B2C Saas - Chinese users and payments, Alipay?
Has anyone attempted to implement payment methods more friendly to Chinese customers such as Alipay, Wechat ? Has it resulted in increased business ? I'd be interested in hearing experiences. It seems not all Chinese customers are equipped to pay with visa/mastercard or even paypal.
I am not sure about increased business for other companies but I can tell you what a previous colleague told me when I asked him if he had WeChat.
He said something along these lines "Of course, every Chinese person has WeChat"
Keep in mind we were in Paris at that time and he had been living there for years.
Also in Hong Kong, ever since the gov was handing out digital spending vouchers to recirculate cash in the economy, AliPay was one of the channels citizens could use to receive those vouchers. Many (local) businesses in HK started accepting AliPay to settle payments.
WeChat and Alipay are ubiquitous when paying brick and mortar businesses, it's pretty obvious, I was looking for some feedback regarding those payment methods for paying for SaaS
Well since their card is linked to AliPay, and you're B2C, should be simpler for them to purchase since they're habituated to paying with those apps already!
Alipay and WeChat Pay are the standards for Chinese apps—you can pretty much use them for everything. If that’s your target market, you should prioritize it. My Chinese friends living in the states have different methods of payment, but all of their friends and relatives back home make purchases and send red packets though those apps. Ordering from China is always in Alipay too. Anyway, that’s my experience from the consumer side.
Do you know whether subscriptions (recurring payments) are supported ?
I’m unsure. I do know Alipay is a supported payment method for Stripe and that Stripe supports subscriptions.