I dunno, but I doubt it.

    Bottom line - I trust Google no more or no less than any other company who has my credit card number. Neither should you.

51. Jim Vernon
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 6:08 pm

    “I hope that stores will offer both PayPal and Google Checkout services, though it seems very unlikely.”

    While I’m sure neither Google nor ebay *wants* to play nice with the other, I’m also not sure they will have a choice in the long run. VISA and MC (and to a lesser extent the other credit cards) each wanted to be the sole POS solution, but they were forced by both market demands and regulations to co-exist. They can’t even force their bank customers to issue only one or the other. I suspect that the same forces will work with online payments, including “cardholder” demand, “issuer” demand and “regulatory” demand, with the possible exception that the cluelessness of lawmakers might lead to some distortions (but not in the long run).

52. Graydon
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:28 pm

    Everybody collects information… paypal has credit card and bank account info for me… so Google having a credit card on file isn’t that big of deal.

    What interests me is if sites like BitPass pick up on enabling Google Checkout payments like they do for PayPal.

    And the comment about who the merchant audience is… I think they are skirting eBay’s core perimeter… The fact that I can put something up on Google Base for sale and accept payment through Google Checkout… and I don’t even need my own site.

    Lot’s of possibilities here.

    I’m sure that the release of some MASTER PLAN is not in the works… but tie the pieces together and there is some sense.

    And come ON people… who hasn’t heard of diversification? If Google was nothing but a search company, they would never have had the IPO. It’s about as stupid as GE only being a light bulb maker.

53. Steve
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 9:40 pm

    have you noticed the trend? everything that Google does is hyped so much and predicted to be a killer of this and that. In reality, it turns out that Google mostly fails to gain ground in everything they do except for search. It’s a one trick company (although a good one)

    The outcome of this will be that PayPal will become even better and Yahoo and probably MSN will try to follow Google and incorporate payments into thier search. Yahoo already signed up with PayPal and I doubt that MSN will try to develop payment system (they are much more likely to use dominant PayPal). In terms of market share, Yahoo search MSN search is just a little bit under Google. But if Yahoo incorporates PayPal into their search, I see this as a very good reason for millions of loyal PayPal users give preference to Yahoo search. I will defenetly switch back to Yahoo search from Google if I can see there who accepts PayPal.

    As for me, I checked out Google checkout and since I am a rather heavy PayPal user, I absolutely see nothing atractive about Google payments. PayPal is incomparably more complete solution and is accepted at over 150K merchants off ebay and several millions on ebay. Google has what? mere 100.

    On a conceptual level, Google plans seem big and encompassing, but that does not translate into killing everyone everywhere - like I said above Google mostly failed to be known to average guy as something more than just a searchbox.

54. stylo
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:35 pm

    >>Paypal has such terrible customer service and has burned me one too many times.

    Paypal is evil. Wait until they steal all your money (no chargebacks but too many sales - sound like a good reason?) and then treat you like a dog while you try to get your money released, eventually having to go to court.

    Any competition here is good. And this is only day one, guys.

55. Andrew
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 10:37 pm

    At first look this doesn’t excite me and is less than what I was hoping for.

    I’ll stick with Paypal and 2CO, especially since I sell both digital goods and subscriptions using a variety of carts and affiliate systems.

    Andrew

56. RBA
    

    June 29th, 2006 at 11:43 pm

    Graydon I won’t argue much with what you say (regardless of whether I agree or not) but remember what got Google where it is now:

    * Do one thing and do it remarkably well.

    Diversification is good, but you also need to know how to execute. So far, execution from Google when it comes to diversification + integration is fair, but IMO is far from brilliant.

57. Graydon
    

    June 30th, 2006 at 12:47 am

    RBA - You are right… outside of search/AdWords/AdSense Google’s offerings are “interesting” but not “oh my god I gotta do that”…

    They seem to leave too much to the “users” to figure out how to tie the stuff together.

    Apparently I have too much time on my hands since I put together some thoughts on how Google Base, Google Checkout and RapLeaf could be used together as an eBay alternative…
    http://marlincreek.com/content/view/84/35/

    I’m not a heavy eBay user… so their are probably gaps in the offerings that I’m too lazy to figure out.

    Despite Google’s growth, I think that they still invoke that underdog mentality in people that want them to do something great… and until they flat out throw the gauntlet down at somebody… they are gonna keep looking like they are dabbling with no clear plan.

58. Blaze
    

    June 30th, 2006 at 1:23 am

    Keep in mind you can only sign up as a seller if youre from the USA and have a social security number (or something like that).

59. 100
    

    June 30th, 2006 at 2:44 am

    That’s great, I will use them, because where I live (Bulgaria) Paypal is not an option …

60. Derek Tut
    

    June 30th, 2006 at 6:31 am

    More anti-Google questions from Arrington. Nice to see his cadre of kool-aid drinkers obediently lining up behind him. So much for objectivity.

61. P-Air
    

    June 30th, 2006 at 8:59 am

    The people who have the most to worry about are the affiliate management systems (ie. Linkshare, Commission Junction, BeFree et al). With Google’s ability to track the transaction w/no invasive technology on the merchant’s side they can now also begin reporting what AdSense affiliate sites generated in sales for the advertiser/merchant. This to me seems like a nice shot across the bow of those players given that those companies do not have a lock in on their merchants and Google is effectively offering a consolidated place to now view advertising data and sales data.

