In my last piece I talked about the ease and simplicity of using PayPal to collect payments on your website.  In this piece I’m going to talk about a newcomer to the payment processing game… Stripe.

Stripe (Stripe.com) began in 2010 and was funded by some of the original founders of PayPal.  Stripe set out to become the next PayPal, and while PayPal still holds the market share, Stripe is quickly gaining ground.

Even though they are built a bit more for the developer in mind, they do make integrating a payment button in your website.  Customers can make payments quickly and easily, without having to have a Stripe account, using a credit card.

You can setup a Stripe account in minutes and you’ll immediately be in “Test mode” where you can create your buttons, develop your software and integrate however you like.  They have great tutorials, and if you’re using WordPress there are countless plugins available to work with Stripe.   Once you’re ready to go live, a few simple steps to verify your account and your bank account and you’re off and running collecting payments.

Their fee structure is remarkably identical to PayPal, simply 2.9% of each transaction and .30 cents per transaction.   They don’t offer any kind of Pro plan with a monthly subscription, however they do ask you to contact sales for Enterprise (aka high-volume) solutions.

They offer some more cutting edge bells as whistles, such as integration with Apple Pay, Alipay and also supporting Bitcoin payments.  They work with over 100 global currencies so you can instantly charge your customers in their local currency.

If you’re looking for a slightly more technical solution to accepting payments via PayPal, check out Stripe!