We’ve been reviewing payment gateways which help merchants integrate their shopping cart with they merchant account. The payment gateways acts as a middle man between your software and the merchant account which then integrates with the Credit Card Interchange.

Finding the best payment gateway can be very time consuming. We’ve reviewed a few on our site such as Authorize.net which is by far the leading provider. They have been in business a long time and offer some of the best tools such as e-check and ACH support as well as a virtual terminal to process payments by phone.

To integrate your shopping cart with your merchant account – you will need a payment gateway – some merchant accounts even come with a gateway – free setup. Gateways almost always have a monthly fee and they usually charge a per transaction fee which helps cover the cost of the address verification and other tools. If you’re looking to accept credit cards online – you will need a SSL certificate as well. Make sure you get at least 128-bit encryption for good security – for max security you can even go higher, but you will pay for the extra. These range anywhere from $14.95 to the hundreds per year.

Good luck with your ecommerce website. Keep coming back for more quick tips on selling products and services on the internet.