62. Aibek Esengulov
    

    July 1st, 2006 at 3:07 am

    UNFORTUNATELY Google doesn’t seem to fail with this one

    Here is why I think so

    Very big portion of Paypal ACTIVE(profitable for paypal) users from one of the following groups;

    1. Ebay Sellers
    2. Affiliate Marketers(I do not need to tell you how popularare they, just any second tier PPC to find out)
    3. Small to medum size website owners, who making their living of adsense.

    When we look at above, the only group ebay can really keep in my opinion is ebay sellers and this is only if they offer fees as good as google does. And for as for the rest 2 groups it seems that switch will occur.
    For all, small and mid size adsense publishers ability to instantly at the moment of approve get payments from Google will outweight any brand and loyalty paypal has established. For an illustration of this visit webmasterworld.com at the end of the month around 24′th when the google is at the stage of approving payments and you will see all the buzz.
    And the reason why it is so, it because publishers are scared of Google because of their harsh policy on banning some publishers without paying earned amount (which may be of course necessary) but unfortunatelly has resulted in Adsense Phobia…It is all there in webmasterworld

    And as aboutaffiliate marketers who usually sell their merchandise through paypal and drive traffic through adwords cutting expenses in both of advertising and payment processing would be nothing but far better deal.

    Welcome for comments

    Aibek

    I think you mucked up how much credit you get for using AdWords, for every $1 you spend in AdWords, you get $10 worth of sales that you dont pay transaction fees for. So if you spend $50 in AdWords, then make a $500 sale, you would be saving $2 + 2% = $12 in transaction fees.

63. Aibek Esengulov
    

    July 1st, 2006 at 3:09 am

    as for the last paragraph it wasnt supposed to be there…smiles…

64. Chris
    

    July 1st, 2006 at 9:54 pm

    I do not like ebay and paypal since they should charge less for their customers. My paypal account was limited for 6 months (I can not use my money, I can not get money through paypal. It is ridiculous since they did not give me any specific reason for me.) Now, they told me my account was normal on June 28 because of google.

65. John Medcalf
    

    July 3rd, 2006 at 3:22 pm

    PayPal is every bit the dismissive monopolist if you’re at the buyer end of the food chain. They’ve ignored my phishing concerns whether emailed or phoned in. I closed the bank account behind my PayPal account. They had me send them a check. They cashed it. Then they sent that account to a collection agency. The collection agency understood my cancelled check and went away. They wouldn’t let me correct the suite number on my shipping address for four months because I still had an item in dispute with eBay. When I visit a seller or charity or political candidate who only has PayPal I take the time to email them the above information.

66. Dale
    

    July 4th, 2006 at 5:02 am

    Another great idea from Google,sounds much better the PayPal,the folks that are complaining are jealous they did not come up with the idea.

67. Rob
    

    July 20th, 2006 at 10:16 pm

    Google Checkout integration is a no brainer if you’re already an active AdWords advertiser.

    1) The free transaction processing is basically free money.

    2) The shopping cart icon that appears next to your ad helps to make it stand out against your competitors’ ads. This is a huge benefit to most small merchants, who generally have a hard time establishing trust with potential shoppers. This icon should increase their click through rates and “browser to buyer” conversion rate.

    Just my $.02.

68. Erdbeere
    

    July 24th, 2006 at 8:27 pm

    I checked out “Google-checkout”.
    The overall process seems to be very easy but exactly that makes this solution very vulnerable. During checkout there was no security question to make sure that I’m indeed the owner of the Google account or the associated Credit Cards in that account. Of course I used my username and password but because there are so many Google sites, using the same username and password, it is very easy to loose your login information on a hijacking page as you might not check the url for Ad-Words or Gmail every time you log on as those services never had the possibility to shop with your Credit Card.
    Now because you have one account and login information for all it is quite possible that hackers will try to get your login information from any Google service out there! Even worth is the fact that the hacker can change the password without any problem. The owner of the account might not even get any information about the password change as the e-mail is sent to the according and hijacked Gmail account.
    Because of this HUGE security risk I would not recommend using Google checkout!
    Please checkout the http://www.thebilliondollarpatent.com as s-registration solution that Google should have implemented in their service to make it solid and secure. This solution is requiring a third credential called TAN to make sure that ONLY the owner of that account is able to shop online even in case the account is hijacked.
    I hope that everybody is aware of the security issue with Google checkout and will inform Google of a better solution!
    Thanks and be safe;-)))!!

69. Waheed Akhtar
    

    August 3rd, 2006 at 11:11 am

    Hi All,
    Well Paypal has done excellent job, But we have to think as a point of user. Healthy competetion always give users better choices. I have seen that websites started putting Google Checkout buttons with Paypal.
    Similarly in our Ecommerce solution GoldbarOne http://www.goldbar.net/ua/link.....waheed_gb1 People demanded to integrate. It is slightly complex in way of integration but very good to use. For all of you please have test drive of Google check out at http://code.google.com/apis/ch.....n_overview
    Get an example credit card and signup to http://sandbox.google.com.
    there you will get inside look of Google checkout.
    and If you are looking for complete solution to integrate then let us do this at http://www.goldbar.net/ua/link.....waheed_gb1

    Vidi.
    itsvidi@gmail.com

70. Lee
    

    August 30th, 2006 at 9:42 pm

    Hi! Good work. By the way, look my site too
    http://wholesale-designer-sun-glasses.34www.com

    Best regards. GOOD LUCK.

71. dimon
    

    November 11th, 2006 at 4:58 am

    More anti-Google questions from Arrington. Nice to see his cadre of kool-aid drinkers obediently lining up behind him. So much for objectivity.