The customer experience platform Birdeye has launched a new payments solution aimed at helping small businesses get their money faster.

Yesterday Birdeye announced its new payments platform. This week’s launch is the full rollout following the beta version of payments released last October.

“Payments is no longer fintech,” Birdeye CEO and co-founder Naveen Gupta, said during the beta launch last year. “It is part of the customer journey.”

The message about the customer journey is key. Customer experience is all about engaging with customers in the mode of their choosing. A Birdeye customer makes this point in this week’s announcement.

“Over the past two years, our customers have come to expect the convenience of contactless digital payments,” said Roger Williamson, founder of Williamson Foundation Repair. “Birdeye Payments makes the payments process effortless and allows us to handle all customer touchpoints digitally, improving their experience and exceeding their expectations.”  

Birdeye is now including the payments feature free of charge as part of its reputation and customer experience platform.

The new Birdeye Payments platform includes the following features. 

• Digital payment options including text–to-pay, web pay, and card readers.
• The ability to collect either one-time or recurring payments through credit cards, debit cards, ACH, and mobile wallets like Apple Pay and Google Pay, for example.
• Integrations with accounting systems like Quickbooks and Freshbooks. It also includes industry-specific applications to reconcile accounts and trigger text-based payment links.
• The ability to view transactions, process refunds, and download account activity. 

The Getting Paid Imperative

So text to pay is the feature Birdeye seems most eager to promote with the new platform. Our sense is this is an increasingly popular feature for small businesses because it dramatically accelerates payments. Birdeye contends that 60% of consumers pay text-to-pay invoices within three minutes.

“Email and paper invoices require hours of back office support to manage and take an average of 29 days to collect,” said Anil Panguluri, Senior Vice President of Product at Birdeye. “With Birdeye Payments, text invoices take seconds to send and typically get paid within minutes, bolstering cash flow and saving significant time for our customers.” 

One challenge with text-to-pay is overcoming consumer fraud concerns. Birdeye addresses this by including customer branding in the text messages requesting payment. The messages also originate from the business’s official phone number.

While apparently easing, inflation is still a major headwind for small businesses. If Birdeye can help SMBs get their money sooner, it’s a definite win for its small business customers. And it’s also a win for Birdeye as it battles rival platforms for dominance in the highly competitive customer experience space.