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To better understand how FastSpring stands out in the market among other merchants of record (MoR), a survey was commissioned through industry-leading strategy consulting and M&A advisory firm Flagship Advisory Partners. The study surveyed users of popular MoRs and payment service providers (PSPs) across a variety of topics — and FastSpring stood out in a few ways.
About the Survey
This survey was conducted by Flagship Advisory Partners to independently evaluate FastSpring’s reputation in the merchant of record space compared to other providers. The survey included 99 companies with direct experiences with merchants of record and payment service providers, who answered 31 survey questions about their experiences and preferences with payment providers.
Net promoter score (NPS) results are generated by asking respondents how likely they are to recommend a company and then subtracting the percentage of “detractors” from the percentage of “promoters.” Detractors are anyone who gave a score of 0-6, passives are anyone who gave a score of 7-8 (which are not used in the calculation of NPS), and promoters are anyone who gave a score of 9-10. This number represents the net number of promoters the company has among survey respondents.
While what a “good” net promoter score is can vary across industries and across B2C vs. B2B markets, it’s suggested that in general, a score above 50 is excellent.
FastSpring Has the Highest NPS Among Top MoRs
Among the top merchants of record in the industry, FastSpring received the highest net promoter score at 65. The average score across these MoRs was 50, with FastSpring’s score 30% higher than the average. After FastSpring, the next highest score was 59, and the lowest score was 23.
This excludes smaller merchants of record for which the results were statistically insignificant with too few responses (n≤6), as well as a major PSP that was included in the survey.
There Are 2 Main Reasons Digital Product Companies Choose the MoR Model
There were two clearly top reasons why participating companies use the merchant of record model to monetize their businesses: to manage the complexities of global tax and VAT compliance, and to reduce internal operational complexity (such as tax, billing, fraud, chargebacks, and reporting).
Respondents were asked to rank the top three reasons their company adopted a merchant of record, among 14 critical considerations.
Managing the complexity of global tax compliance was chosen by 43% of participants, and reducing internal operational complexity was a close second at 41%.
Additional popular answers include keeping internal resources focused on core product development, accelerating time to market and international expansion, improving authorization rates and international expansion, and avoiding the cost and complexity of establishing local entities.
The Majority of MoR Users Are Using an MoR for the Majority of Their Payments
Participants were asked what percentage of their total payment volume is processed through MoR vendors, and they were given a choice between seven ranges, from “Less than 10%” to “100% (all volume is processed via MoR).”
Out of the respondents using MoR vendors, 75% had more than half their total payment volume running through an MoR, with 8% having more than 90% of their volume running through MoR.
More Than Half of Survey Respondents Plan to Increase MoR Usage
When asked how they expect their usage of MoR services to change over the next year, more than half of survey respondents plan to increase MoR usage, with 54% answering “Increase usage.”
When asked the same question for the next five years, the result was slightly higher with 56% stating that they plan to increase their MoR usage.
Both of these statistics include all answers across all MoRs, including multi-MoR users.
100% of FastSpring Users Surveyed Agree FastSpring Provides Good Value for Money
We also asked all respondents to evaluate the statement “The Merchant of Record solution we use from the following vendors, provides good value for money” for each of the included payment vendor options. Participants could respond on a five point scale, from Strongly disagree, Somewhat disagree, Neutral, Somewhat agree, or Strongly agree.
Responses included multiple answers from multi-vendor users, allowing respondents to answer for any applicable vendors.
We were very pleased to see that FastSpring received all positive responses, and that we were the only vendor among top MoRs to have this distinction.
Partner With FastSpring, the Merchant of Record Whose Users Are More Likely to Recommend Them
We at FastSpring see these survey results as a reflection of all the hard work we put in to make our platform and our service top notch, and we’re proud to be able to back with numbers what we already knew: FastSpring is the merchant of record that users are most likely to recommend among other similar MoRs in this space.
Our company values are simple: Make a Difference, Seek to Understand, Act With Urgency. Our team members are proud to represent FastSpring with these qualities internally and externally, and it shows through the partnership our customers know they can count on to help them sell their digital products globally.
It’s why we do what we do, and it’s why so many companies trust us with their cross-border monetization strategy — so they can stay focused on building great products.
Are you looking for a merchant of record that will partner with you to grow your business internationally? FastSpring provides an all-in-one payment platform for SaaS, software, video games, AI, eLearning, and other digital goods businesses, including VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, and consumer support.
Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.
