BuySAFE launches beta of e-commerce rating tool
Worried about identity theft and fraudulent e-commerce sites?
BuySAFE may have something for you. The company launched a free desktop application on Tuesday called buySAFE Shopping Advisor that offers ratings on U.S.-based e-commerce sites.
The sites are rated based on whether they are using valid SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) encryption for data transmission, whether the sites are regularly inspected for security vulnerabilities, have a published privacy policy, and whether the merchant is bonded.
The integrated browser tool also offers a portal to 3,000 shopping sites where purchases are guaranteed with a bond of up to $25,000 and are protected with identity theft insurance for 30 days.
Arlington, Va.-based buySAFE partners with underwriters Liberty Mutual, Travelers, and ACE on these services.
Looks to me like a tactic to scare merchants into giving up 1% of their sales revenue in exchange for a warm-fuzzy.
Either way, cool tool for users.
Our goal with Shopping Advisor is to create a true win-win-win for shoppers, merchants and buySAFE. Shopping Advisor is designed to make internet shopping safer and more secure for consumers in two ways - 1) by arming them with the information they need to make smart and safe shopping decisions (Shopping Advisor assigns a Safe Shopping Rating to 300,000+ eCommerce websites in the U.S. based on an objective assessment of their use of the normal best practices that ensure a safe and secure shopping and experience) and 2) by providing access to an alternative risk-free shopping channel where every purchase via the Safe Shopping Portal is automatically guaranteed with a bond up to $25,000 per purchase and the buyer receives 30 days of free ID Theft protection (covers ID theft issues regardless of cause). All of this is FREE for the shoppers who use Shopping Advisor. Period.
For merchants, our normal bonding service is a free service (they pay 1% only on some marketplaces like eBay where we are not able to offer our Buyers Choice pricing model) that builds trust with shoppers, helping convert more visitors to buyers. We've tested buySAFE on literally hundreds of merchant sites and across millions of transactions and have found we have a materially positive impact on website conversion - 6.8% on average as you pointed out. Our free bonding solution, however, gives buyers an option - if they so choose - to purchase a Bond Guarantee at checkout, typically for about 3% of the purchase price to fully guarantee all the terms of sale + ID theft protection. Our testing shows that just giving the shopper the option to buy the bond makes them more likely to buy (whether they choose to buy the bond or not).
With Shopping Advisor, our goal is to no longer ask the buyer to pay the 3% fee but rather include the Bond for free. Instead, merchants agree to pay buySAFE a referral fee, but ONLY if a shopper actually makes a purchase. Our merchants tell us they really like this concept because we send them buyers that are trust motivated (vs. just cheapest price) and they pay us a % of the sale price, but only if we actually generate a sale. This cost-per-sale pricing model makes it essentially a risk-free advertising solution for the merchant.
buySAFE wins because we're succeeding on fullfilling our vision of making internet shopping safer for buyers and more profitable for merchants and hopefully building successful business in the process so that we can rollout additional tools like this to make internet shopping safe.
I'd highly encourage you to download Shopping Advisor and give it a try by going to www.buysafe.com It's our first day of the public beta launch so I'm sure there are lots of areas for improvement. Please send us all the suggestions you have and we'll work hard to incorporate as many as we can. Many thanks. Jeff